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MIT Bitcoin Project To Create Cryptocurrency Ecosystem, Give $100 Per Student
rjmarvin (3001897) writes "Two MIT students have raised $500,000 to turn the campus into a cryptocurrency ecoystem, giving each MIT undergrad $100 in Bitcoin (or about 0.22 Bitcoins) starting next Fall. The MIT Bitcoin Project will make MIT the first physical location worldwide with widespread access to the digital currency. As of yet, there are no regulations governing how the students can use it."
It'll all be blown on Marijuana because that's what those liberal college students do.
Giving every student a fedora and trench-coat.
Unfortunately there was no money left for the "enough razors to shave neck-beards" initiative
The students that go to MIT should know better than that though.
Half a million. That's some serious demand for Bitcoins. You know that the number of Bitcoins is bounded, right? If you haven't invested, get in before MIT drives the price up!
More like they'll pool their money, buy components for and build a dedicated bitcoin harvester, invest their gains in more equipment, and virtuously circle their way to enough bitcoins to buy free weed for everyone, including the staff.
The issue with BitCoin isn't the acquisition, its the storage and spending. Giving each student easy access to a university-run "bank" with safe backed-up storage and good access would be a big step in the right direction. Having everywhere in MIT that accepts dollars also accept BitCoin would do far more.
The reason that the dollar works - that all currency works, really - is that people need it to interact with the government. Make BitCoin the easiest way to interact with MIT (for daily use stuff even) and people will use it, which will force them to acquire it, which will entice more people to take it, etc.
You're special forces then? That's great! I just love your olympics!
So, how does this work? Every time I see reference to fractional bitcoins I get confused.
Is a bitcoin an atomic or a divisible unit? I'd thought it was an atomic unit, and there wouldn't be things like 0.22 Bitcoins. How do you spend a fraction of a bitcoin?
Are there bitpennies? I don't think I understand this new fangled stuff well enough yet.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
what a great idea. when you need to put a theory into practice start with the smart. That way the realities that try the hypothesis will be experienced by individuals who know how best to express them.
I think the only problem with bitcoin is the anonymity of holder - not knowing how much the other actors have in an economic system leads to inefficiencies.
Purchases may be anonymized, but holders should not be.
Once the flow of money can be tracked atomically then distribution can be properly managed and the power that comes with currency can be allocated properly, justly and in a sustainable fashion.
After that, the real future can begin.
What does the IRS think about this little financial transaction?
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
Once there was a gnarled and crooked tree in a forest of stoat oaks. The oaks made fun of him because he was completely useless and served no purpose.
Now there stands a gnarled and crooked tree on a meadow where there once was a forest of stout oaks, free to all the carbon dioxide and nitrogen he could ever want, because being useless is immensely useful.
Beer & hookers...
Thank you - I now have a very amusing picture in my head of a stoat oak. Possibly some kind of bizarre animal-vegetable hybrid formed by those self-same ex-MIT students who all got rich promoting the currency of our new distributed overloads?
You're special forces then? That's great! I just love your olympics!
Well just make sure to save all your receipts for that $3 latte or whatever else you buy for 7 years along with hire a tax professional to figure everything out since you are paying with property that will have capitol gains/losses.
I imagine this is how the owlbear was conceived of. Though to be fair one of the advantages that pencil and paper offers over slashdot is an edit function.
Watch for the few accounts that the BitCoin flows into. Thems the drug dealers.
Like casinos in Nevada that mint their own silver dollar size tokens
and gaming chips it may make sense for closed electronic transaction
systems.
Parents and scholarships might make deposits to the account of a student.
Time payments to ensure a meal ticket or rent budget not be blown in a weekend
might be facilitated.
Interesting.....
Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't. Mark Twain.
Thank you for that, I foresee my gaming group encountering a pack of stoatoaks in the near future.
Really the main question is why? What was the supposed problem that this is solving? Or is this yet another solution in search of a problem.
It takes a lot of failures to get to a success. Don't feel bad about pissing away a bit of time and money to try something new. Even if it doesn't turn out as you hope it may help you understand something else in a new way.
Too many people want guaranteed success. They end up being the people who never get far.
Is to legitimize virtual currencies and get people primed for the move away from cash, because what gives those in power even more power?
Complete and utter control over your finances.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
Cryptocurrencies rely on smartphones and wallet backups and encryption and time delays and blah blah blah. It's actually less convenient and easy than cash or credit. So what they need is an NFC-like system. Just get the "credit belts" from the book A Tale of Time City or something. Those worked pretty slick! With bitcoins the delay to verify that a transmission wasn't faked is up to 10 minutes. Even in litecoin, it's 2.5 minutes. That's a bit long to hang around and make awkward conversation with the checkout person at a shop while there's a line behind you. That alone will make it not work.
