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Well said, though, I think there is reason to be concerned about the continued centralization of bitcoin payment processors. In a world where bitpay and coinbas

Well said, though, I think there is reason to be concerned about the continued centralization of bitcoin payment processors. In a world where bitpay and coinbase are processing the vast majority of bitcoin payments, it's easy to imagine how a coordinated denial of service attack could temporarily cripple the bitcoin economy from the consumer's perspective.

Mahn 12y ago
Sure, but then again, it's hard to picture the "consumerization" of bitcoin happening without services like BitPay or Coinbase in the first place. Plus, if there's a future where bitcoin actually has a respectable market share in consumer payments, surely there would be more competing companies in the space trying to get a slice of the pie.
ThomPete 12y ago
The big difference is that you don't need to be certified and so it doesn't exclude anyone from getting into this game. Compare that with banking which is basically impossible to even get started with properly. The interesting thing here is that it's build on an open protocol rather than on legislation and so this I believe will at least give the opportunity to create all sorts of interesting solutions that are currently impossible to do within the current banking system because technology moves faster than legislation. So even if we are talking centralization or clustering as I like to call it, we are not talking exclusion.
- vectorpush 12y ago
  Sure, the barrier to entry is lower, but that may not always be the case, especially once the big players start to push towards regulating competition out of the market. Even existing regulations are already a show-stopper for any company without the considerable capital necessary to tackle the morass of money transmission laws and licencing concerns that vary from state to state. There is also a big first mover advantage in payment processing because there isn't very much room to innovate beyond lower fees (hard to beat bitpay's 0%) and a reputable brand. I think there is a real risk that we'll see bitcoin processing completely swallowed up by these big players.
  - ThomPete 12y ago
    How can they push toward regulation? Honest question? I could set up wherever i want i the world right?
    - vectorpush 12y ago
      Yes, you can setup wherever you want, but if you want to process payments for U.S. businesses then you need to act in accordance with U.S. money transmission laws, otherwise, nobody will do business with you. Currently, bitcoin payment processors do not fall under the purview of MSB or MTB classification, but that could easily change, especially because cryptocurrencies are still a relatively new concept.
      - ThomPete 12y ago
        But then it's the US businesses that will not be in compliance right? Not me?
        sushid 12y ago
        Right, but if US (et al.) merchants are not using your service because using your service means they're not in compliance, you won't be much of a competitor in that field.
        ThomPete 12y ago
        Which if the rest of the world is, is going to decrease the risk of any legislation happening to begin with no?
        moe 12y ago
        You are a bit late... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legality_of_Bitcoin_by_country http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legality_of_Bitcoin_by_country
oco101 12y ago
Well that is only one problem, the other is that 58% of the hasrate is controlled by only 5 pools .

Mahn 12y ago

Sure, but then again, it's hard to picture the "consumerization" of bitcoin happening without services like BitPay or Coinbase in the first place. Plus, if there's a future where bitcoin actually has a respectable market share in consumer payments, surely there would be more competing companies in the space trying to get a slice of the pie.

ThomPete 12y ago

The big difference is that you don't need to be certified and so it doesn't exclude anyone from getting into this game. Compare that with banking which is basically impossible to even get started with properly. The interesting thing here is that it's build on an open protocol rather than on legislation and so this I believe will at least give the opportunity to create all sorts of interesting solutions that are currently impossible to do within the current banking system because technology moves faster than legislation. So even if we are talking centralization or clustering as I like to call it, we are not talking exclusion.

vectorpush 12y ago
Sure, the barrier to entry is lower, but that may not always be the case, especially once the big players start to push towards regulating competition out of the market. Even existing regulations are already a show-stopper for any company without the considerable capital necessary to tackle the morass of money transmission laws and licencing concerns that vary from state to state. There is also a big first mover advantage in payment processing because there isn't very much room to innovate beyond lower fees (hard to beat bitpay's 0%) and a reputable brand. I think there is a real risk that we'll see bitcoin processing completely swallowed up by these big players.
- ThomPete 12y ago
  How can they push toward regulation? Honest question? I could set up wherever i want i the world right?
  - vectorpush 12y ago
    Yes, you can setup wherever you want, but if you want to process payments for U.S. businesses then you need to act in accordance with U.S. money transmission laws, otherwise, nobody will do business with you. Currently, bitcoin payment processors do not fall under the purview of MSB or MTB classification, but that could easily change, especially because cryptocurrencies are still a relatively new concept.
    - ThomPete 12y ago
      But then it's the US businesses that will not be in compliance right? Not me?
      - sushid 12y ago
        Right, but if US (et al.) merchants are not using your service because using your service means they're not in compliance, you won't be much of a competitor in that field.
        ThomPete 12y ago
        Which if the rest of the world is, is going to decrease the risk of any legislation happening to begin with no?
        moe 12y ago
        You are a bit late... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legality_of_Bitcoin_by_country http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legality_of_Bitcoin_by_country

oco101 12y ago

Well that is only one problem, the other is that 58% of the hasrate is controlled by only 5 pools .