Bitcoins - can I get rich? ponzi scheme?

[Krieg]

Money is made out of thin air, money it is just numbers in the computer bank. Every time someone loan money from the bank they just write a new balance in your account with the money you loaned, just like that. It is backed up by Jew magic.

Edit: BTW, the BTC prices are crashing right now.

[badgevvrecker]

truly hope you aren't responding to my sarcasm with stuff that anyone who reads about money knows.

[Jerrod]

Edit: BTW, the BTC prices are crashing right now.

BTC China is getting hammered by the Chinese government, but they're still operational and looking for ways of sidestepping the latest rulings. If they can figure a way to recharge accounts without using yuan, prices will shoot back up. I'll be watching closely the next few weeks.

[Thrashmaster Flash]

Now is definitely a good time to get either filthy rich or 100% stone-cold broke, but I'm not sure which! I'm actually considering buying some of these damn things after the current crash, but I'm a little too risk-averse, I think. If you could flip these things really fast (maybe you can; I don't know because I know approximately jack shit about investing), then I think you could very reasonably make some big returns in the next day or two.

[Zap Rowsdower]

How is BTC something secretive? BTC is fully open source, anyone can buy them, sell them, mine them, etc without the intervention of any "official" entity. Everything you need to fulfill a BTC transaction is the 3 people, the one with the BTC, the one who wants to get the BTC and the one who will facilitate the transaction. So as long as there is one person doing the transaction BTC will be alive, and that person can be just a plain normal user. So how are governments going to stop that?

I can understand people being afraid of putting big amounts of high earned dollar bux on BTC, but at the end of the day it is just a very volatile currency, it is not magic and it is not a scam. It is just very risky.

I mean the people who use them generally do so for secretive, off-the-grid purposes (i.e. child porn, drugs, money laundering, and tax evasion).

[featherboa]

Now is definitely a good time to get either filthy rich or 100% stone-cold broke, but I'm not sure which! I'm actually considering buying some of these damn things after the current crash, but I'm a little too risk-averse, I think. If you could flip these things really fast (maybe you can; I don't know because I know approximately jack shit about investing), then I think you could very reasonably make some big returns in the next day or two.

It'll probably take to long to get setup on a website and then wire transfer money to an exchange. That big dip is already done anyways, for now. You can flip them fast on an exchange. You can watch that happening here http://bitcoinwisdom.com/
Getting USD out of an exchange back to your bank takes longer

I did have a gambling/odds question though...

http://wdc.rapidballs.eu/

under what conditions should I play these raffles? Lately, not many people have been entering. I always forget to in time because it happens at 8pm UTC.
1 WDC = ~$0.30
Yesterday only 5 people entered the daily raffle.

I have a bunch that I bought for cheap

[Necrophilic Mallard]

wtf?

Colors Payouts

Match 0 Colors: Win x2 Stake
Match 3 Colors: Win x10 Stake
Match 4 Colors: Win x70 Stake
Match 5 Colors: Win x800 Stake
Match 6 Colors: Win x1200 Stake
Minimum Stake: 0.1WDC

Tell us how rich you got!

[featherboa]

wtf?

Colors Payouts

Match 0 Colors: Win x2 Stake
Match 3 Colors: Win x10 Stake
Match 4 Colors: Win x70 Stake
Match 5 Colors: Win x800 Stake
Match 6 Colors: Win x1200 Stake
Minimum Stake: 0.1WDC

Tell us how rich you got!

gonna quote this so you can't chad out

[Thrashmaster Flash]

I did have a gambling/odds question though...

http://wdc.rapidballs.eu/

under what conditions should I play these raffles? Lately, not many people have been entering. I always forget to in time because it happens at 8pm UTC.
1 WDC = ~$0.30
Yesterday only 5 people entered the daily raffle.

I have a bunch that I bought for cheap

This is a pretty simple situation to determine the +EV (positive expected value) entry point. The rake is 20%, with the remaining 80% of the prize pool going to a single winner. However—as you noticed—the house will pay the full guarantee even if the amount of entries needed to generate a prize pool is not met. This sometimes happens in poker tournaments where a payout guarantee is set but not enough people enter. It can be +EV off the top to play if you're able to enter the tournament right before the final registration period, as long as the house has failed to secure enough registrations to cover the guarantee.

