No, I blame *insert name of politician here* because it happened under their watch, therefore it's perfectly acceptable to blame them.



The Jedi Master

It should be pointed out that not all of Flexcoin's holdings were raided. As noted in the article the coins held in "cold storage" were not accessed by the thief. However, those coins that were in the "hot wallet" (I.e., those available for immediate trading) were vulnerable and taken.

If Bitcoins cannot be TRADED safely, then what is their utility as a store of value?

It seems to me that the writing is on the wall. Recent events have irreparably damaged Bitcoin,imo. If I had any, I'd be dumping them for traditional fiat immediately, regardless of what theoretical advantages they might have.

more turmoil from the slide of the bitcoin

Suspected suicide from Bitcoin CEO

Here's the point I am trying to make-

When I go to the store, my money is worth the same today as it was yesterday as it will likely be tomorrow, notwithstanding store markups, discounts, sales, and so forth.

Bitcoin does not work that way- its value can change from day to day, depending on what someone is willing to exchange for it. The price you see on any given day is the average what people are bidding on them, but it's not pegged to anything else. It is volatile and unpredictable- the fact the someone hacks or steals them is just one symptom that contributes to that. If someone robbed a Bank of America branch, in terms of cash supply, it will be negligible.

The only time you see the U.S. dollar experience more severe changes in value is in foreign exchanges, but in the US in its own system, it's extremely stable and reliable. Anyone will accept it for payment. If someone pays me one dollar, I don't have to sell the dollar on the market in order to covert it to another currency and then take whatever I can get for it. The dollar is already good to go.

You've seen Bitcoin skyrocket and then come down hard in value and then kind of flutter around. The dollar does not do that. That simply is the way it is.

How do you physically hold or exchange your bitcoins? Don't you have to interface electronically to store, manage or spend them?

I believe that is the point of theft is when they are being stored/exchanged/traded, there is active hacking and malware that focuses on stealing it and potentially some vulnerabilities in the systems that are used to store/exchange them that has made it possible for a lot of these high visibility thefts.

Also based on the volatility of the price, holding any significant sum of Bitcoin seems to be a high risk investment, so it would seem from the outside all the activities around Bitcoin involve a high risk, the main benefits being to those that profit from it's lack of traceability...or those that mine them... for the general public looking to use it as a currency not much benefit.

i understand what you're saying kontakt5 but i just don't agree with it. there is a definite need for this kind of currency, and people who want to use it will put up with the fluctuating value by adjusting the prices of goods that they sell. it just isn't a big deal unless you're a currency speculator.

bitcoin is not an investment unless you're using at as speculator, and if you're using bitcoin to speculate then whatever money you lose is your own fault - speculating on bitcoin is like hyper-leveraged FX trading on conventional currencies. incredibly foolish and risky.

i say, if you need strict regulation and stability, use a different currency. bitcoin will sort itself out as it matures. it's still in its infancy. in the meantime, follow strict security procedures (the same as you would for sending secure emails, for example) and your money stays safe and confidential.

Well, if we are going to use Bitcoin as a currency, it will have to be the end of amateur hour- it will likely need to fall under some kind of regulation or monetary policy, but that defeats some of the purpose of what people want it for.

I like it as a black market currency for that reason, and I am not arguing it can't be a kind of investment (although I don't know for how long, I make no predictions there), but as a currency, it has a huge uphill battle.

Interesting related deeper analysis of what likely did or did not happen at Mt.Gox and Bitcoin situation as a whole:

http://hackingdistributed.com/2014/03/01/what-did-not-happen-at-mtgox/

Nice quote:

"What Nigerian scams are to your grandfather, Bitcoin exchanges are to the 20-30 semi-tech-savvy libertarian demographic. Even if the Bitcoin protocol were perfect, and it isn't, our computing infrastructure is not up to the task of handling high-value transactions. The exchanges are built on the latest hyped technologies that have incredibly poor guarantees, and routinely run into technical problems. They require full trust for their operation and are open to attacks from insiders and out. In a world where secret agents are hopping across machines and networks, keeping coins safe in a computer is a losing battle. Even if you keep everything in cold storage, laptops and phones can be infected with malware that steals coins when they come out of cold storage."

Yup. I think Bitcoin will be done very soon.

Some of the technical/software explanations are over my head, but this also provides a good summary of the 'gold as currency before we collapse' forces driving some of this:



A lot of the discussion as to why it's necessary to move to a new currency is not based on a need that's been demonstrated, but just a manufactured disdain. It gets repeated without a lot of critical thought.

It's not there aren't some people with best intentions in this, I'm sure there are, but that doesn't mean that they haven't been caught up in a lot of hype.

I've looked at several BC exchanges this morning, and the trading prices are just all over the place. The spot price is nothing more than an average of this chaos- and this is supposed to be some sort of answer to a currency that has shown to be very reliable and desireable.

People have spread this 'fiat currency is an illusion' philosophy, and people have picked up on it for trendy reasons- no doubt of course a lot of real world current events have fueled this, with the bailouts, the Great Recession, local and national governments having problems meeting their debt obligations, conflict abroad, domestic and international terrorism, government spying, computer hackers, Congressional gridlock and fighting with the White House, and yet through all of this- the U.S. dollar is still very stable and reliable and still works. Yet these people who claim all of this would prefer to back volatile, unknown currency that isn't widely circulated, created by people who know nothing about monetary policy but are more technically minded. It's bandwagon mindset fueled by fear.