» 神奇的电子货币:比特币--别让比特币把你坑了
(CNN) -- In recent days, Bitcoins have enjoyed a media buzz as the value of one Bitcoin jumped on several Bitcoin exchanges to more than $200 per Bitcoin. But by Wednesday, itfell to $105 .
Bitcoins are an attempt at creating an electronic currency that is beyond the control of any government. They are created through a digital mining system, in which digital "miners" are granted Bitcoins by using their computers to do computations that verify Bitcoin transactions. Pretty clever.
With allegedly strict rules on the creation of Bitcoins, the money supply is limited. Theoretically, no government can water down the Bitcoin with any type of quantitative easing. As a result, Bitcoins seem to present the best of all possible worlds -- the convenience of modern digital payment technology and the stability of a fixed money supply.
Fearmongers point out that banks are no longer safe as government authorities in the European Union have signaled their willingness to confiscate funds from even insured depositors. Those fearing the collapse of their local currency or their local banking system won't have to lug around hunks of metal as a way to store their wealth. Why not turn to Bitcoins?
The near anonymity built into the Bitcoin system keeps funds away from the prying eyes of tax collectors, who are getting ever better at shutting down tax havens. This potential for anonymity makes the currency ideal for drug smugglers, terrorists and money launderers, as well as the merely paranoid.
So are Bitcoins the currency of the future? I think not.
那么比特币是未来的货币吗？我认为不是。
No one really knows who is really behind Bitcoins, as the creator is just a pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto. That in itself should be a huge red flag. I would certainly not trust my life savings to some mysterious computer algorithm created by shadowy anonymous characters in a system that attracts underworld types.
One of the self-proclaimed largest Bitcoin exchanges is Mt. Gox. The name originally stood for Magic: The Gathering Exchange, an online site designed to trade cards used in playing the card game popular with the younger set. An exchange based on trading kiddy cards does not seem like a sound foundation for a monetary system.
Mt.Gox是自称最大的比特币交易站之一。这个名字最初代表着魔法风云会交易所(Magic：The Gathering的中文译名是魔法风云会，是一种由威世智公司开发的集换式卡牌游戏，又叫万智牌。)是一款在年轻人中非常流行的卡片游戏的线上交易网站。基于玩具卡片的交易模式对货币体系来说不像是一种稳固的基础(引自dbmail的修改)。
There is no government regulating participants in the system to prevent fraud and abuse. I would not be surprised if the Bitcoin mining software becomes a magnet for computer viruses. After all, the tax evaders, drug dealers and terrorists attracted to Bitcoin would not be likely to cooperate with authorities when they have been hacked and robbed.
It would be close to the perfect crime to create a pseudomonetary system that rips off other evildoers. Just be careful when the bad guys find out where you live.
Even if the system is not one big scam designed to enrich its shadowy creators, it can be hacked and can break like any technology. The authorities won't be too eager to help out Bitcoin-based financial enterprises when they get in trouble, just as they were all too eager to punish the depositors of the Cyprus banks storing questionable funds from Russian oligarchs.
Rather than being a safe place to keep money, the exchange rate of Bitcoins relative to other global currencies has fluctuated wildly. The recent jumps on price give all of the impression of being a bubble that could soon pop. If Bitcoin ever could establish itself as a legitimate payment scheme, which I doubt, it's hard to tell what the appropriate exchange rates should be with respect to other currencies.
Bitcoins are not the first attempt to create digital money. Other ventures, such as Cybercash, have come and gone, as well as various attempts to create local currencies. Governments don't like the competition. Managing a currency is a very profitable activity for governments, and they depend on seignorage -- the profit stemming from printing money -- in various degrees to cover budget deficits.
Indeed, one can always pay the troops by printing more almost worthless money, as the U.S. did in the American Revolution and Robert Mugabe did in Zimbabwe. One can expect governments to throw up legal roadblocks to prevent such competition from cutting into the lucrative business of printing money.
Moreover, it would not be good for the global economic system to have a totally fixed money supply. A growing economy needs a money supply that grows at the same rate to keep prices stable. Much as we love to criticize the governmental entities that control the monetary system, it does help to have some human judgment (armed with a checkbook) involved to deal with crises.
Our banking system is as safe as it is because there are lenders of last resort who can create more money in a crisis to protect the entire system from collapsing in a liquidity crisis. Iceland and Cyprus have discovered how painful it is to have a banking system without such a deep pocket lender of last resort.
There are some decent arguments against bitcoins in particular, but this author doesn't make them. He just seems to hate the entire concept of a currency that can't be manipulated by governments. He writes like an oil company owner condemning wind power. Except, of course, that CNN actually printed his article.