Let's look at a simple scenario, where 10 entrants buy in (all 3 drawings have 10:1 payouts), and for the sake of simplicity, we'll pretend like it's $1 an entry (making it a $10 guarantee). If 10 people buy in, that's a $10 prize pool. $8 goes to the players (making each player's equity in this situation $0.80) and $2 goes to the house.

Now, if fewer players are involved, the prize pool stays the same, raising the equity of each individual player. At what point should you enter the drawing?

SPOILERSPOILER_SHOW

8 players in the pool is the breakeven point. Since the player pool is $8 and there are 8 players, each player has exactly $1 in equity, which makes it a 0% house edge game. Therefore, if you can ensure that no more than 7 players will enter the pool, then you have a +EV game, with each player holding about $1.14 equity (profit of $0.14). With 6 players, that's $0.33 profit. If there are only 5 players, you have a monstrous 60% edge, netting you an EV of $0.60 per drawing.

[Thrashmaster Flash]

Also note that you should never play the drawing game if there is a chance of 8 or more entrants (8 is breakeven, but the risk of a last minute player sneaking in makes a breakeven proposition undesirable, unless you're also getting some sort of comps or other incentive). Since the payout will presumably remain 10:1 even if the entrants exceed the guarantee threshold, the 20% vig will make any further action a really bad investment (unless you get better than 10:1; specifically, odds that defeat the house edge).

[Thrashmaster Flash]

wtf?

Colors Payouts

Match 0 Colors: Win x2 Stake
Match 3 Colors: Win x10 Stake
Match 4 Colors: Win x70 Stake
Match 5 Colors: Win x800 Stake
Match 6 Colors: Win x1200 Stake
Minimum Stake: 0.1WDC

Tell us how rich you got!

Read it closely.

SPOILERSPOILER_SHOW

How much do you get paid if you match 1 or 2 colors?

[featherboa]

awesome
setting alarm on phone for an hour before draw

also, this probably isn't enough to change the math, but i get 1.38% of the site's profits

[Thrashmaster Flash]

also, this probably isn't enough to change the math, but i get 1.38% of the site's profits

It makes a game with 8 players marginally profitable.

[Jerrod]

http://rt.com/usa/bloomberg-anchor-robbed-bitcoin-747/

[jews 4 cheez-its]

lol mt. gox

[Necrometer]

[this guy lost...]About 14 coins. And it happens to be the last 14 coins my wife will ever let me invest in bitcoin. She wants nothing to do with it now. Not for investing, not for spending -- nothing. And it's a damned shame.

I love how all the other bitcoin companies got together to say that their money was safe. Did they think that would help people like me? Do they think my wife cares?

1 coin = ~$500, right? some guy said he lost 1000

[featherboa]

daggum. i hadn't looked today $433. pretty low for nowadays. i should get some more.

[Zap Rowsdower]

I read an article yesterday how prices on Mt Gox nearly doubled in an obvious arbitrage opportunity should withdrawals open again. So much faith put into the Magic the gathering of the juggalos Online Exchange.

[jews 4 cheez-its]

[jews 4 cheez-its]

They might as well have written that in crayon...

[Zap Rowsdower]

What I really want to know is how much money the Winklevoss twins lost.

[Necrometer]

Aaaand the dude took the money and ran. hahahahah

http://valleywag.gawker.com/mt-gox-died ... -hedgecock

Financial regulators in Japan, where Mt.Gox was based, say they won't intervene, because virtual money is not their problem.

ahahahahaha, jesus... I guess that's why you don't invest in Monopoly money (outside of the game of Monopoly)

[james]

you can still use it to buy drugs though...

[Necrometer]

definitely

but... the people with TONS invested were simply trying to gain wealth/power by doing something risky

it was pretty literal gambling

I still think it's cool to have a weird e-currency because fuck the police

but until it reaches whatever steady state, all the deeply associated people will be gamblers

[Zap Rowsdower]

There's an inherent libertarian bend to the pro-bitcoin arguments about the lack of a middleman and transaction fees that exist for "fiat" currencies. I'll gladly absorb some of the costs passed down to me for Visa fees if I know the fed'rul gub'mint is insuring my accounts in the event I wake up and discover the RPG game card exchange database and/or "federal and state regulated bank" (whatever that is) disappears with all my money.