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Risks

I have reverted the recent addition ([3]) of a section that consists of one sentence that is cherry-picked from a Bloomberg article ([4]). Another user ([5]) also believes that this assertion is inaccurate. While Bloomberg is a reliable source, it would be different if the focus of the article was about what it's being cited for, and not an unrelated topic. --Neøn (talk)

What is the focus of this article entitled Bitcoin? Homni (talk) 12:38, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

What is the unrelated topic you are referring to?Homni (talk) 12:39, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

I think the most difficult point you will find to prove is that the statement is "inaccurate". If it were, surely Bloomberg would have picked that up. They are very good at things like that.That is why WP policy requires reliable sources. You have already agreed that Bloomberg is a reliable source.Homni (talk) 12:47, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

It's not that it's inaccurate per se, it's just out of context. I think what you're both missing here is that this is one of many risk warnings in the prospectus for the proposed Bitcoin ETF. It's a regulatory warning, and one of dozens listed in the prospectus, along with "The Trust’s Bitcoins may be subject to loss, damage, theft or restriction on access." and "It may be illegal now, or in the future, to acquire, own, hold, sell or use Bitcoins in one or more countries, and ownership of, holding or trading in Shares may also be considered illegal and subject to sanction." and dozens of others. They are legally obliged to list all the risks they are aware of; it doesn't mean they think these things are actually going to happen (indeed, if they did, they wouldn't be launching the ETF). If you're going to take risk warnings from the prospectus, you need to understand the context. I have no problem with discussing the real concerns in this area but you'd be better off using Gavin Andresen and Mike Hearn's comments on this topic than taking a regulatory statement out of context. I'd support a well-written paragraph on this subject. I don't support a single regulatory warning taken out of context. (I also think that it was in completely the wrong place in the article.) Roybadami (talk) 13:09, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

So just to clarify: I'm not at all averse to discussion about concerns in core development. My concern is not that the statement is untrue, but that that statement alone, without any discussion or context, is not up to Wikipedia quality standards. I also think this issue is not of sufficient importance to justify such a prominent position in the article. (And even if it is, sandwiching it between a definition of the blockchain and a description of mining just makes no sense in terms of the structure of the article.) This is about article quality, nothing else. Roybadami (talk) 13:20, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

It does not warrant it's own separate section in my opinion, because in the SEC filing they are speculating about things that could happen, however unlikely they may be. Also the article itself says that it takes this claim from the SEC filing, but I'm unable to locate anything in the filing about the core developers requiring payment to continue developing an open source project. ([6]) This would mean that the author of the article came up with this risk on their own. --Neøn (talk)

Well, just to point out that Gavin and Wladimir are paid by the Bitcoin Foundation to work on Bitcoin. There certainly have been legitimate concerns raised in this area though. Gavin made some comments after the malleability attack on the network about how Bitcoin companies should be working on the technology and not just expecting to be handed a commercial quality product on a plate, for free. And more recently Mike Hearn has expressed concerns about development stalling. This is a very valid subject to address in this article. But let's do it properly, in a way that is both balanced in it's treatment and consistent with a properly structured artcile Roybadami (talk) 13:54, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

And even if it deserved it's own section (which it doesn't) and even if this section was well enough written to deserve to remain part of the article (it isn't) then sandwiching it between the definition of the blockchain and a discussion of mining doesn't make sense in terms of the structure of the article. (EDIT: I'm not wedded to the current article structure, but maybe discussion of this belongs in the secion 'Reception'? It certainly doesn't belong in the overview.) But I see the edit has been reinstated. I have no idea how to deal with this (I'm a pretty occasional Wikipedian and have never been involved in an edit war before). I'm just going to walk away and leave this to those who understand Wikipedia process better than I. Roybadami (talk) 13:58, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

One thing is for sure: the "Core admin" section name is totally unrelated to contents, which does not discuss some "Core admin", but software developers. Also, it is not true that there was any consensus on the edit. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 21:03, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

While I agree that the section should be renamed or the content placed elsewhere, it appears that this is cited material. Why is it contentious to add cited content to the page? And @Neøn: where do you get the idea that to include a cited in Wikipedia that fact must be the "focus" of the citation? That's simply untrue. Likewise @Roybadami: it's not usual to remove cited content because it's out of context... why not work with the editor who included it to provide context instead of trying to get it removed? Fleetham (talk) 22:32, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

I believe the contention is coming from where and how it was added. I don't feel that the citation is very strong, and I think that more sources would reinforce it. The editor that added the content has reverted attempts to move or change the content, and believes that there is consensus on format and placement. (See 1, 2, & 3) I'm not against its inclusion, but it needs to be rewritten and moved. --Neøn (talk) 09:24, 14 July 2014 (UTC)

It is not entirely correct that I reverted attempts to move the content. The content was initially completely removed by Wuerzele who suggested I put it in the Overview section. I followed his suggestion and put it in the Overview section. I mistakenly thought that Wuerzele and no-one else over the first few days not challenging the content indicated consensus. I was mistaken. My view is that the article needs a specific section - prominently placed - under the title Risks. The concern about risks regarding Bitcoin is an important matter to the majority of people following and having an interest in Bitcoin. In my opinion it is necessary to insert a Risk heading in the article and include at least all the risks cited above by Roybadami from the SEC listing - and more with proper references. To me that is the obvious and correct thing to do. Homni (talk) 11:04, 14 July 2014 (UTC)

Having a risks section is a good idea. The EBA just issued a report that identified 70 risks, see [7]. Some of these risks are disputed however and a brainstorming session by a bunch of bureaucrats doesn't make hypothesised risks real. We can simply state who has identified what risks. Martijn Meijering (talk) 11:25, 14 July 2014 (UTC)

I see lots of problems in the present text of the "Risk" section:

• the text "...and ownership of, holding or trading in Shares may also be considered illegal and subject to sanction" does not refer to bitcoins.
• the text "... These are some of the 70 risks stated to the Securities and Exchange Commission in New York regarding Bitcoin" is not true. In fact, the risks are listed in a registration and in relation to a specific ETF.
• Also, it is not important who is the intended recipient of the document, more important is who wrote it and for what purpose.
• The specific risk mentioned in the section is one of many listed in the registration. There should be some proportion, and it does not make sense to make the text this much disproportional. (the source is disproportional to illustrate that there are some recent edits to the document).
• My opinion is that specifically User:Homni should find some agreement on his changes taking into account how problematic the edits are. Also, please read the capitalization note specifying the capitalzation used in the article. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 22:13, 14 July 2014 (UTC)

"Shares" in the article text have been clarified to be Bitcoin ETFs. They refer to bitcoins: it is a bitcoin Trust Fund: the "shares" refer to bitcoin ETFs.

"the risks are listed in a registration and in relation to a specific ETF" is exactly the same as "stated to the SEC": when you list the risks in the registration form you "state" them to the SEC: you inform the SEC about the risks as you are required to do. So it is true and you have to do it.

I think it is important that the recipient of the document is the SEC: listing on the NY Stock Exchange is an important public matter. The Winklevoss twins wrote it. They want to list the Bitcoin Fund. The purpose why they wrote the risks or stated them to the SEC is because the SEC requires them to state the risks.

