[ExI] My personal "intelligence" failure regarding Bitcoin...

[Brent Allsop]

I have a good story too.  It's much longer, so sorry, but for those 
interested....

I liquidated a significant portion of my IRA to invest in Bitcoin, and 
bought in at an average of about about $120.  I was having fun at the 
Bitcoin Miama conference, in Jan of this year, while Bitcoin was arround 
$900, and I was thinking I was going to be way more rich than I really was.

At that conference I heard more about Either, and Bitshares, and 
realized Bitcoin was doomed, so I started selling, while still arround 
$800.  At least, I was doing this slowely.  I still fealt Bitcoin had a 
good chance at making at least one more 10 times in value run, so was 
taking my time.  But as things started to crash, likely because of 
MtGox, I panicked and activated my rehearsed plan to get out as fast as 
possible.  This plan included selling the maximum limit on many 
exchanges I had established accounts with, including MtGox.  So this 
include sending 90  of my Bitcoin through Mt Gox with an immediate 
sell.  I knew the risk, but figured the better price was worth the cost, 
and obviously lost that bet, and those 90 Bitcoin.

So, when all is said and done, I made a crap load of money, and then 
lost most of it during this expensive panic selling on exchanges. 
incliding being Goxed.  But we were able to pay off our house with what 
was left, and we had near the same amount of money left, not in IRA 
money, taxes and penalties paid, so kind of a constellation, finally not 
having a house payment, and some non IRA money could could now spend/invest.

I then invested (not near as much) in both Bitshares and Either, still 
thinking these will take over where Proof of Waist Bitcoin left off.  At 
the Bitshares Price peak, I made more money, with a much smaller 
investement, than I did with Bitcoin, so was feeling rich again.  But, 
at the current valuations, the profit is much smaller.  I sometimes 
wonder if even Bitshares or Either will be able to survive and make 
crypto currency any more than a flash in the pan, like most all grass 
roots efforts to revolutionize the world.  People just need to find some 
way to make a grass roots efforts scale to become as powerful to compete 
with Hierarchy and bureaucracy.  (You know, like you can do with 
Canonizer.)  and become more than just a flash in the pan.  I think at 
least Ripple will disrupt things, and contribute to the hierarchical 
bureaucracies that created them, and make things more efficient than 
currently.  It'd be too bad if we can't do more.

I could sell out now, with little if any profit, again.  I am wondering 
if I should.  Or, could a 2.0 currency take over where Proof of waist 
left off?

What would you guys do?  Anyone still holding any crypto currency of any 
kind, besides me?  What is your favorite Currency (most likely to have a 
future) today?  Bitshares and Either are still quite pie in the sky, but 
you never know, if they can manage not to destroy each other (again, as 
Canonizer.com might be able to enable, by building consensus for things 
like mergers between such).  After all, the singularity is near, right?

Brent












On 1/25/2015 5:53 PM, John Clark wrote:
> On Sun, Jan 25, 2015 at 1:51 AM, Stuart LaForge <avant at sollegro.com 
> <mailto:avant at sollegro.com>> wrote:
>
>
>     Don't feel so bad, John. You didn't profit but neither did you
>     lose. I too have a tale of woe regarding bitcoin. I bought 120 btc
>     from MtGox back in 2011 at about $8 per when MtGox was the only
>     exchange with any  reputation.
>
>     Because my computer is old and slow, except for some
>     experimentation, I never transferred the btc into my wallet. I
>     figured I was going to be trading on the highs and lows anyway so
>     I left my bitcoins in my MtGox account as I would stocks on
>     E-trade or a similar online brokerage account.
>
>     When the price went through the roof back at the end of 2013, I
>     sold off my coins for about $60,000. I was congratulating myself
>     for having made a $59,000 profit on a $1000 investment.
>
>     But when I tried to get my $60,000 wired back to my bank account,
>     the nightmare began. MtGox started demanding copies of my ID, bank
>     account statements, and even some kind of letter from my bank to
>     prove that I was who I said I was. This was all despite the fact
>     that it was the same bank account from which I had wired Gox my
>     original $1000.
>
>     Well needless to say, I started get really nervous about sending
>     all manner of personal info to them especially when the forums
>     were full of people saying they had sent all their info months
>     earlier and still had not gotten their money. So I bought back
>     into bitcoin at a loss, upgraded my wallet, and tried to transfer
>     the bitcoins out of MtGox at which point, they announced that they
>     were halting all bitcoin withdrawals. Then a few weeks later MtGox
>     declared bankruptcy.
>
>     So I guess what I am trying to say is that I got into bitcoin
>     early but still managed to lose $60,000 (really only $1000 & 2 yrs
>     of waiting) and feel kind of idiotic because of it. So don't feel
>     bad for not making money in bitcoin if you didn't lose any either.
>
>
> There are worst Bitcoin stories, A man names James Howell in the UK 
> mined 7,500 Bitcoins in 2009 on his home computer but then lost 
> interest in it. A few year later he junked his old computer, including 
> the hard drive, and sent it to a landfill. Then in late 2013 when he 
> realized it was worth millions he talked to the dump manager to ask 
> where his old computer might be, he said it was burred between 3 and 5 
> under potentially hazardous waste in a area the size of a soccer 
> field. He never found it.
>
>  John K Clark
>
>
>
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