BitCoin 101: Lessons learned and why I'm still in and why it's still a bad idea

Discussion in 'Bitcoin Primer' started by VisuTrac, Aug 21, 2018.


  1. VisuTrac

    VisuTrac Ваша мать носит военные ботинки Site Supporter+++

    I'm going to use terminology in this posting that you may not understand but feel free to add a reply to the thread and I'll answer as best I can.

    In the past year and a half we've seen BitCoin go from 1k to over 20k and back down to 6kish.
    Talk about a wild ride. Fortunes have been made (not by me), fortunes have been lost (and entire life savings in some cases), people have gone to jail. There is fraud and ponzi schemes in the Initial Coin Offering (ICO's) everywhere.

    There has even been an uptick about BTC on our own forum as well.
    Most of us here on the forum are going to fall into one or maybe two of a few camps:

    Camp Are you F#!kn NutZ it's a government plan to steal your money.
    Camp You do remember Tulips right (AKA a fool and his money)
    Camp Whatcha Talking about Willis
    Camp Lotto
    Camp MLM please join make my hodlings worth more
    Camp FOMO
    Camp Moonshot
    Camp Anarchist
    Camp Seriously? Not joining this nonsense.

    and I hope to god that none of you are in
    Camp I should eat a bullet. (My grandkids will still be paying my debts)

    Full disclosure I'm in Camp Anarchist and in Camp Lotto. Anarchist because I like things and knowledge government would rather not have access to and Lotto because if it does go up even if I have to pay crap tons of taxes .. I'll be happy to pay it.

    Lessons Learned:
    Ok, for lessons learned (some the hard way, some vicariously)
    • Never keep any crypto on any exchange longer than necessary and then get it off to your own cold wallet.
    • Exchange fees for trading and/or withdrawing funds can cost you money.
    • Trading and/or Withdraw rules (ex. transaction size must be full coins or large percentage of coins) can cost you even more money as you have fractions of coins stuck on exchanges that you can never get out.
    • don't lose your private key or whatever coins you had are gone 4evar.
    • using crypto to purchase goods/services can carry an additional charge depending on if the merchant uses a service to convert your crypto to fiat if they don't accept crypto directly .. ie 4.9 percent of the total transaction that you'll pay for the convenience.
    • network has a fee to ensure the timely inclusion of your transaction can vary widely especially when the network is congested.
    • Just like handing some one a big stack of cash, once you hand off the request to the network .. your coins are gone. No calling up AMEX and disputing the charge .. it's a one way street.
    • There are a shit ton of dishonest vendors out there willing to accept your crypto and not fulfill your order.
    • Crypto on an exchange is a huge target for thieves (including government ones) be prepared to lose your coins … often.
    • Mining BitCoin on your home computer is no longer viable, specialized equipment in this day and age is required.

    • The best way to acquire crypto is through face to face transactions with a local crypto enthusiast or user group. But as with anything, I'd not be making a huge single purchase.
    • Another way is to offer goods and services yourself and accept crypto as another form of payment.
    • Lots of sites offer the ability to pay with crypto to buy electronics, precious metals, web hosting, adult entertainment, homemade crafts, travel, regular consumer goods .. just about anything.

    I'm still in:
    So even though to this point I've had just a little less than 5.5 BTC stolen from exchanges, swindled in exchange trades or not receiving goods I paid for with crypto over the past 7 years or so. I'm really not too upset.
    What .. not upset? That would have been worth over 100K recently and your not upset? Not really, My original acquisitions were back in 2011 .. I didn't pay much. I spent a large number of my coins in the early days .. my invoice number at BitcoinStore dot com was under 60 .. seriously I was an early adopter and one could get bitcoin with paypal (ah those wild and crazy days). BitCoin went up to over 100 and then started to crash to under 25 .. I bought stuff and made more than my initial 'investment' back in goods during the crash. So the rest of my coins were just like a bonus. Some of those were used to purchase other crypto currencies but most of them boomed and then busted but I consider their becoming worthless a learning experience .. learned the hard way but oh well.

    I've still got some of my original coins left and basically not going to sell them until they can, either fund me starting a new business or build me a house on 10 acres or fund my retirement .. it'll depend on how old I'll be at the time it happens. If it never happens .. the kids will get them and either they will laugh at the folly or the good fortune.

    Believe it or not .. I'm still running an antiquated mining rig .. earning a few cents a day in crypto while costing me a couple of dimes. Yep negative returns .. but it's not breaking the bank so what the heck, there are more expensive vices out there.

    I also run a full node of the entire bitcoin blockchain ledger on my computer and doing my part at keeping the blockchain secure for which I gain no personal benefit other than supporting the network.

    and on top of that I also hodl other crypto currencies that may or may not be around in the next 5 years or maybe even the next 5 months, but I found their project to be interesting and spent some bitcoin dust to purchase their crypto (and if I cashed them in today i'll have also lost money on those as well)

    But over all why I stay in is .. I lose nothing at todays price. If the price drops by half tomorrow, the loss is only the potential profits I could have had but chose to forego.