I am obviously expecting interested editors to improve the text in the article. We have to start somewhere. The current text is simply a starting point regarding the Risks relating to Bitcoin. I am not an expert in Bitcoin. I am simply an interested party wishing to help. Homni (talk) 22:53, 14 July 2014 (UTC)

There are simply too many inaccuracies as listed above, and they would surely deteriorate the quality of the article. The edits need to meet some basic quality standards of Wikipedia, just writing something to force other editors to completely rewrite it is not a good way how to proceed. Also, as pointed out by Martin Meijering above, there are other sources more related to bitcoin than the one you are using. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 05:53, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

I would like to point out that there already are sentences listing some risks related to bitcoin (e.g. the warnings of EBA), they are just spread over the article at present. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 06:20, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

I am not trying to "force" other editors to completely rewrite Risks. It is true that other editors rewriting content - even completely - is what often happens on Wikipedia: it is what WP is about: collaborative effort. I agree that some Risks are already mentioned elsewhere in the article. Homni (talk) 09:41, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

I concede: I agree with you that there is more opposition here on the talk page to having a section on Risks than supporting the idea. The overall consensus is thus to leave Risks out of the article. End of story.Homni (talk) 12:18, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

Contrary to the consensus on this article, there are people who take Bitcoin risks seriously: — Preceding unsigned comment added by Homni (talk • contribs) 20:08, 15 July 2014 (UTC) Homni (talk) 20:11, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

I am still of the opinion that the article should have a Risks section:

"Last month, a mining pool -- an association of people who own specialized hardware that produces Bitcoins by running specific mathematical operations -- gained a 51 percent share of computing power used in currency production. That gave it the power to reverse transactions, to pay twice with the same Bitcoins, and to delay or even cancel other people's transactions."

"The stability of the electronic currency and all the infrastructure that has grown around it in the past five years -- at least $240 million worth of it in venture capital investment alone, most of it made last year -- now depends on the goodwill of a few people whose names nobody knows."

"I'm not willing, however, to ignore the risk that a group of people who won't even tell me who they are might take the money and run."

"This means Bitcoin should not be treated as a currency but rather as a complex real-world experiment that may lead to different outcomes." — Preceding unsigned comment added by Homni (talk • contribs) 16:23, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

Homni (talk) 16:27, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

This report also states the considerable risks in detail: Homni (talk) 16:36, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

From the above report: "Overall, there is absolutely no reason to trust GHash or any other miner," they wrote in Friday's post. "People in positions of power are known to abuse it. A group with a history or double-expenditures just blithely went past the 51 percent psychological barrier: this is not good for Bitcoin." This article certainly needs a risks section. Homni (talk) 16:48, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

Further statement of risks:"Morgan Chase & Co. Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon, 58, has said bitcoins probably won’t last as a currency after governments subject them to rules and standards akin to those for other payment systems. Billionaire investor Warren Buffett, 83, has said he’ll be surprised if bitcoins last 10 or 20 years." — Preceding unsigned comment added by Homni (talk • contribs) 08:29, 18 July 2014 (UTC)

Homni (talk) 08:36, 18 July 2014 (UTC)

I have changed my mind: we have full consensus: there is no need for a section on risks in the article about bitcoins. Homni (talk) 01:40, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Proposing changes to "Classification as currency"

There was a consensus on the contents of the section. Trying to maintain the consensus I am proposing this update:

Bitcoin is commonly referred to with terms that include the word currency such as digital currency, digital cash, virtual currency, electronic money, or cryptocurrency. Some media outlets do make a distinction between "real" money and bitcoins, however. According to the director of the Institute for Money, Technology and Financial Inclusion at the University of California-Irvine there is "an unsettled debate about whether bitcoin is a currency or payment protocol".

Economists defining money as a store of value, a medium of exchange, and a unit of account agree that bitcoin does best as a medium of exchange. (About 1,000 bricks and mortar businesses were willing to accept payment in bitcoins as of November 2013 in addition to more than 35,000 online merchants.) The bitcoin market currently suffers from volatility, limiting the ability of bitcoins to act as a stable store of value, and, although bitcoins are the unit of account for the block chain, bitcoin does not see use as a unit of account outside of it. Where people are allowed to buy with bitcoins, prices are not denominated in bitcoins.

The People's Bank of China has stated that bitcoin "is fundamentally not a currency but an investment target".

My opinion is that the update brings the following advantages:

• removes duplication
• removes bitcoin-unrelated text discussing variations in money definitions
• completes the PBC citate
• improves readability

Ladislav Mecir (talk) 09:48, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

Discussion regarding editor interaction. Please restart the article improvement discussion below.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Apparently in terms of WP edit-warring rules, Ladislav Mecir is not allowed or would be edit-warring if he were to revert any of my changes. He is only allowed to discuss them till a consensus is reached. He can only change my changes after consensus. My changes indicate that there is not consensus, but he cannot revert them. He is not allowed to revert my changes. That is how the edit-warring rule works, isn´t it? Homni (talk) 11:39, 17 July 2014 (UTC) WP:BRD states, inter alia: "Therefore, if your edit gets reverted, do not revert again. Instead, use the opportunity to begin a discussion with the interested parties to establish consensus." Homni (talk) 11:49, 17 July 2014 (UTC) For User:Homni: this is a talk page. If you want to make a different proposal, you are welcome to do it, writing your own proposal and properly signing it. But, realize, please, that it does not make sense to replace my signed text by your wording pretending I wrote it. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 12:09, 17 July 2014 (UTC) That is not true. My changes are named in the history. My will stay named forever. It will never disappear with my name indicated as author of the edit. I stated above I made changes. When I made them there was no place to sign. I realized that. Your idea to copy the article content into the talk page is not foreseen in WP procedures. I thus wrote the paragraph which you and everyone can see above stating I made changes. You are edit-warring. Please stop that. I never pretended or even tried to pretend I am writing in your name. Your unique method is not foreseen in WP talk page procedures. Please revert your revert of my changes. You are edit warring. Please follow WP rules. Otherwise I will make all my changes in the article - which I now will. They will be signed and you are not allowed to revert them.Homni (talk) 12:20, 17 July 2014 (UTC) My name appears seven times in this talk page history for everyone to see that I made the changes to your proposal. You are edit-warring. If you do not revert your revert of my changes - which is edit warring on your side - then you leave me not alternative but to show that there is not consensus on the content in the article. Then you will have to leave my changes and discuss them here anyway. I never pretended I was writing in your name and you know that. Homni (talk) 12:28, 17 July 2014 (UTC) Ladislav is correct. He is not edit-warring and you have now definitely crossed the line as far as disruptive editing is concerned. Please do not lecture experienced editors on editing policy until you have considerably more experience yourself. On Talk pages you are not supposed to change other people's words. It is true that the history shows you made any changes, but that is too inconvenient. You are welcome to propose a change on the article page itself, but anyone else who objects is free to revert it, and then you cannot revert that revertion until a new consensus has been achieved. Martijn Meijering (talk) 12:32, 17 July 2014 (UTC) Martijn Meijering Why did you remove the following direct quote of WP edit-warring policy from my statement above: WP:BRD states, inter alia: if your edit gets reverted, do not revert again. Instead, use the opportunity to begin a discussion with the interested parties to establish consensus." Please indicate the WP policy that states new editors are not allowed to quote WP policy and indicate why you have removed my quote of WP:BRD which indicates that Ladislav Mercir is edit-warring? Please also stop your personal attack that my disagreement with content is disruptive. I simply disagree. I am trying to improve WP. Suggesting changes on a talk page is not disruptive. That is what talk pages are for, isn´t it? Martijn Meijering can you please restore my original direct quote of WP:BRD above? I am not going to edit-war by reverting your revert of my direct quote of WP:BRDHomni (talk) 12:57, 17 July 2014 (UTC) Ladislav brought the content to this talk page to discuss. I suggested changes. You say I am disruptive. You are making a mistake. I simply am suggesting changes. Please stop your personal attacks. Homni (talk) 13:01, 17 July 2014 (UTC) What do you mean why did I remove the following direct quote? I didn't remove anything. Martijn Meijering (talk) 13:13, 17 July 2014 (UTC) This is not a disruptive edit as Martijn Meijering mistakenly imagines and which leads him to personal attacks on me. These are my changes to Ladislav´s suggestions. He suggested I do this. This is not disruptive. This is actually what is suppose to happen on the talk page.Martijn Meijering does not see it as that. He sees it as disruptive. However it clearly is not. It was suggested by Ladislav. Bitcoin (the bitcoin unit of measure of the Bitcoin system) is commonly referred to with terms that include the word currency such as digital currency, virtual currency or cryptocurrency. Digital cash and electronic money are used without the term "currency".Some media outlets do make a distinction between money and bitcoins, however. According to the Institute for Money, Technology and Financial Inclusion at the University of California-Irvine there is "an unsettled debate about whether bitcoin is a currency or payment protocol". Economists defining money as a store of value, a medium of exchange, and a unit of account agree that bitcoin does best as a medium of exchange. (About 1,000 bricks and mortar businesses were willing to accept payment in bitcoins as of November 2013 in addition to more than 35,000 online merchants.) The bitcoin market currently suffers from volatility, limiting the ability of bitcoins to act as a relatively stable store of value, and, although bitcoins are the unit of measure for the block chain, bitcoin does not see use as a unit of measure outside of it. Where people are allowed to buy with bitcoins, prices are not denominated in bitcoins. The People's Bank of China has stated that bitcoin "is fundamentally not a currency but an investment target". The above is what I suggest. It is not disruptive editing as mistakenly imagined by Martijn Meijering. It was suggested by Ladislav Mercir. I did not say your proposal was disruptive, changing Ladislav's edit on a talk page is. Your constant hectoring when you're clearly not very experienced with the rules also is disruptive. You have wasted a lot of our time already. You also didn't answer my question. I didn't delete anything, contrary to your accusation. Martijn Meijering (talk) 13:54, 17 July 2014 (UTC) Homni (talk) 13:33, 17 July 2014 (UTC) Martijn Meijering you have no credibility: You say when I change something in the article, anyone can revert it. But, you say that when Ladislav reverts my changes, he is not edit-warring although WP:BRD states he would be edit-warring. Homni (talk) 13:42, 17 July 2014 (UTC) No one is supposed to change other people's words on a Talk page, though they are free to add their own comments and counterproposals. A first revert of a new edit on an article main page is not edit warring, reverting that revert on the other hand is. Ladislav made a signed post on this Talk page which you should not have changed. He rightly reverted it. You've now made a counterproposal, which is also fine and which you should have done in the first place. No one should now delete your counterproposal, and it is very unlikely anyone will try to. Martijn Meijering (talk) 13:54, 17 July 2014 (UTC) So, correct me if I´m wrong: the only time I can revert any edit in an article is when it is completely and absolutely a "new" edit (first time ever appearing in the article); and revert means 100% revert or delete; it does not mean deleting what is there and replacing it with something different: it means simply reverting or completely deleting the new edit without entering another edit in its place?And this applies to other editors too regarding my "old" edits? They can only revert my edits if they are "new". They cannot revert "old" edits? Then what is a "new" edit? After it has been there for one day, is it an old edit? Homni (talk) 14:25, 17 July 2014 (UTC) The WP:Teahouse is a better place for such questions. Martijn Meijering (talk) 14:29, 17 July 2014 (UTC) Martijn Meijering you are very disrespectful saying I am wasting your time. No-one forces you to be here. This is the nth personal attack from you. Nothing happens to you about so many personal attacks and disrespect to an editor acting in good faith. You are very disrespectful. Homni (talk) 15:04, 17 July 2014 (UTC) So, Don´t-waste-my-time-Martijn Meijering, please stop your continuous personal attacks. Homni (talk) 15:27, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

