

French Tobacco Shops Will Sell Bitcoin and Ethereum Starting January 2019 (venturebeat.com) 121
Tobacco shops are a staple of daily life across France, selling cigarettes, newspapers, magazines, and lottery tickets. Come January, these most traditional of merchants will take a plunge into the future by adding cryptocurrencies to their wares. From a report: The French Federation of Tobacco Vendors (French Confederation Nationale des Buralistes), which represents the 27,000 tobacco shops in France, announced that it has approved plans for its members to sell Bitcoin and Ethereum to customers. The program is expected to start in 3,000 locations in January, eventually rolling out to all tobacco shops across the country. Of course, the timing is somewhat less than ideal, as prices of cryptocurrencies have been in free fall most of this year. Just this week, Bitcoin hit a new low for 2018. While the effort is seen as a new potential revenue source for these merchants, it remains far from clear how interested the general public is in owning cryptocurrencies.
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They do however give a huge shit if the money they have today is worth 50% less tomorrow.
That is more of an investment concern than what I am talking about.
I don't think people will replace nation-currency with Bitcoin or anything like that. Bitcoin will simply eventually become the engine of commerce as I said, for grey and black market transactions... small amounts for most people, to get things the government does not want them to have (like drugs in most of the world, or sugary drinks in New York).
As
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"And for your non-white markets. Hard physical cash is king."
When has that been the case? Black market only strives on times of trouble and times of trouble bring inflation.
If there's one situation you definitely don't want to depend on hard cash is on an inflationary economy.
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Cash, grass, or ass (where ass can mean physical labor in exchange for goods and services; and not just the giggity definition).
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There is no ban on sugary drinks in New York. If you require "alternative facts" to make your point, maybe your point just sucks.
Or are you lying out of "love" again?
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A) If you were PopeRizzo, maybe you would understand a joke when you read one.
B) "the government does not want them to have" != ban
C) Future-proofing the joke for later readers.
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Kendall plays the bassoon [wikipedia.org]?
Re:I think these will rise again (Score:5, Interesting)
Think about how much Bitcoin would rise again if even 10% of the people in most modern cities around the world bought and started using a few hundred $ worth.
Now think about how much it would be worth if they didn't.
PS: Currencies aren't supposed to "rise", they're supposed to be stable.
You'll be mocked mercilessly until you grasp this concept: A thing can't be both an investment instrument and a working currency at the same time.
Are you sure about that? (Score:2)
A thing can't be both an investment instrument and a working currency at the same time.
A) I am saying it's mostly going to be a working currency, however...
B) are you really trying to say that currencies are never are treated as investments [investopedia.com]? Really?
Even the USD (sort of stable) is used by people around the world as a hedge if nothing else. Just what life experience makes you think any currency cannot work for people and also be an investment at the same time? The more I think about it I am pretty sure y
Re:Are you sure about that? (Score:5, Insightful)
B) are you really trying to say that currencies are never are treated as investments [investopedia.com]? Really?
No, but really:
a) All currencies trend downwards in the long term, due to inflation.
b) To make money, you're relying on the difference between two currencies becoming larger over time.
c) You're relying mostly on one currency going down, not the other one going up (ie. the other one won't be worth more in the country where it's used).
Right now:
i) All cryptocurrencies are going down so the advice of any sensible person would be to switch to $, not the other way around.
ii) It's a negative feedback loop, less people using Bitcoin as a currency means it won't "recover", it will be worth less and less as time passes.
Re: Are you sure about that? (Score:2)
B) are you really trying to say that currencies are never are treated as investments? Really?
I believe the word you're looking for is "hedge."
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I believe the word you're looking for is "hedge."
From my very post:
Even the USD (sort of stable) is used by people around the world as a hedge if nothing else.
Looks like I found it before you did...
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Yeah, parent's understanding of monetary systems seems to have been created by observation rather than study, academia, peer-review, etc. His rule might work for fiat currencies, but falls flat for pre-fiat currency systems (gold, gems, commodities or commodity-backed). I say **might**, because I'm not expert, nor interested in any sort of argument/research... I merely know enough to know he's full of beans.
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"A thing can't be both an investment instrument and a working currency at the same time."
What compleat horse shit you have crapped out, there. Of course it can. It depends on the timing and duration of the investment.
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It depends on the timing
A yes, the famous I will "time" my way to riches. Wall St. is absolutely paved with the shirts of all the people who uttered those words.
How does one "use" bitcoin in daily life? (Score:2)
Think about how much Bitcoin would rise again if even 10% of the people in most modern cities around the world bought and started using a few hundred $ worth.
How does one "use" bitcoin in daily life? In many national jurisdictions with those modern cities bitcoin is considered an asset. So when you buy a cup of coffee with bitcoins you have to note the price of those coins when you received them, note the current price at which you used them, calculate the gain or loss that was just realized and report that gain/loss to your tax authority when you file your tax return. Just as if you sold an asset such as stocks.
