Mt.Gox Meltdown

You bet. This is 2014 we're talking about, so who the hell uses USD anymore?

Oh right, everybody.
You could say that and be correct 2 years ago.

There are tons of examples today of countries buying oil and other large purchases from each other without using USD. Especially BRICS nations, but south & central america are getting in on the action too.

Snowden really created a Tipping point, I believe. You wouldn't ever hear of European parliments considering a ban US technology imports or anything similar before this year; now they all consider it and have bills in the pipeline to protect their sovereignty against the NSA.

Tides have changed bigtime. Reminds me again of this old chart:

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Even before snowden, our inflation & debt levels both were getting too unpalitable for other nations, but they didn't want to speak out against the empire... Snowden got them speaking out against the empire on a daily basis... What's to stop the dollar's collapse now?

Every second you can spend watching this page and believe that "But they're the USA and they can handle this" is a second you are believing in their big ponzi-ass illusion. These are signs of death, not business as usual.


So? The NSA isn't capable of launching an open source project, or something?
My point wasn't that it's impossible for the NSA to be behind bitcoin; it was that they have absolutely shot themselves in the foot if they did so. No one has more to lose that US government agencies from bitcoin's existence, except the banks.

And you should be able to SEE that if you understand the code. Thousands of people do. Maybe tens of thousands, all around the globe.



To be honest, it makes more sense for this to be a NSA funded project, versus being from Satoshi Nakamoto, some guy sitting in a studio apartment in Japan somewhere, who has mysteriously disappeared off the face of the earth, and can no longer be contacted.
That's cute.

If you had been following the cypherpunks you'd know that both scenarios you just outlined are silly. Didn't I go over the origins of bitcoin in my birthday thread last halloween? You can catch-up here: http://nakamotoinstitute.org



Again there's the first step asking for trouble though... people getting paid in bitcoins... how to control whose account got funded? how to control money laundering? how to control if taxes got paid properly?
Thousands and thousands of people get paid in bitcoin now, including myself. It's just an asset like stocks are as far as uncle sam is concerned, and nowadays we have dozens tax services that specialize in bitcoin tax compliance.

In fact, it's now possible to PAY TAXES in bitcoin thru a 3rd party service, and even Mint.com can make tracking all your bitcoin purchases and spends effortless like your antiquated bank account does.



For me, it's just a matter of time until government(s) take a call on Bitcoins. To think they can't would be ignorant. Everything that's 'possibly' able to crush the 'system' won't survive.
Which government? All governments are in a constant flux of bitcoin acceptance, and wherever the lax laws go, so does all the wealth and innovation.

But do feel free to tell us how a government could crush bitcoin. I'm all ears.
 


And now we have an rally after the Huobi boss commented on gox and said LTC will with a high chance added... Thats what i call timing, the charts just moved back down for an after crash dip.
This should now make some pump & dump moves.
 
Thousands and thousands of people get paid in bitcoin now, including myself. It's just an asset like stocks are as far as uncle sam is concerned, and nowadays we have dozens tax services that specialize in bitcoin tax compliance.

In fact, it's now possible to PAY TAXES in bitcoin thru a 3rd party service, and even Mint.com can make tracking all your bitcoin purchases and spends effortless like your antiquated bank account does.

In fact, you didn't answer my question nor referred your reply to it at all. I didn't ask if it's possible to pay (especially not in the US since your answer is limited to the US), but if it's possible to CONTROL it like it is with regular payments. With BTC wallets being anonymous, it's not. That's one of the biggest hurdles in my opinion for BTC to become mainstream unless the anonymous part of it will be decreased significantly. One huge issue is VAT which is practically uncontrollable with BTC payments, assuming the receiver isn't willing to report his BTCs.


Which government? All governments are in a constant flux of bitcoin acceptance, and wherever the lax laws go, so does all the wealth and innovation.

But do feel free to tell us how a government could crush bitcoin. I'm all ears.

Maybe not BTC itself as a currency / digital currency. By forbidding the use & acceptance of BTC a government can harm bitcoin though. If taking this route, legit businesses will not risk accepting BTCs which results in a decrease of usage for it.
 
Wonder how long it takes for some crazy kid hackers to decide to start their own exchange and dos'ing the other major exchanges out of the web. Plus, I wonder what's about to happen with the price if the let's say top5 exchanges get unaccessible for a couple of hours.
 
1st... I have no idea why lukep spends so much time defending bitcoin..
2nd.. I actually came here to find a Sudden_ass post, soooooooooo disappointed.
 
By now even the doomsayers on this thread must be starting to get a sneaking suspicion that bitcoin is actually pretty damn strong. How can this awesome lineup of attacks of the last week be seen as anything but a positive sign of bitcoin's invincibility??


Let us count the many ways bitcoin has been under attack during the last week, shall we?

Bitstamp Starting Price, Feb 4th: ~$800

1. Bitcoin Foundation VP Charlie Shrem arrested and jailed for Silk Road laundering...

2. On the morning of the NewYork Regulation talks, which went pretty horribly, and pissed off a bunch of vocal bitcoiners at the state of new york.

3. DPR formally Indicted on drugs & money laundering.


Feb 5th:

4. Kazakhstan warns it's ppl against bitcoin.


Feb 6th:

5. Apple removes the final bitcoin wallet from the app store!


Feb 7th:

6. MtGox halts all withdrawals, panic sets in among its customers.

7. The State of Florida runs a sting operation on LocalBitcoins sellers, arresting 2!

8. Government of CYPRUS, yes, the same Cyprus that vaulted bitcoin's price into the stratusphere last year, issues a warning against bitcoin!

9. A string of Coinbase wallet thefts causes a small panic and Coinbase has to assure everyone that the core safety problems are still 100%.

10. RUSSIA Bans bitcoin! The #2 exchange, BTC-E, removes Ruble support.


Feb 10th:

11. Mt.Gox Commits Seppuku by blaming the bitcoin Protocol for their recent errors!

12. New sting of Mac malware starts stealing apple users' coins.

13. ANOTHER new malware is spotted, this time a Ransomware, demands a ransome while it uses your PC to MINE BITCOIN!


Feb 11th:

14. JPMorgan publishes report saying that bitcoin is "Vastly inferior" to fiat currency.

15. THIS WHOLE TIME, a "Massive concerted attack on the bitcoin network" has been ongoing from some unknown source, mostly using DDoS attacks, aimed the Exchanges, Pools, and wallet providers, all at the same time. Today Bitstamp issued a temporary halt on all bitcoin withdrawals, and BTC-e announcing possible delays on transaction crediting because of this attack.

Bitstamp price at this moment: $674


IN JUST ONE WEEK! After all of these direct attacks against bitcoin by governments, hackers, internal bad actors, & after losing our most famous exchange completely, you have to ask yourself; "How did bitcoin only lose 16% during this time??? How is it still alive at all?"

The answer is simple. Bitcoin is stronger than you think it is.


Papers have been written to demonstrate that it is in fact Antifragile. (The more you throw at it, the strong it becomes.)

Either way, you'd be a fool to bet against it.

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