These are my changes to Ladislav´s suggestions. He suggested I do this.

Bitcoin (the bitcoin unit of measure of the Bitcoin system) is commonly referred to with terms that include the word currency such as digital currency, virtual currency or cryptocurrency. Digital cash and electronic money are used without the term "currency".Some media outlets do make a distinction between money and bitcoins, however. According to the Institute for Money, Technology and Financial Inclusion at the University of California-Irvine there is "an unsettled debate about whether bitcoin is a currency or payment protocol".

Economists defining money as a store of value, a medium of exchange, and a unit of account agree that bitcoin does best as a medium of exchange. (About 1,000 bricks and mortar businesses were willing to accept payment in bitcoins as of November 2013 in addition to more than 35,000 online merchants.)

The bitcoin market currently suffers from volatility, limiting the ability of bitcoins to act as a relatively stable store of value, and, although bitcoins are the unit of measure for the block chain, bitcoin does not see use as a unit of measure outside of it. Where people are allowed to buy with bitcoins, prices are not denominated in bitcoins.

The People's Bank of China has stated that bitcoin "is fundamentally not a currency but an investment target".

Homni (talk) 16:52, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

There is now a proposal by User:Homni to modify my proposed update. The main modification I notice is the replacement of the standard term "unit of account", which is already present in the article and supported by reliable sources, by a nonstandard (in this specific context) and unsupported by reliable sources "unit of measure", which (being unsupported by reliable sources) is original research and not acceptable per WP:NOR policy. The modification removing the word "real" does not represent the cited source. The note 'Digital cash and electronic money are used without the term "currency".', while true if taken literally, disregards the usage of the terms "cash" and "money", both subject to debate. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 19:00, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

Your proposal states: "Bitcoin is commonly referred to with terms that include the word currency. The statement "that include the word currency" is not true: Digital cash and electronic money do not include the word currency. You cannot say: Bitcoin is commonly referred to with terms that include the word currency such as digital cash and electronic money. Homni (talk) 19:16, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

The fact that a US federal judge referred to bitcoin as a unit of account does not constitute a binding definition or description since it was made under US common law. Any other US common law judge can have a different opinion. Unit of account is an accounting term. Bitcoin is not used as a unit of account in any accounting model. Bitcoin is a unit of measure. Homni (talk) 19:21, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

Money is generally accepted to be anything that has the three functions of money. Only an item that has those three functions is money. If an item does not have those three functions, it is not money. Bitcoin does not have those three functions. There is thus no real money and unreal money. There is monopoly money and we know what that is. It is also not money. But, we know it is a game. Homni (talk) 19:30, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

According to the Institute for Money, Technology and Financial Inclusion at the University of California-Irvine there is "an unsettled debate about whether bitcoin is a currency or payment protocol".Homni (talk) 19:45, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

In hope that the proposal can achieve a broader consensus I propose an alternative wording of the first sentence as follows: "Bitcoin is commonly referred to with terms that include the word currency such as digital currency, virtual currency, cryptocurrency, the word money such as electronic money, or the word cash such as digital cash." The rest of the proposal remains unchanged. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 20:45, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

That is an awkward sentence. It does not read very well. I propose: "Bitcoin is commonly referred to with terms that include the word currency such as digital currency, virtual currency and cryptocurrency. It is also referred to as digital cash and electronic money."

I do not agree with the rest of the proposal remaining the same. You have not refuted my suggestions. Homni (talk) 21:01, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

I think any changes to the section should come along with substantive changes to the references as well... are any new refs added in either proposed change? If no, why make a change? Fleetham (talk) 23:54, 18 July 2014 (UTC)

Sorry, this was a mistake. Homni (talk) 00:36, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

talk, I agree with your proposal. "Bitcoin is commonly referred to with terms that include the word currency such as digital currency, virtual currency, cryptocurrency, the word money such as electronic money, or the word cash such as digital cash."

The rest of the proposal remains unchanged.

