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Bitcoin Payments Go Live At Overstock — Two Quarters Early

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the will-trade-bitcoin-for-socks dept.

New submitter citab writes with news that "the first major retailer is now accepting bitcoins!" In December, Overstock.com announced that they would begin accepting Bitcoin for payment as early as the end of second quarter 2014, but decided to make it a priority task to avoid having someone else beat them to it. From the article: "Last Tuesday, the company struck a deal to handle Bitcoin payments through a service operated by the suddenly hot San Francisco startup Coinbase, and since then, a team of Overstock engineers has worked almost every waking hour to prepare the site for what is undeniably a key moment in the digital currency’s short history. ... [Overstock CEO] Byrne believes this can ultimately boost the company’s bottom line, but that’s not his only aim. For Byrne, a rather opinionated libertarian who’s unafraid to take his company places others fear to tread, embracing the cryptocurrency is as much a political statement as a business decision. Like so many others, he believes Bitcoin can free the world from the control of big banks and big government. 'It helps us fight the machine,' he says."

3 of 182 comments (clear)

  1. First major retailer to accept Bitcoin by Rosco+P.+Coltrane · · Score: 5, Funny

    was Silkroad.

    --
    "A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
    1. Re:First major retailer to accept Bitcoin by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

      What does it matter that Overstock is immediately converting bitcoins to USD?

      Selling coins reduces the liquidity of the exchanges, purchasing coins increases it.
      If a large retailer starts selling a lot of coins but people don't begin buying coins at the same rate, the value of the coin itself drops. They don't have the option in the US (or most countries) to pay their workers in bitcoin, because we made it illegal to use Scrip for paying workers due to the horrible abuses it allowed. And for the most part they don't have the option to use the coin to purchase more inventory because most suppliers still aren't accepting it as payment.

      There really isn't any good reason for people to rush out and buy bitcoin just so they can buy stuff on Overstock. So the only people who will actually DO that are people who already have coin in their wallet, or people who are intentionally trying to increase the popularity of the currency.

      The bitcoin network has obviously created wealth in the world.

      Lol, no it hasn't. All it's done is shift wealth around, there is no inherent value to the coin itself.

      People who are getting all Drunk on bitcoin really need to look at what happens when private industry is allowed to control currency and payment systems.
      Here's a start: wikipedia.org/wiki/Scrip
      Make no mistake, bitcoin is not nearly as "decentralized" as people would like you to think, and it's not nearly as free from manipulation as is claimed. The difference is that it's the privately owned Exchanges which get to make the rules, as opposed to governments.

  2. This Is Huge! Game Changing Step by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    This is the big game changer right here. This is what has been holding everything back, up until now. With this policy decision things are really going to take off. Clearly it has been the lack of Bitcoin that has been holding Overstock.com back for all this time.