Quote Originally Posted by ToomuchStuff View Post
Bitcoin's traceability is questionable at best (anything electronic can be manipulated).
"Traceability is questionable". ???

Mt Gox ring a bell? (still haven't recovered peoples money and the place is out of business, so hard to go after)
How is that different than cash? And other currencies?
Have credit card companies fixed fraud and identity theft in that antiquated system?

Likening Mt Gox to Bitcoin is like likening a bank with shoddy security to the dollar and shows a profound misunderstanding of what Bitcoin is.

Also anything webbased is subject to needing access (which can be hacked or traffic shut down as Korea was recently).
Websites can be hacked, and will be hacked, the de-centralized network that Bitcoin uses has had many hacking attempts, to which none has prevailed and it has only served to make the network more resilient against attack.

One tiny communist country 'shutting down traffic' TEMPORARILY is a mere hiccup as it will be in the future. These shut downs can be easily worked around and you would know that if you watched the video.

That isn't to say there isn't other tech out there, to mirror bits (think of Echelon and such), physical seizure, lack of regulation etc. The goverment seized all the Silk Road bitcoins and can seize any property let alone they haven't decided on how they want to deal with it from a tax perspective.
If you don't have the keys, you don't get the Bitcoin. If people haven't been careful with the keys, which is to be expected with a new technology, they will learn digital security the hard way.

Governmental entities are not able to seize Bitcoin which is properly made secure. They can seize bodies which can be manipulated to give up keys, but governments that do this regularly, as a matter of policy, will expose their own tyranny, usage will become more stealth/underground and the larger Bitcoin commerce will move elsewhere in the world to develop and thrive.

And it has the same problem as ANYTHING that one wants to use as currency, both parties need to accept and believe in it.
That is not a problem to the millions exchanging it now all over the world.

Your statement demonstrates what I've been saying: anything has value and utility as a currency when there is agreement to use and hold it as such. That "problem" is quietly solving itself everyday as startups are launched, adoption spreads and usage grows.

California just passed a law making Bitcoin legal tender...BTW.