We have full consensus. Homni (talk) 01:38, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Ladislav, I propose to simply say "Bitcoin is commonly referred to with terms that include the word currency such as digital currency, digital cash, virtual currency, electronic money, or cryptocurrency." Thanks.--Wuerzele (talk) 04:44, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Yes, Wuerzele, that looks shorter and acceptable. For Fleetham: the main reasons to propose the changes were the duplication - the usage of the word "currency" is mentioned twice in the old wording, while, as demonstrated, the text can be consolidated mentioning the dispute just once. The additional reason was to remove the bitcoin-unrelated discussion of variations in definitions of money. Also, there was a perceived contradiction - economists were mentioned (by one source) to generally agree with one definition of money, while the subsequent text and references mentioned other definitions, also used by economists. Hope this clarifies the reasons. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 21:14, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Faucetlists

Wouldn't a page with minimal content, advertising other websites and giving a referral link to yet another site meet WP:ELNO? --Neøn (talk) 00:50, 22 July 2014 (UTC)

yes, Neøn absolutely. I dont understand Fleetham undoing your removal. thank you.--Wuerzele (talk) 05:40, 23 July 2014 (UTC)

Stolen bitcoins

Bitcoin transactions are irreversible and Homni's edit was clearly erroneous. Instead of edit-warring he would be better off reading up on Bitcoin itself and on Wikipedia editing procedures (see WP:COMPETENCE). His recent edits have been detrimental to the quality of the article and come dangerously close to disruptive editing. The source says that the attack on a wallet was *foiled*. That means the bitcoins weren't stolen and the transactions were not reversed. A one-off fork may still be feasible for Vertcoin and some other alt-coins with low adoption, but Bitcoin itself is far beyond that stage. I won't revert Homni's edits for now, but I expect him to self-revert before someone else steps in. Martijn Meijering (talk) 21:07, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

Martijn Meijering Please stop the personal attacks and smearing my name here on the talk page. I simply added content I found from a reliable source. If I have made a mistake, and it seems I have, it does not give you the right for immediate personal attacks and smearing my name over here. Making a mistake is not edit warring and is not disruptive editing. You need to find a way of dealing with situations where someone disagrees with you here on WP which is a public site. You cannot immediately launch into various personal attacks and smearing of an honest editors name just because you do not know how to deal with the situation where someone disagrees with you. You will often find that other editors disagree with you. You cannot immediately attack them and smear their names. Please stop that. Homni (talk) 22:05, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

Making mistakes is not the problem, everybody makes mistakes. The problem is that you are violating Wikipedia editing policy and that you persist in the mistakes once corrected / once someone objects. In the past days you have violated at least WP:POINT and WP:BRD and many of your edits have been reverted. Pointing this out does not constitute a personal attack. I don't want to smear your name, I want you to change your editing behaviour. In the light of the reversions of your recent edits it would perhaps be wiser to check first (on Talk) to see if you have a consensus instead of boldly assuming it. In any event, once you are reverted you need to stick by WP:BRD. If that happens, you'll hear no complaints from me. Everyone is welcome to make constructive edits as long as they play by the rules. As I said in the discussion on my Talk page, I have no doubt you are acting in good faith. Martijn Meijering (talk) 22:13, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

The fundamental problem was that I did not know that I am not allowed to revert a revert. Now I know. It does help a lot to know that, actually. Saves a lot of problems. Homni (talk) 22:25, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

Yeah, no problem. I don't claim to know all Wikipedia rules either. Maybe someone else will step in and point out I violated one too. Peace. Martijn Meijering (talk) 22:30, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

Homni, I did inform you about editwarring info amongst many other things here about 10 days ago.--Wuerzele (talk) 06:08, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

Wuerzele, yes you did. I am sorry. Homni (talk) 01:43, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Homni, it is very easy to understand that you would feel unhappy about the claims some people have made about your editing. Regardless of whether these claims are right or wrong, they are not personal attacks. They are opinions about some edits that you made.Daqu (talk) 07:27, 26 July 2014 (UTC)

Daqu, there are a number of key words or red flags on Wikipedia. They have a very strong effect in the community. "Disruptive editing" is one of them. If you want to abuse your position as a trusted editor here, you say the editor you have a difference of opinion with, is "disruptive" when he or she simply has a different opinion - as you so correctly mentioned. Confidently demonstrating with reliable sources that a statement is an encyclopedic statement appropriate to be on WP is not disruptive editing. However the term disruptive editing is one of a number of terms abused by abusive editors on WP. It is very disheartening when some "trusted" editor immediately use that term against you when you simply have a different opinion. They know the power of that word, that is why they use it. There are a number of these "power" words used in the WP community. Abusively using this tactic is a personal attack - in my opinion. The other editor involved here also stated my contributions in various articles is wasting Wikipedians´ time. He also considers the fact that I address you and other editors by name as something that can be used in a negative way against me. Homni (talk) 11:07, 26 July 2014 (UTC)

More clarity needed in what goes into the ledger

Several sentences say:

"All transactions are recorded into a public ledger, the block chain, and are viewable by everyone."

or approximately the same thing.

But exactly what information is recorded in the block chain? The answer to this appears to be omitted from the article. But without the answer, sentence like "All transactions are recorded into a public ledger, the block chain, and are viewable by everyone" are difficult to make much sense of.

I hope someone knowledgeable in the subject will add clarifications regarding this.Daqu (talk) 21:00, 14 July 2014 (UTC)

First of all: In fact, it is not a "Ledger". A ledger is an accounting term. A ledger is nowadays a computer file that contains all "accounting accounts" in a set of financial accounts. But we can ignore this fact. This is just trivial scientific information that is meaningless in reality (Wikipedia)- to the people or world at large.

I am of the opinion that the Bitcoin "Ledger" makes it a centralized system: all bitcoins only exist inside this single, centralized Bitcoin public "Ledger". Obviously no-one else will ever agree to this fact. I accept that as reality. Just some trivial information about science as opposed to popular practice. Popular practice, no matter how wrong and unscientific is what is reality. I accept that.Homni (talk) 21:29, 14 July 2014 (UTC)

I believe it is actually stated that it is the "trust" that is decentralized. I agree with that. All actual bitcoins exist only in a centralised repository everywhere called the Public "Ledger". Everyone agrees there is only one Public Bitcoin "Ledger". However, no-one else will ever agree that all bitcoins only exist in one single repository, always and everywhere called the Bitcoin Public "Ledger", when in fact it is not an accounting ledger. Homni (talk) 21:38, 14 July 2014 (UTC)

The fact that all bitcoins only exist in one single central Bitcoin "Ledger" or repository clearly means to the Bitcoin community that Bitcoin is a decentralized platform. So, it thus becomes a fact that this single Bitcoin "Ledger" crypto-currency payment system with a single repository for all existing bitcoins is actually a decentralized payment system. And that is now a fact in the Bitcoin community.That is how the world works. I accept that: Bitcoin is a decentralized payment system despite the undeniable fact that all bitcoins are deposited in this single, central repository called the Bitcoin Public "Ledger" when in fact it is not a ledger. Homni (talk) 21:50, 14 July 2014 (UTC)

User:Homni wrote: 'I am of the opinion that the Bitcoin "Ledger" makes it a centralized system' - your opinion is interesting, nevertheless, independent reliable sources agree on the decentralized character of bitcoin. In this case the policy of the Wikipedia is that the article must not contain such opinions characterized as original research. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 06:14, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

"independent reliable sources agree on the decentralized character of bitcoin" although all bitcoins only exist in the single, centralized repository called the Bitcoin Public Ledger. The creation of bitcoins - mining - is decentralized: once they are mined, all bitcoins are deposited in the centralised repository, i.e., the Bitcoin Public Ledger. Apparently bitcoins never leave the Public Ledger. They are thus centralized forever - or so it seems. Homni (talk) 10:00, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

The blockchain is not a single centralised repository at all. It exists in hundreds of thousand of copies on all full nodes, which are kept synchronised through Bitcoin's consensus algorithm based on proof-of-work. It is a ledger in the sense that it is an append-only log of financial transactions, though it is structured rather differently than traditional accounting ledgers. Martijn Meijering (talk) 21:10, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

Martijn Meijering, well spoken. And yet, ironically, the decentralization of bitcoin mining is in jeopardy, a discussion of which I started Talk:Bitcoin#proposing small subsection on bitcoin's decentralized aspect here, but hasnt been picked up.- and I suggest to not continue hereunder this section "More clarity needed in what goes into the ledger".--Wuerzele (talk) 06:26, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

Daqu, can you tell us what clarifications you need to "All transactions are recorded into a public ledger."? Have you checked the references?

would it help to spell out, that IP address, date and time and amount of bitcoins transferred are entered?--Wuerzele (talk) 06:26, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

It is a major misconception to think that an article can possibly be a good encyclopedia article if it makes sense only when combined with its references.