I assume 'Gelatinous Cubes' were invented when someone's mom brought down snacks to the basement during a miniatures session.
Pretzel Golems didn't make the cut.
According to the IRS, bitcoin is a property, not a currency. For the IRS, bitcoin is the equivalent of real estate or shares of stock. You don't pay capital gains on currency, but you do on property.
By next fall, 100$ in Bitcoin might be 0.0022BTC or 22BTC.
Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
Actual bitcoins aren't all that interesting. They're roughly convertible to US dollars, something that students already have access to, so it's the equivalent of giving them back a small amount of money.
What would have been very interesting is if they'd created their own blockchain to create a currency unique to MIT and then make it valuable by accepting it for school expenses (tuition, housing, dining hall, bookstore, etc). The resulting experiment would be interesting to see...would we start to see small-scale industries where students paid for services from each other using the currency or would we simply see everyone use their ~$100 worth of MITCoin to pay for something and then see the currency die?
seriously, nobody gives a shit
Don't think of bitcoin as a currency, something that you hold over a period of time. Think of it as a transaction mechanism, an alternative to credit cards, pay pal, etc.
Merchants already have the option to assume zero risk when using bitcoins. An exchange like Coinbase lets merchants do all their accounting, pricing and billing in US Dollars. If a customer wants to use bitcoins the merchant sends the transaction info in USD to Coinbase, Coinbase translates that to Bitcoins and provides a Coinbase payment address, sends this updated transaction info back to the merchant and when coinbase receives the coins the merchant is paid the USD amount they originally submitted to coinbase regardless of any bitcoin price fluctuations that took place in the minutes it took the transaction to occur and be verified. The merchant never sees a bitcoin, and with the new IRS guidelines this is a good thing.
On the consumer side it may not be as convenient. It can take a few days to convert dollars to bitcoins, and there will probably be a fee. So keeping a small amount of coins in digital wallet may be common. Can they be lost, yes, but so can a physical wallet with USD. Can the USD to bitcoin conversion be sped up, perhaps with greater personal identification information provided to the exchange and a track record of use. But we're probably still talking about a 3 business day ACH transfer (bank to coin exchange) becoming a 1 business day ACH transfer.
What does the IRS think about this little financial transaction?
The IRS recently released a notice regarding virtual currencies.
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-dro...
I am not an accountant or tax advisor, but my understanding is that bitcoins are considered a property and not a currency so users must keep track of their basis and gains or losses like with stock purchases.
For incoming coins the new coins have a value based on the time they were received. The old coins returning to you based on when they were new. For outgoing coins (not including those coming back) it would probably be like other accounting practices where a first in first out (FIFO) system or a last in first out (LIFO) system is used. In either case the basis of the outgoing coins are known.
The odd thing would seem to be that as the outgoing coins are spent its necessary to determine if a gain (coins being paid at a price higher than basis) or a loss (coins being paid at a price lower than basis) is being recognized.
Ex. You buy one coin at $500 and another at $600. Coins are priced at $800 at the time of a future purchase. You buy something for $1,200, 1.5 coins. Using FIFO your basis for the outgoing 1.5 coins is $500 + $300 = $800, and the basis for the returning 0.5 coins is still $300. You experienced a gain of $400 on the 1.5 coins at the time of the sale and that $400 would seem to be taxable income. Apologies if I botched the math, hopefully the point gets across.
Actually, the satoshi is the fundamental units. Every other multiple is based on a satoshi amount. 1 BTC = 1e8 satoshis
I foresee some young enterprising student to institute a "Beer for BitCoin" service. ... and since the BitCoins are being given free, I guess it falls under "Free as in Beer".
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Wow, I thought "the humorless mods are out in strength today" so I modded this +1 Funny, yet it remained at Score:0, Offtopic. I'm starting to think we're dealing with a /. editor who doesn't tolerate criticism on the antiquated posting and moderation system.
In case I'm just being paranoid and it's the humorless mods anyway: dear mods, even though I noticed "owlbear" is often used in a political context on this site, don't you think it really looks like this particular instance is an innocuous D&D reference?
And now The Bitcoin Betting Guide is giving 0.01 Bitcoin to any MIT student through Nitrogen Sports. It’s happening!
http://bitcoin-betting-guide.com/james-cannings-blog/free-0-01bitcoin-to-mit-students-for-using-nitrogen-sports/
How is owlbear used in a political context here? A google search wasn't very enlightening.
Chuang Tzu, section 20
Can anyone else in the class tell us why Ralphie here picked 2014 Jan-Apr only, instead of looking at:
* the last year (since April 2013)
* the last full calendar year (2013 Jan-Dec)
* since the currency in question was started (1792 for USD vs 2009 for BTC)
Here's the answer.