Bitcoin falls from $266 • Hacker News Board

Re: Bitcoin falls from $266

#221

Post by andrewcooke » Wed, Apr 10, 2013, 8:56 PM UTC

nwatson wrote: post #185

jjcm wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In some ways the price is tied to the cost of electricity needed to mine a coin. Granted, the mining "price" is usually about two weeks behind the actual price, and the electricity required is variable based on the current sum of computational power being used by all the miners, so there's certainly some disconnect.

So if I shock a turd with a thousand dollars worth of electricity from my electric utility company, can I sell it for $1,000? Or add some non-intrinsic worth by calling it "art" and sell it for $2,000? Actually, make those figures $1,010 and $2,010 -- my turds also have intrinsic value.

no, because throwing electrons at turds doesn't generate currency. in contrast, throwing electrons at a chip does generate bitcoins. that's the relationship being alluded to: there's the possibility of arbitrage between electricity (compute cycles) and currency.

Re: Bitcoin falls from $266

#222

Post by Terretta » Wed, Apr 10, 2013, 8:58 PM UTC

ISL wrote: post #149

binaryorganic wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. There's been so much talk about curation/deletion of posts lately. Letting the algorithm do it's job is the only way to determine what's HN worthy in my view.

Mostly agreed. There is value in curating HN. People come to HN because it has a reasonably high signal to noise ratio in a certain realm. Highly charged topics tend to drive upvotes, even if it's just a 'like' or a, 'yeah, that's important, I'll up-vote it'. I didn't really start visiting HN for politics or shocking stories; those tend to disproportionately draw upvotes. I'm not in favor of downmodding non-tech arti…

What's worse, as I understand the algorithm's explanation here previously, flagging stories that are much upvoted counts against the flagger. So if the attempt to flag it off fails, those who tried will be penalized.

Disclaimer: I have no idea if that explanation is true. But if so, then you don't want to be the kid with his finger in the dike.

Re: Bitcoin falls from $266

#223

Post by yebyen » Wed, Apr 10, 2013, 8:58 PM UTC

foobarqux wrote: post #199

dia80 wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Will a press release from the target suffice? https://mtgox.com/press_release_20130404.html

That's from a week ago. Is there any evidence that a DDOS happened today?

DDOS with malicious intent, or does a general usage spike count?

Just try loading mtgox.com -- it's slow. Try using it to trade. Even slower. Service is being denied. Confidence undermined. I would not take this as a vote that once the server issues are resolved, the price will continue to soar, but if I said that, it's possible that later I would be able to "told you so".

Re: Bitcoin falls from $266

#224

Post by thatthatis » Wed, Apr 10, 2013, 8:58 PM UTC

cs702 wrote: post #135

Evidently, many hoarders/speculators decided to cash out at once -- much like the audience in a movie theater would try to go through the exit door at the same time if someone were to yell "fire!" The naive souls who recently bought bitcoins to make a 'quick buck' are in for a rude surprise. In the short run, no one knows how Bitcoin's price will fluctuate. In the long run, however, if Bitcoin continues to work as in…

There is literally no fundamental value to bitcoins. Spikes and crashes are absolutely to be expected in such a situation.

Re: Bitcoin falls from $266

#225

Post by Terretta » Wed, Apr 10, 2013, 9:00 PM UTC

aw3c2 wrote: post #216

DanBC wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The guidelines suggest that people flag for spam or off-topic: > Please don't submit comments complaining that a submission is inappropriate for the site. If you think something is spam or offtopic, flag it by going to its page and clicking on the "flag" link. (Not all users will see this; there is a karma threshold.) If you flag something, please don't also comment that you did. Some people (but not me) flag all Bit…

I lost my flagging rights without further notice when I thought I was flagging well, so be careful.

That would seem to confirm what I noted adjacent: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5528118

It's rumored that flagging something when the majority don't want it flagged will likely backfire.