I used the word "ledger" only because it appears in the article.

If you want to write an at-least-passable encyclopedia article, you have to learn to put yourself in the place of someone who doesn't know anything about the subject of the article, except maybe a vague idea of what it is. For example, all I know about bitcoin is that it's a currency that lives on computers, but I know nothing of how this works. I came here to find out, but no such luck.Daqu (talk) 07:22, 26 July 2014 (UTC)

Daqu thanks for your opinion. would you mind answering my question from 9 days ago? please use the colon to file your reply, showing whom you are replying to. WP netiquette.--Wuerzele (talk) 01:09, 27 July 2014 (UTC)

Pseudoedits

I consider edits like this today section Regulation/Ecuador a mild form of vandalism (cant call it testing since the editor has been editing on this page for almost a month), because it introduces an intentional error, an empty space, where there ought to be none. The intent appears to me to to use the edit summary space to communicate, which is not the right spot. The talk page is. I am asking the editor in question to revert this edit, otherwise someone else will have to do this.--Wuerzele (talk) 17:20, 27 July 2014 (UTC)

The editor in question did not revert the erroneous edit, but besides leaving a wild attack on my personal page added more pseudedits today for example here under Ownership.--Wuerzele (talk) 05:43, 29 July 2014 (UTC)

Bitcoin, a virtual product

I added Bitcoin as a virtual product here because I felt it is not crystal clear to a newcomer of teh site, that this is so. I was reverted with the reason that this classification was superfluous. What do people think ?--Wuerzele (talk) 04:10, 7 August 2014 (UTC)

To clarify the reasons for reversion: the classification of bitcoin as a virtual product may not be superfluous per se, it may well be useful in the "Classifications" section, especially if it is properly sourced. However, it is superfluous in a sentence which explains how bitcoins are created. Also, per WP:LEAD, "significant information should not appear in the lead if it is not covered in the remainder of the article", which seems to be the case here, since there is no reference to bitcoin as a virtual product in the contents of the article. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 06:53, 7 August 2014 (UTC)

Claims to formalize bitcoin protocol

I revert the addition, here are the reasons for the reversion:

• the sentence 'There have been academic attempts to formalize the protocol, claiming that this will "contribute to the position of Bitcoin as a (crypto)currency".' contains weasel formulations, appears unsupported by the cited sources, and is not specific enough for a reader to understand what is the actual claim
• the first of the sources appears to be incorrectly cited, the name of the author in the citation does not correspond to the name of the author of the cited material
• the first of the sources discusses proof of stake (POS) currencies demonstrating their weakness. Since bitcoin does not use POS, the source is only indirectly related to bitcoin. Per WP:LEAD the lead section should serve as a "summary of its most important aspects". Since POS is not an aspect of bitcoin, it actually does not qualify for the lead. That does not mean the research should not be mentioned in the contents of the article. Also note that per WP:LEAD "significant information should not appear in the lead if it is not covered in the remainder of the article".
• the second source cited is a self-published book, consult WP:IRS, please Ladislav Mecir (talk) 07:26, 7 August 2014 (UTC)

Why not Bitcoin?

When was the capitalisation rule for Bitcoin changed (in the beginning of this page)? It used to be (nearly) the opposite rule of what it is now.

Was there a discussion and a vote? What are the arguments for the current rule? --Mortense (talk) 16:58, 21 August 2014 (UTC)

The discussion can be found here: [8]

The arguments:

• There is no uniform convention of using lowercase "b" vs capital "B"
• The old convention used in the article had "gray areas", where it was hard to determine with certainty which of "b" or "B" should be used
• The WSJ in a 3/14/14 article suggested using lowercase "b" in all cases
• The Associated Press Stylebook also suggested using lowercase "b" in all cases
• The Chronicle of Higher Education advocate use of lowercase bitcoin in all cases
• It's usually clear from context or unimportant which meaning of bitcoin is intended, and where it isn't, it's better to reword it so that it is, rather than depend on "B" versus "b" for clarity
• The new convention is simple to follow
• The new convention looks better, frequent case switching looked clumsy

All editors discussing the issue agreed to make the switch. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 19:18, 21 August 2014 (UTC)

@Ladislav Mecir: Thanks for rounding up all the reasons we made the switch! Fleetham (talk) 01:35, 23 August 2014 (UTC)

Limitations as a currency

I don't see where the article discusses bitcoin's limitation as a currency. I've read several articles that talk about this, such as the lack of liquidity and the fact that the fixed supply disallows growth of the money supply as the economy grows. Should this be added? TimidGuy (talk) 11:14, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

The lack of liquidity is mentioned in "Price and volatility" as a factor contributing to price volatility. Several bitcoin's limitations as a currency are discussed in the "Classification" section, the limited supply is also mentioned at several places throughout the article. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 12:20, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

What I read was something like this: Bitcoin's usefulness as a currency is limited because the supply can't be increased as the economy grows, as is the case with traditional monetary policy. I don't see this point in the article. In addition, the article says, "Volatility has little effect on the utility of bitcoin as a payment processing system." But I've seen sources that say the opposite, something like this: The volatility of bitcoin limits its usefulness as a currency because the bitcoin one receives as payment may be worth considerably less than at the time one state a price for one's good or services. TimidGuy (talk) 10:52, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

"Bitcoin's usefulness as a currency is limited because the supply can't be increased as the economy grows, as is the case with traditional monetary policy." - you are right, this is not present in the "Classification" section. But it looks that the traditional currencies did have limited supply too.

"The volatility of bitcoin limits its usefulness as a currency because the bitcoin one receives as payment may be worth considerably less than at the time one state a price for one's good or services." - in my opinion this is already mentioned in the article, using a slightly different wording. The wording being that the volatility limits the ability of bitcoin to serve as a stable store of value. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 15:11, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

TimidGuy I agree with Ladislav.--Wuerzele (talk) 19:45, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

info on comics

there seems to be an edit war starting with Hypnopompus preferring a section from reception to disappear for teh second time. best to discuss here than trying to push... Fleetham: you reverted the deletion. Would both of you agree to the compromise to move the comics sentences conservatively into the hodge podge section at the end "in teh media"- where you, Fleetham moved my info on the MIT students from teh reception section some months ago- ? that would still keep the body of the article "crisp" as you said,Hypnopompus. Peace and happy Labor Day, --Wuerzele (talk) 03:04, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Indeed, I suggest Hypnopompus to consult the WP:BRD policy, which he already violated by reverting Fleetham's revert. I vote for preserving the information, either in the form proposed by Wuerzele, or in the original form. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 08:49, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

I also noticed that when engaging in his war, Hypnopompus unexplainedly reverted this edit, which I vote to be preserved as well, consult WP:DECIMAL, please. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 09:03, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

First of all, let me thank you Ladislav for pointing me towards the WP:BRD policy. There is so much to learn! Secondly, as I noted on Wuerzele's talk page, I didn't intend to start an edit war and will not be a party to one. Wuerzele's proposal is more than welcome to me. Hypnopompus (talk) 13:09, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

I moved the material to the "In the media" section. Also copyedited it because the sources are largely links to songs instead of mentions of actual comedians. Fleetham (talk) 23:06, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Fleetham, it looks that you wrote: "Several silly songs celebrating Bitcoin have released." In my opinion, the formulation looks not exactly grammatical. Also, (pardon my laziness) I did not check the sources (nor did I listen to the songs), did they use the "silly" characterization? If not, it is not neutral to add such a characterization on our own. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 09:08, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for the heads up about grammar. I fixed that and changed "silly" to "lighthearted." Hope this works for you. Many of the songs are parodies a la Weird Al Yankovic and clearly lighthearted. Fleetham (talk) 10:25, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

Hal Finney should be named in the article

Hal Finney, who died last week, was bitcoin's first adopter. He was also cryptographer, futurist and cypherpunkt. He was also programmer and made contributions to bitcoin. He contributed also to the creation of namecoin, which is, given of the Internet's reliance on cerntralized DNS services, a very important feat.

