petition: official currency code for Bitcoin (BTC?)

[Daniel Pocock]

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%