Prediction: Bitcoin doomed

[drdoug]

This story ("Bitcoin’s real-world problem: Virtual currency facing bank backlash in Canada" prompts me to post quickly to log a prediction I've had in my head for ages: I think Bitcoin, the virtual currency, is very likely to become effectively worthless at some point in the not too distant future (say within ten years) or if not, to remain a very

Comments

[babysimon]

I'm with you re medium to long term failure, although I think there are other (IMHO more likely) ways for BitCoin to fail than Massive Governmental Bannination.

I haven't time for the long blog post explaining my thoughts, but since we're nailing predictions to the mast...

[babysimon]

Also:

conspiracy theory

I'd be interested to know what you think a saner distributed currency would look like (even in the most handwavy of ways, obviously I get that this is a difficult thing to talk about without examples in front of us).

For me most of BTC's doomedness is tied up with its distributedness.

[steer]

Surely a centralised anonymous currency would quite definitely be doomed?

[babysimon]

I'm not sure how that answers my question :-)

But we might be talking at cross purposes. I would view cash as both centralised and anonymous. And it seems to be working OK.

[steer]

Hmm... I don't think banks will be too much of a problem for anything other than bitcoin trading centres. There are too many other ways for me to effectively get bitcoins which have nothing to do with banks so a bank based shut down of individual users is a futile gesture. (Also, individual banks shutting down access puts a strong incentive for other banks to allow access... but I don't need to go near a bank to make the transfer to bitcoin anyway

[lovingboth]

PayPal is dodgy and does zip off (or freeze access to) people's money! (Try taking payments for a big conference or for - legal in the UK - sex work with it.)

Unfortunately, like eBay, it currently has a dominant position in the market in many places, including the UK.

[steer]

I know what you mean... but to my mind it's that puts them into the anti-dodgy... the kind of polar opposite of dodgy (or at least the kind of dodgy I was meaning). It's exactly the same kind of decision you can imagine large banks making (and, indeed, Doug's article begins with a bank making that decision for a business