Here an article about him with a photo:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/31/business/hal-finney-cryptographer-and-bitcoin-pioneer-dies-at-58.html?_r=0

And here is what he wrote about himself and bitcoin:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=2436;sa=showPosts

I think Finney should be mentioned in this article. Why? Because he was one of the people who created it - Finney made the first proof-of-work system which is one of the very foundations of bitcoin. A currency can only exist when more than one person uses it, and Finney made that very important step. Finney gives also a face to the people who use bitcoin, which helps to show that bitcoin users are not generally anonymous. This is important because the false impression that bitcoin is something completely anonymous and created by unknown people leads to many pointless conspiracy theories, and the interest of Wikipedia's readers to know about bitcoin's authors and users is legitimate. Also, Finneys personality represents some of the mindset and ideal out of which bitcoin was created, and thus makes it much easier to understand. --Hoppingstone (talk) 20:00, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Agreed, I think that the information could be used in the "History" section, e.g. We could also have an "Early adopters" section. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 08:58, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

Hoppingstone, thanks for suggesting. At some point earlier this year, Hal Finney was even mentioned on Bitcoin I believe, (but maybe I am mixing it up with one of the 200 Bitcoin references insteadd). will use NYT ref, the bitcoin.org ref should be worked in on his wikipage if it isnt already. Ladislav, I was thinking of the History section too. Wouldnt make a new section - too many already.--Wuerzele (talk) 19:26, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

Ladislav,I see you didnt like my rephrasing of the NYT - whatever. I would not use Hal (first name) to refer to Finney though, its unencyclopedic.--Wuerzele (talk) 04:32, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

Wuerzele thanks for the suggestion, replacing the first names in the formulation. Your formulation was not a problem, but I wanted to add more informations and unify the capitalization. I would like to put a photo of Hal Finney in the history section, I am just unsure how this can be done. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 07:10, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

good idea to break up the long history section with a photo, but I dont see a pic on wikimedia/ and none in the public domain when searching the web--Wuerzele (talk) 02:48, 4 September 2014 (UTC).

Proposal to merge "Classification" sections

I propose to merge the "Legal and journalistic opinions" section contents into the "Classification" section. Reasons:

• On one hand, there is no world-wide authority to definitely classify bitcoin, on the other hand, a classification can become widely accepted regardless of its original proponent.
• The "opinions" term in the "Legal and journalistic opinions" section name is unfitting, the listed statements are either classifications or classification attempts.
• The sections have significant overlap:
  • The "Classification" section already contains journalistic opinions.
  • The "Classification" section contains classification by PBC, which is also present in "Legal and journalistic opinions".
• The "Classification" section should inform about existing classifications without restricting itself to just the moneyness aspect.

Ladislav Mecir (talk) 11:46, 29 September 2014 (UTC)

I'd go along with that. It seems like this article has too many sections overall. TimidGuy (talk) 15:13, 29 September 2014 (UTC)

On its political economy

The quality of the claims in the section is highly questionable:

• the claim that it was "difficult to see what problem Bitcoin solves for people with left-wing politics." is problematic, suggesting that the author of the cited source did not spend enough effort to find out whether bitcoin does or does not solve any problem for people with left-wing politics. I see such an information not worth including.
• as another editor already observed, the claim that "this project ... exacerbates the social inequalities that it is supposed to combat" is dubious. And, importantly, the source cited to support the claim is actually an advertisement for a book that has not been published yet. As such, neither the claim nor the source shall be used.
• to me, all the claims in the section look like advertisements for nonexistent work, and, based on this observation, I propose to delete the section. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 13:55, 8 August 2014 (UTC)

I'd be fine with removing this section. The article in The Nation is quite good, and could be used as a source, perhaps in other contexts. But quoting that sentence doesn't inform the reader much; it's simply an anonymous opinion. Perhaps in the reception section, one could add material from the article in The Nation about why the concept of bitcoin appeals to the right and to libertarians. TimidGuy (talk) 10:39, 22 August 2014 (UTC)

Ladislav Mecir agree. TimidGuy, thats a good idea. I was uncomfortable with what I saw as self promotion of Bauwens & Vasilis Kostakis, but didnt want to delete the whole section (appropriately titled IMO), because I thought it would be edited for the better, for the same reasons you are mentioning. Here are pertinent sources, do you want to start?

• Bitcoin paradise Dec 25th 2013, J.M.P., Economist
• Is Bitcoin just a libertarian fantasy? Keith Wagstaff, April 11, 2013, The Week
• Bitcoin Proves The Libertarian Idea Of Paradise Would Be Hell On Earth Jim Edwards, Dec. 10, 2013, The Business Indsider
• Bitcoin - Finally, fair money?Gruppen gegen Kapital und Nation, undated
• Living On Bitcoin A Year Later: The All-Bitcoin Start-Up With No Bank Account 5/12/2014, Forbes.

--Wuerzele (talk) 06:14, 24 August 2014 (UTC)

Ladislav Mecir and TimidGuy As the author of a work that was recently added (I'm giving an upcoming talk on Bitcoin, so it may have been added by an attendee), but then promptly removed on account of "why is it a critique?" I'd suggest that it is manifestly a critique in the long tradition of political economy (I suggest it leads to a "control society", which is certainly a critical thing to say). I don't mind that it was removed (this section does seem dangerously close to self-promotion), but I do think there is a chilling effect occurring on this page, and to remove this section would be proof-positive of this. The only critical voices on the whole Bitcoin page are narrowly economic, which are not really critiques at all (they critique only the operation of Bitcoin, not its existence or effect). Some of the references above are good, but they too are deeply partisan. I think this section needs to remain, and while the reference to my work may not be appropriate, suggestions that there are people working on the political economy of bitcoin is important. --Quinn d (talk) 18:55, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

I'm not opposed to criticism, and in fact was eager to add information about bitcoin's limitations as a currency (and still intend to add that). A first step is to find some reliable sources that support your points. If you have a couple sources, then the next step would be to draft some sentences. TimidGuy (talk) 09:51, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

Note that this discussion has been moved to a new thread at bottom. TimidGuy (talk) 10:02, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

Beginning of a draft

heading: Appeal to libertarians

proposed text: One reason for the popularity of bitcoin is its philosophical appeal to libertarians, who like the fact that it exists outside of the control of government and the dominant institutional banking system, as well as the fact that, like gold, it's "deflationary" due to the intentionally limited supply.[9]. Libertarians have established a community in Chile that exclusively uses bitcoin as a medium of exchange.[10]

TimidGuy (talk) 11:14, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

It is a fact that bitcoin (similarly to gold) has a limited supply. However, "having a limited supply" does not necessarily mean "being deflationary":

• For example, Martin Feldstein in [11] states that gold is not deflationary, making a point that gold is not a good hedge against inflation.
• The "deflationary" characterization of bitcoin is rather hypothetical, and many sources actually state the opposite predicting the value of bitcoin to decrease (some sources predicting the value to go to zero, which, in case of conventional currencies, is called a hyperinflation event, i.e., the opposite of deflation).

