Bitcoin Payments Go Live At Overstock — Two Quarters Early

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."

Re:First major retailer to accept Bitcoin

[mythosaz]

Quibble: The owners of BTC wallets are anonymous; not the transactions.

But sure, there were some other confidence scares with the bust -- not just the loss of SR itself.

...if anyone asked me what you could do with BTC, I pretty much said, "Well, you can rent some server space, donate to the EFF or buy some party drugs."

Charlie Stross was right!

[madhatter256]

Bitcoin is the Libertarian's Currency!

Taken from his rant:

"Libertarians love it because it pushes the same buttons as their gold fetish and it doesn't look like a "Fiat currency". You can visualize it as some kind of scarce precious data resource, sort of a digital equivalent of gold. Nation-states don't control the supply of it, so it promises to bypass central banks. "

Re:I don't get it

[Anonymous Coward]

I guess for some the fact that you don't need to pass a credit check to participate in Bitcoin might be a major advantage.

Re:Fantastic news

[Jeff Flanagan]

Are you joking, or did you drink gallons of the bitcoin kool-aid? There's no reason that a single bitcoin should be worth more than $1, much less close to $1,000. It's all based on speculators, rather than any inherent value to bitcoins. Why make early-adopters and the founders of a single crypto-currency wealthy, when we can create new crypto-currencies as needed?

If crypto-currencies catch on, bitcoin will just be one of many, and I expect it to be worth a small fraction of the current bubble price caused by speculators rather than people actually using it as money.

Re:I don't get it

[Anonymous Coward]

Many people are interested in bitcoin because of the lack of central bank control and it's non fiat currency nature.

non fiat? Are you saying that bitcoins have intrinsic value?

Fluffy PR stunt

[bloodhawk]

If overstock was such a huge believer in bitcoin then they would accept it as a payment method. and NO this is NOT what they are doing, they are still only accepting US dollars, they are just supporting a 3rd party payment method that allows people to convert bitcoins. In exchange for this convenience they lose the ability to get a refund.

Re:First major retailer to accept Bitcoin

[Zynder]

Well, you can rent some server space, donate to the EFF or buy some party drugs

3 very important things!

Re: First major retailer to accept Bitcoin

[pantaril]

ordering fake ids (another trap)... he was not trying to stay hidden at all.

Why did he order fake IDs if he wasn't trying to stay hidden at all? I think you seriously underestimate the difficulty to run hidden service. It's asymetric war, the operator must do everythink correctly, the attacker needs to find only single mistake.

Ross is not an idiot, he is a hero who tried to run usefull service which could save many lives by ensuring some quality of the goods the shop was selling (thanks to user ratings). The idiots are the politicians who run war on drugs and the voters who support them. I feel sorry for his live ruined by the government.