    Why it's still a bad idea to get into crypto:
    Crypto space is full of bad actors wanting to separate you from your fiat. Right now I've got a crypto investor that want me to partner with him in his business. He's been bugging me for weeks to come on board. 10 - 20 percent monthly returns. bwahahaahaha. Not going to happen .. well not at least with my money.

    Mining hardware is super expensive and with ever rising difficulty, electricity costs and consumption, the ROI is negative unless you can get free power and the hardware is stolen.

    You may wind up being a criminal by sending someone in iran crypto for a Turkish hookah because you didn't know where the final recipient resided. and Violated our trade rules.

    Future legal precedence my declare all crypto illegal and now .. as a hodler of crypto .. you could go to jail .. or worse.

    it could go to zero in a blink of an eye. Unlike the stock market .. there is no circuit breaker after a 10 percent drop trading stops. It could beat the express elevator down as someone cut the cable.

    If you can not afford to lose everything invested into crypto in a matter of minutes .. you shouldn't play

    You know those camps I listed at the beginning of this thread? All of them are valid camps.
    The government could use the block chain to come after you .. get your coins .. and then just sell them for their own funding. It is a bit of a tulip mania depending on where your ROI line is, getting in now is either a great time or too late. It's got a lot of buzzwords and is confusing as hell.
    Crypto could run up again making more people more money. There are pump and dumpers that are hoping you will get in so they can recoup their losses and then sell causing your holding to drop like a rock. There are people still trying to get in in case it takes off and they don't want to miss the train.
    There are seriously a lot of folks hoping this replaces a national currency and prices go to the stratosphere. and then there are those that just like things the government doesn't.
    And more folk that can say .. this is worthless and I'm not gonna play.

    Only time will tell what the best camps were to be in but as long as you don't bet the farm or think of crypto as a must have in your preps you won't wind up the eating lead as an option camp.

    Just remember, don't put into crypto that which you can not afford to lose or you'll have lost already.
    It is just an idea, in a white paper, that some people find interesting, and decided to test it out, to see where it goes. So far it's been great, and it's been terrible. I expect more of the same.

    So if you don't want to be a future criminal and have bitcoin on a wallet that you need to get rid of, send it to the bitcoin address below. I'll dispose of it properly
    bitcoin:15y51PPcoZV773CtxnjnHhjmakLVSZNQR3
     
    Last edited: Aug 21, 2018
    Hanzo, enloopious, offgrittyt and 6 others like this.
  2. oil pan 4

    oil pan 4 Monkey+++

    The tulip reference is to dutch tulip mania where people were people got so crazy for tulips they were willing to trade an entire house or even an estate for a few tulips.
    And then about the time it got that crazy the price of a tulip dropped back down to normal.
     
  3. techsar

    techsar Monkey+++

    Bitcoin is, to me anyhow, worse than fiat currencies. At least you get to count a stack of pretty paper...

    I guess I'm in Camp I've got better things to spend money on ;)
     
  4. SB21

    SB21 Monkey+++

    I'm not the wisest investor . But I started to invest in the Bitcoin craze when it was on the uptick . I had a little extra cash laying around then . Should have done it , and then cashed out when it got up there in the " I need to cash out while I still can range " . I could have been rich , If I'd have just known then , what I know now .
     
  5. VisuTrac

    VisuTrac Ваша мать носит военные ботинки Site Supporter+++

    Added Camp Seriously? Not joining this nonsense. sound accurate?
     
  6. techsar

    techsar Monkey+++

    Close enough (y)

    ...and just to be clear, I'm not going to knock your strategy. It's just not my cup of tea.
     
  7. ghrit

    ghrit Bad company Administrator Founding Member

    I'm risk averse, put me in camp seriously (or more likely camp chicken.)
     
  8. 3M-TA3

    3M-TA3 Cold Wet Monkey

    Been a "tulip bulber" since the beginning, though I could have gotten in cheap and if I had would now be comfortably rich. Coulda, woulda, shoulda but that ship has long since sailed.
     
  9. enloopious

    enloopious Rocket Surgeon

    Me and my friends started hearing about BTC in 2009. We ran LAN parties with a bunch of nerds in Los Angeles and had tournaments. I started mining BTC in 2012 and quickly realized that it was a large investment into hardware. I lost around 22 BTC when the EX destroyed one of the computers that it was on out of spite but still have some.

    The reason I like BTC is that it is the only real money for free people. Gold and silver can be confiscated (stolen) and paper just keeps getting printed into oblivion. If the people of the world understood how money worked, nobody would use anything but BTC.

    At the $17700 mark I threw some more money in. Under $20k per BTC is an insanely cheap price and all the people in the know are going nuts right now. Any savvy investor is putting what ever they can scrape together right now into Bitcoin because it is NOT an investment. It is money. 1 BTC does not equal the current price. 1 BTC = 1 BTC. People need to wake up, grow up, and change their perspective. You want monetary freedom? BTC is your only chance. There is nothing else.

    How many wars were fought and the gold/silver and treasure plundered? How are you going to plunder BTC? BTC is the currency of peace, love, and freedom.

    https://twitter.com/maxkeiser/status/1538540616107192322
     
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