Thus, wanting to remain neutral, we should state that bitcoin does have limited supply, which is a property appealing to libertarians. Stating that "having a limited supply" means "being deflationary" is rather controversial. If we do, we should mention that some sources disagree. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 12:41, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

The source characterized it as deflationary, but I don't mind omitting that particular term. I think instead of my suggested heading above, it might be better to be more general and say "Philosophical appeal." TimidGuy (talk) 10:48, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

My proposal: A more generic subsection heading: Political ideology.

My proposed text: Bitcoin appeals to tech-savvy libertarians, because so far it exists outside of the institutional banking system and the control of governments.[12] Its appeal reaches from both left wing critics, "who perceive the state and banking sector as representing the same elite interests, [...] recognising in it the potential for collective direct democratic governance of currency"(Visions of a Techno-Leviathan: The Politics of the Bitcoin Blockchain Brett Scott,1 June 2014, E-International Relations) socialists [proposing their] own states, complete with currencies" (A left defence of Bitcoin International Socialist Network, December 2013, Margaret Corvid), to right wing critics suspicious of big government, at a time when activities within the regulated banking system were responsible for the severity of the financial crisis of 2007–08 (Melanie L. Fein, The Shadow Banking Charade,15 February 2013, SSRN) and [where "governments are not fully living up to the responsibility that comes with state-sponsored money" (Right-wing dreams, Edward Hadas. 27 November 2013.Thomson Reuters}'.

I dont think that you can say that "Libertarians have established a community in Chile" yet, per the Economist article.

I also would not mention "deflationary" nor "intentionally limited supply" in the section context.--Wuerzele (talk) 20:49, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

@Wuerzele:: The text you propose looks acceptable. I think, however, that the "Political economy" section name looks better than "Political ideology", which has a different meaning as far as I know. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 02:14, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

Political Economy may deal with ideology, but it is an entire domain of study, quite separate unto itself. --Quinn d (talk) 20:49, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

TimidGuy-?- waiting for your opinion.--Wuerzele (talk) 04:27, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. Looks good. TimidGuy (talk) 10:39, 5 September 2014 (UTC)

Political economy of bitcoin and control society

Copying the discussion from above:

Ladislav Mecir and TimidGuy As the author of a work that was recently added (I'm giving an upcoming talk on Bitcoin, so it may have been added by an attendee), but then promptly removed on account of "why is it a critique?" I'd suggest that it is manifestly a critique in the long tradition of political economy (I suggest it leads to a "control society", which is certainly a critical thing to say). I don't mind that it was removed (this section does seem dangerously close to self-promotion), but I do think there is a chilling effect occurring on this page, and to remove this section would be proof-positive of this. The only critical voices on the whole Bitcoin page are narrowly economic, which are not really critiques at all (they critique only the operation of Bitcoin, not its existence or effect). Some of the references below are good, but they too are deeply partisan. I think this section needs to remain, and while the reference to my work may not be appropriate, suggestions that there are people working on the political economy of bitcoin is important. --Quinn d (talk) 18:55, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

My objections to the paragraph: I, as an uninformed reader, do not know what are the negative/positive aspects of the "control society" versus the "disciplinary society". (I did not find the explanation in Wikipedia, which suggests that the "control society" notion may not be notable enough.) Thus, I was unable to decipher the text was a critique. I do not object against critical views, but they should be understandable. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 20:46, 30 September 2014 (UTC)

I replied in the thread above before I had seen the recent addition that was reverted. The source Journal of Peer Production seems okay. I don't understand why you were so quick to revert. Wouldn't it have been better to address the language? TimidGuy (talk) 10:01, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

TimidGuy, I agree with Ladislav´s revert and points. And I see nothing reflexive about the revert; Wikipedia edits normally undergo this cycle WP:BRD. Plus Ladislav kindly asked for more explanations on Quinn´s talkpage.

As far as WP:RS: I looked at the Journal of Peer production and have a hard time deciding whether it is okay, leaning towards Fleetham´s opinion. It is a very new journal. The long list of the editorial board contains names of folks, that were cited in the political economy section before, with work that we discussed and decided to replace (see talk archives).

As far as the points mentioned in the 2 sentences:

1. "To date, there has been very little political critique of bitcoin, since it is generally accepted as positive by the political Left and Right due to its perceived privacy-protecting, anti-censorship (distributed) nature." This claim and its purported cause, also a hypothesis, need a fact based citations. However, Isaac Quinn Du Pont, PhD student at UToronto, and author of the paper that is referenced, does not provide any references for these claims and their connection.
2. "Quinn DuPont suggests that due to Bitcoin's ordering function (undergirded by its cryptographic primitives), the increased use of Bitcoin may lead to a "Control Society" (a concept pioneered by the philosopher Gilles Deleuze". Cryptographic primitives, control society, and ordering function are undefined terms. The sentence is not written with transparency in mind. The claim of an "orderering function" can not immediately be understood, and worse, it is poorly explained and not backed up by others in the reference. Likewise "control society" is no familiar construct. Furthermore it is unclear why just bitcoin´s function could lead to it. In short, I cannot find the substance of, see problems with the quality of the referenced paper, and do not think it reaches encyclopedic relevance. I would not quote from or reference it. And that even though i welcome criticism (I wrote the section), and I am not an economist.

That said, I think it would be great if Quinn d would lend his expertise to constructively improve the section, especially after having condemned the -admittedly mainstream ("partisan")- sources used so far. Wuerzele2 (talk) 21:29, 1 October 2014 (UTC) (wuerzele while traveling)

Claim that bitcoin is the largest cryptocurrency

I reverted previous changes inserting the claim to the first paragraph of the lead. Fleetham reverted my edit, violating the WP:BRD policy without discussing the edits. To not continue the edit war, I list my reasons for the removal:

• Per WP:LEAD the lead shall serve as the summary of the most important aspects of bitcoin. However, neither Litecoin, nor Ripple are aspects of bitcoin, not to mention important.
• The sentence is unrelated to the preceding sentences, combining them is a poor style.
• Per WP:LEAD, significant information should not appear in the lead if it is not covered in the remainder of the article. The significant information not covered in the remainder of the article is the information that there are other cryptocurrencies, most of them derived from bitcoin. Without having this information in the article body, the discussed sentence does not belong to the lead. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 23:44, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

Sorry for reverting, but being the most prominent cryptocurrency is an important aspect of bitcoin. This information helps the reader place bitcoin in the proper context.

You are correct that anything mentioned in the lede should also be in the body of the article. However, I think the page has larger issues than that... it's sprawling with about thirty sub and sub-sub-sections many of which have little practical value. Just recently someone added a new sub-sub-section discussing the idea that because it's theoretically possible to see what each bitcoin was used to purchase in the past, the value of a particular bitcoin could be more or less than the value of some other bitcoin based on what was bought with it prior. While this is an extreme example, there are many places where essentially useless information has been added for one reason or another making the page, as it stands, much less helpful to the average reader than it could be.

If anything, I'd like to see more information removed from the body than added to it. Fleetham (talk) 22:40, 7 October 2014 (UTC)

I've long had the same impression. And I'd like to point out to Ladislav Mecir that BRD isn't policy nor a guideline, but an essay. TimidGuy (talk) 10:16, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

TimidGuy thanks for pointing out that its not a policy, you are right.

Fleetham I agree the fact that bitcoin is the largest cryptocurrency should be mentioned somewhere, also since in the forseeable future its number 1 place is unlikely to change, ie teh sentence wont need adjustment. But I also agree with Ladislav Mecir´s two reverts of the overreferenced sentence with its numerous cryptocurrency comparisons. Maybe a compromise should be sought with a supershort mention like bitcoin is the largest cryptocurrency and again under economic reception. This aint swelling up lede nor body.