Re: Bitcoin falls from $266

#226

Post by thatthatis » Wed, Apr 10, 2013, 9:00 PM UTC

kybernetikos wrote: post #218

ghshephard wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is HUGE news on Bitcoin - nothing like this has ever happened in it's history. Market went from $250 to $110 in 5 hours. MtGox was down for 30 minutes today. Trading lag was 600 seconds for orders placed at market prices. April 10th, 2013 may be the day that will be remember for the next 20 years as the day that Bitcoin crashed and either (A) never recovered or (B) kept progressing after an incredible Blip. Defi…

> Definitely HN fodder today. Maybe, but my own unscientific, vague sense is that I've been seeing multiple bitcoin related submissions to HN every day for quite some time now. At this stage all of the arguments have been hashed and rehashed (ho ho) in the comment threads to the extent that they're getting pretty repetitive and tedious (especially since so many of them are so political). So, sure, it was marginally i…

The big crash that mathematically had to happen, happened today.

Re: Bitcoin falls from $266

#227

Post by jdludlow » Wed, Apr 10, 2013, 9:00 PM UTC

phreeza wrote: post #196

cpressey wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if the value would ever fall to precisely zero. Mightn't they still have value as a novelty or collector's item? Like, "Hey, a Bitcoin! I remember those... sure, I'll buy one, just to say I have one." It's unfortunate that you couldn't mount it in a decorative frame, though.

At some point it would probably be easier to mine one, if the value and interest drops low enough.

That's backwards. As the value approaches zero, the relative cost of mining grows not shrinks.

Re: Bitcoin falls from $266

#228

Post by vyrotek » Wed, Apr 10, 2013, 9:00 PM UTC

DanBC wrote: post #207

cpressey wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if the value would ever fall to precisely zero. Mightn't they still have value as a novelty or collector's item? Like, "Hey, a Bitcoin! I remember those... sure, I'll buy one, just to say I have one." It's unfortunate that you couldn't mount it in a decorative frame, though.

One guy made physical coins for bitcoin: ( https://www.casascius.com/ )

Indeed. My friend knows the man behind this. He owns another software company in Utah and gives his employees bonuses in BitCoin.

Re: Bitcoin falls from $266

#229

Post by tatsuke95 » Wed, Apr 10, 2013, 9:00 PM UTC

ashray wrote: post #55

chollida1 wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> However, BTC China is still trading at above $275! That's the beauty of bitcoin, it isn't restricted to just one region in the world. Bitcoin does have alot of advantages over existing currencies it, but this isn't one of them. I can buy and sell USD/CAD/AUE/GBP in many markets around the world

Yes, but that's because those governments have allowed their currencies to be free float currencies or something like that. Buying and selling an Indian Rupee for example is quite heavily restricted. Probably to prevent instability caused from speculation. BTC never had that from the start because it's pretty much unregulated from the get go.

>"However, BTC China is still trading at above $275! That's the beauty of bitcoin, it isn't restricted to just one region in the world."

This is a flaw, not a benefit. I want to know what the value of my BTC are. Not what they are here, vs China, vs Canada, vs Australia...

>"Buying and selling an Indian Rupee for example is quite heavily restricted. "

What do you mean, "quite heavily restricted"? It's far harder for me to buy BTC, especially with these ongoing issues, than it is to buy Rupees in my forex account.

Re: Bitcoin falls from $266

#230

Post by gavinlynch » Wed, Apr 10, 2013, 9:04 PM UTC

dia80 wrote: post #169

cs702 wrote: post #135

Evidently, many hoarders/speculators decided to cash out at once -- much like the audience in a movie theater would try to go through the exit door at the same time if someone were to yell "fire!" The naive souls who recently bought bitcoins to make a 'quick buck' are in for a rude surprise. In the short run, no one knows how Bitcoin's price will fluctuate. In the long run, however, if Bitcoin continues to work as in…

On the contrary this is just the most pronounced in a series of recent coordinated DDOS / aggressive selling attacks designed to (successfully) inspire panic. The attackers unload their bitcoin before the price gets smashed and presumably buy it all back again from frightened speculators. If anything it might be a positive sign for bitcoin that the attackers are keen to acquire it! On another note, mtgox.com the main…

>> "If anything it might be a positive sign for bitcoin that the attackers are keen to acquire it!"

I don't think it inherently implies anything of the sort. There is nothing to suggest that they believe in Bitcoin or care about it. If your suggestions are true, the only thing we know is that they are playing a very, very easy game of manipulation for financial gain. I don't see that as a positive for Bitcoin and think you're reaching with that statement.