On 12/11/12 12:38, Heiki "Repentinus" Ojasild wrote:
Hey,
Personally I am of the opinion that FSFE should support an open crypto-currency. However, I am also of the opinion that BitCoin is not suitable as the early adopters would benefit rather handsomely at the expense of everyone else if BitCoin were universally adopted, and that seems contradictory to the idea of Free Software, of emancipating users.
I agree that is one aspect of Bitcoin that needs to be thoroughly compared to the alternatives. One alternative that was mentioned is to distribute coins through a random lottery system rather than `mining' with a GPU. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=55184.0
However, it could also be argued that these people took a big risk and invested to bring about some kind of technology revolution, and the `profit' they make from appreciation is rewarding them. Even so, the profit they make in absolute terms is insignificant when compared to the profits that banks make from the `fractional reserve' mechanism.
P.S. If you pay 6% or 7% for foreign currency payments to your bank, get a new one. Seriously. They are robbing you.
My estimate of 6-7% also includes the fees incurred by the merchant, which are hidden from you at the point of sale.
E.g. exchange commission = 1% foreign transaction fee = 2-3% cost to merchant (included in prices) = 2-3% total = 5-7%