The question of trimming the article, with which I also agree, is a separate one, and a bigger endeavor.--Wuerzele2 (talk) 21:20, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

Fungibility

Fleetham, it was me who inserted the subsection to the article. I am not 100% sure about the placement, but I am 100% sure about the notability of the subject - there are many sources discussing fungibility of bitcoin in reaction to the decision of IRS, or in reaction to the proposals to blacklist stolen bitcoins, bitcoins used at contraband sites, paid as ransom, or associted with other illegal activities. Any blacklisting would destroy the fungibility of bitcoin, making it unsuitable for payments. Some ‘clean’ coins would be easier to spend and transact with, while other ‘less clean’ or downright ‘tainted’ coins would be more difficult to use. For fiat money, the rules of bona fide acquisition establish the fungibility, in case of bitcoin the situation is less clear. The problem is exacerbated by the fact that the history of every coin is publicly available. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 12:38, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

Okay, well that argument makes sense... you would attract the attention of law enforcement if you spent "bad" bitcoins. Why isn't that explainer in the article itself? Fleetham (talk) 21:58, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

Tax guidance by IRS

In the "USA" subsection of "Legal status and regulation" there are two paragraphs mentioning that the IRS issued a tax guidance on 25 March 2014:

The US Government Accountability Office (GAO) reviewed virtual currencies upon the request of the Senate Finance Committee and in May 2013 recommended that the IRS formulate tax guidance for bitcoin businesses. On 25 March 2014, in time for 2013 tax filing, the IRS issued a guidance that virtual currency is treated as property for US federal tax purposes and that "an individual who 'mines' virtual currency as a trade or business [is] subject to self-employment tax.

and

The IRS classified bitcoins as a capital asset end of March 2014 and subject to taxes on capital gains.

As can be found out from the cited sources, both formulations announce the issuance of the same guidance by IRS. The first of the paragraphs is more detailed and better reflects the facts, also, the first paragraph contains the sources that are more reliable for examining the actual text of the guidance. Taking these facts into account, I deleted the second paragraph finding that it unnecessarily duplicates the information contained in the first one, but, I found out that it was restored by Aoidh using a justification that it did not appear to be a duplicate of anything in the article. I hope it is now clear that the second paragraph duplicates the news about the issuance of the guidance by IRS on 25 March 2014 and once again propose to delete the second paragraph as superfluous and inferior to the first one. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 09:06, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

"Already mentioned info"

This was removed citing that it's already in the article. Where is it? - Aoidh (talk) 20:58, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

See Talk:Bitcoin#Tax_guidance_by_IRS, please. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 21:08, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Bitcoins can be Stolen

The article says: "Bitcoins can be stolen[18] and chargebacks are impossible." However, there are no cases where bitcoins have been stolen due to weaknesses in the bitcoin protocol. So far all cases of bitcoin theft have been attributed to weak implementations by 3rd parties. For example, MtGox claims to have bitcoins stolen from it due to poor implementation or understanding of the bitcoin protocol. And the article linked to the claim "Bitcoins can be stolen" actually says more accurately "Bitcoins ... were stolen or transferred illegally". Meaning that the bitcoins were properly transfered from one account to another at the request of a user having the private key of the sending account. In other words, the bitccoin protocol did what it was supposed to do. It was the improper protection of private keys that allowed it to happen without the real owners consent. I am claiming that it is misleading to say "Bitcoins can be stolen" without any evidence to support this can happen using the bitcoin protocol. A more accurate statement might be "bitcoin can be stolen when the private keys of the sending address are made available to 3rd parties". But that is a irrelivent as a generalization of bitcoin.

I would like to propose that the words "Bitcoin can be stolen" be removed from this article completely, until there is a reliable reference to support this claim that is general to bitcoin.

Stealing digital property from an unprotected or ill implemented computer system has nothing to do with bitcoin in general and actually applies to any digital commodity or digital online service. I can equally say "digital photos can be stolen", "email can be stolen", "online bank accounts can be stolen", "passwords can be stolen" or "facebook can be stolen". But this discussion is not relavent to a general statement on digital photos, email, online banking or social networking. It is more accurate to say: "Bitcoin cannot be stolen" or "There is no proven method for stealing bitcoin from a properly secured wallet". Until such time as the opposite is true.

The generalization "Bitcoin can be stolen" seems like fear mongering. Whereas in truth, bitcoin provides a means of securing a digital balance that can be far more secure since it does not require the trust of any 3rd party. See: bitcoin paper wallets.

I am not saying that "Bitcoin can never be stolen". I am saying that this has not happened yet to the bitcoin protocol. Because if it were possible and this was common knowledge, the value of bitcoin would be $0/bitcoin. peawormsworth (talk) 00:21, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

• "Bitcoins can be stolen" is a correct and unambiguous statement about the reality. Unfortunately, some bitcoin apologists do claim that "bitcoins cannot be stolen", which of course is untrue.
  The claim that bitcoin is "more secure" (than what?) is also unsupported by facts, to say the least. Unlike money lost by credit card or bank fraud, stolen bitcoins cannot be canceled, blocked, or seized and returned to the legitimate owner. Bitcoins can be stolen instantaneously and remotely by malicious software, without exposing the thief. There is no security review or delaying of large or unusual transfers. I could write a page about "features" of bitcoin that render it less safe than other payment methods, including cash and credit cards.
  Whether in proportion to the total money supply, or to the total transaction volume, bitcoin theft is already at least an order of magnitude greater than credit card fraud. (The MtGOX heist alone was about 5% of all bitcoins in existence at the time, and its USD equivalent puts it among the largest heists of all times.) Things will only get worse if more people start using bitcoin and more value gets stored in it.
  It does not matter that the heists did not breach the protocol. (By that logic, one could also say that when someone else uses your credit card, that is not a weakness of the credit card system, because it did exactly what it was supposed to do -- namely, pay for the exenses of whoever had possession of your card data.) Bitcoins have been definitely stolen, hundreds of times, even though the protocol "worked as intended"; and -- as far as I know -- no thief has been caught yet.
  Saying that "bitcoin cannot be stolen from a properly secured wallet" is trivial tautology: by definition, nothing can be stolen from a properly secured storage. Unfortunately, the precautions needed to keep a "properly secured wallet" are quite cumbersome (starting with a second isolated computer with bare-bones installation); so that even computer security specialists often relax, and are sometimes victims of theft. Need I give examples?
  In conclusion, that section should be retained, if nothing else to dispel the common misisnformation that bitcoin is safer against theft than banks or credit cards. --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 06:05, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

Moving the "Malware" section out of "Criminal activities"

There is a broad consensus that malware is a part of criminal activities. It does not make sense to move the section elsewhere. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 10:23, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

• The original malware section comprised three things: a general comment on the widespread occurrence of bitcoin-related malware, then some material about malware that USES bitcoin (ransomware, stealing computing power) but does not impact the bitcoin system per se, and then some material on malware that is a threat to the bitcoin payment system itself (theft of private keys, address substitution). So I split the last two parts between "Criminal uses" and "Security", and moved the first paragraph, that conflates the two types, to the "Overview" section, which lacked it. --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 15:40, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

As alredy mentioned, my opinion is that everything you described is a bitcoin-related criminal activity, and should be kept in that section. I do not think "Criminal uses" section name is better than "Criminal activities", and I do not doubt that bitcoin theft, extortion, etc. are all criminal (mis)uses of bitcoin threatening individual users. While your opinion is different, I still must remind you that the placement of "Malware" to the "Criminal activites" section is a result of a consensus and you are the only editor going against that consensus. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 17:16, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

The fact is that the "Malware" section, its contents and placement were consensual, discussed at this talk page (see talk archives). Also, the current placement of the sections is inappropriate, and the text of the "Ransomware" section suggests that it is expected to be a part of the "Malware". Restoring to the previous consensual status quo and removing the incorrectly placed parts. Ladislav Mecir (talk) 11:19, 15 October 2014 (UTC)