More hypocrisy.
(回复)The banks and government depend on coercing people to work for them.
If people are working for themselves and the banks/gov't can't take a cut,
they can't survive. We hear a lot about freedom from our politicians, but that's what they want for themselves. What they want from us is subservience. And many are fool enough to proudly give it to them.
(回复)This article is the most blatant piece of propaganda I've read in years, other than what typically comes from the North Korean media.
Authorities are clearly running scared because BITCOIN IS A DIGITAL VERSION OF GOLD.
(回复)how exactly is bitcoin anything like gold? bitcoin could be replaced with zitcoin tomorrow it has no unique non replicable traits
到底比特币哪一点像黄金了？明天，比特币可以被Z特币代替，它没有一点不可复制的特点。
(回复)No, but it is an agreed upon standard to replace currency. It's very, very complicated to mine making the output of bitcoins regulated so as to keep prices up. If people continue to buy into the bitcoin craze, then it would continue to be digital gold.
It's also great for things like silk road and whatnot, but I'm not getting into that.
(回复)it has inherent value other than as defined by a bank or government
它有着不被银行或者政府所定义的内在价值。
(回复)digital, aka. illusional, not real.The least significant bits they are
电子，又叫做虚假的，不真实。比特是最不重要的东西
Yeesh. The problem was that amateur folks were confusing the BTC with a commodity as opposed to a currency, which it is. THAT's why the bubble burst.
嗯~~~问题在于那些业余的家伙混淆了，比特币是一种商品，而非货币。这就是为什么泡沫爆炸了。
This is a very good example of typical main stream media scaremongering the sheeple away from cryptocurrency which tells me that bitcoins is definitely on "the radar" ;)
No one really knows who is really behind Bitcoins, . I would certainly not trust my life savings to some mysterious
computer algorithm created by shadowy anonymous characters...
Why should we care about who has created bitcoin ? The algorythm is absolutely NOT mysterious at all it is PUBLIC. Everyone, even you , can read the source and even modify it. This is a silly argument we can often read here and there and I'll give the same silly answer. Do you really know what's behind your Iphone technology (i don't know why but i 'm pretty sure you have an iphone^^) ? Do you really understand the GSM protocol ? Probably not (and neither do I by the way) but still we use it everyday to exchange sometime some really private things ! And the technology behing it is in that case REALLY shadowy, mysterious and secret (because protected by the people who develop it).“
The peak in interest for BitCoin was due to Tax Season. Some journalist published something about using BitCoin to evade taxes and how to use it as a tax haven. Hence the negative propaganda from American Media. If the US can't collect it's taxes, that means the boys in Washington can't play ball in the global arena.. Whether or not BitCoin is a viable currency, it simply goes to show how that greed will always fuel the free market folks. lol.
CNN ... what a JOKE. Its so obvious that this is "Yellow Journalism" created out of fear of a currency with a high degree of accountability. You don't have to buy thousands of dollars worth, I just bought .05 for 7$ on ebay. People throw away thousands of dollars in casinos why not throw 20$ into a digital wallet and see what it does?
who accepts bitcoins? can I buy groveries with it? pay my water bill? credit cards bill? deposit it in my savings account or retirement fund?
谁接受了比特币？我能用它买东西吗？付我的水费？信用卡账单？攒在我的储蓄账户或者退休金里面？
If bitcoins didn't get cheaper before 4/20 many regular users of the currency would probably have opted out from buying goodies this year. The mainstream media's understanding of bitcoins is sometimes too complex and sometimes in terms of cryptography they try to just say that technology is risky. They don't understand how impossible tricking all the nodes of the system would be. Where as fiat currency has banks and departments of government, bitcoins have sci-fi loving miners with an infallible sense of justice and logic. Greedy bankers vs. Sci-Fi loving Miners | You decide who you want controlling the flow of valued currency into a market place, make the choice between the constant speculation of fiat currency or the legitimacy of a international crypto-currency.
(回复)Why if they don't get cheaper many regular users would opt out from buying goodies? Can't you spend fractions of a bitcoin?
为什么比特币没有降下来的话，用户们可能今年就会选择买一些杂货？你能把一个比特币拆开来用吗？
After researching bitcoin mining, I came to only one logical conclusion. Bitcoin was created by energy (oil) companies to make us waste energy so they can make more money.
The fact that it is a virtual currently without any underlying value what so ever; and that you can get free bitcoins by burning through tons of electricity (wasting resources) makes it a very scary idea for investment and especially for usage.
If I used bitcoin to pay for the same things, one day I would have to pay 2 bits, next day 4, day later 3... it is just not how currency works. This is just a speculative hot air.