Of course buying that coffee was theoretical. E
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Think about how much Bitcoin would rise again if even 10% of the people
So you are hoping for even more wild swing in value of a purported 'currency' that people are going to trust.
You're not doing Bitcoin's case for becoming a stable currency people trust as a means for exchange any kind of favor.
In the revolutionary (non-corrupt) days of the Soviet Republic, they lined speculators up against the wall.
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"So you are hoping for even more wild swing in value of a purported 'currency' that people are going to trust.
You're not doing Bitcoin's case for becoming a stable currency people trust as a means for exchange any kind of favor.
In the revolutionary (non-corrupt) days of the Soviet Republic, they lined speculators up against the wall."
My opinion of bitcoins as currency is not any higher than yours, but this is as much a strawman argument as it can get.
His argument was not that bitcoin was a good currency bec
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It sounds like you're trying to double down on the idea that this Crypto"currency" should be an investment vehicle.
No. The whole point in a currency is trust and stability. When the value of a currency swings wildly, it's called "inflation" or "deflation" and it disrupts the entire economy. Currencies are supposed to be very stable means of exchange. A dollar's worth of sand should be a dollars worth of sand five weeks from now.
at whatever the exchange rate it happens to be stable enough needs to be so
My Hovercraft is full of Etherium (Score:3, Insightful)
I will not buy this bitcoin, it is trashed.
While I am enamored by the cleverness of the entire proof of work system it seems like there's an inescapable problem with the proof of work concept.
To boil bitcoin down to it's most elemental irreducible aspect there is one and only one thing that all cryptocurrencies have to do. This is prevent double spending the same token without using a central authority to regulate when a coin is transferred and can't be spent again. There's other nifty bells and whistles
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If they had but adopted APK's hosts file engine, they would find true prosperity.
Bitcoin can not survive without APK. It is the same for all of us. We need him! Badly!
Give your mind, body, and soul to APK! Only then will you know true prosperity.
ALL HAIL APK
Re: My Hovercraft is full of Etherium (Score:2)
That's a really silly line or reasoning. You may as well argue that banks are trash because once they stockpile enough cash and valuables in their vault, it becomes profitable for someone to put together an armed crew and rob them at gunpoint.
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"You may as well argue that banks are trash because once they stockpile enough cash and valuables in their vault, it becomes profitable for someone to put together an armed crew and rob them at gunpoint."
Why do you think commercial buildings, being them banks or shops only want to retain as little money and for a shortest time as possible?
You think you are debunking his argument but you are making it stronger. Unless there was a means *not* to stock enough physical money at a single place that would be exa
Re: My Hovercraft is full of Etherium (Score:2)
Why do you think commercial buildings, being them banks or shops only want to retain as little money and for a shortest time as possible?
Because cash is trash!!!11!1!1
You think you are debunking his argument but you are making it stronger.
That's a rather special take on it ...
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You need to get on Facebook, hit my dumbass brother-in-law with this.
He's a goddam day trader who chases the little ball around the black and red spinning reel and he, like most gamblers, loses at about a rate of .4%, on average.
He knows that I know cryptocurrency from a deep technical side and every fucking time we get together he corners me and asks questions that are crafted to get him to the place where his frustrated WIFE will let him go down that rabbit hole.
I don't know, and am not willing to researc
An idea, it's time come. (Score:2)
"French Tobacco shops... selling cigarettes, newspapers, magazines, and lottery tickets."
Well, that's the stamp of financial legitimacy right there. Classy!
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"French Tobacco shops... selling cigarettes, newspapers, magazines, and lottery tickets."
Well, that's the stamp of financial legitimacy right there. Classy!
Smells like freedom. Where the guns at?
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Not as reputable as Magic the Gathering ... (Score:2)
"French Tobacco shops... selling cigarettes, newspapers, magazines, and lottery tickets."
Well, that's the stamp of financial legitimacy right there. Classy!
True, no where near the financial legitimacy as say a Magic the Gathering Trading Card Exchange that was handling 70% of all bitcoin transactions in 2014, before it noticed that 850,000 bitcoins were missing and shut down and filed for bankruptcy.
Seriously, I did not make that up.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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MtGox has NOTHING to do with magic the gathering you stupid asshole!!!
From the wiki link you apparently ignored:
"Founding (2006-10)
In late 2006, programmer Jed McCaleb (eDonkey2000, Overnet1, Ripple, Stellar) thought of building a website for users of the Magic: The Gathering Online fantasy-based card game service, to let them trade "Magic: The Gathering Online" cards like stocks. In January 2007, he purchased the domain name mtgox.com, short for "Magic: The Gathering Online eXchange". Initially in beta release, sometime around late 2007, the service went live for approxi
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Isn't that backwards? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: In California they supported both... (Score:2)
They even sell activist stickers on ebay that say something like
"Your privacy from this camera was enabled by this sticker, go here to buy more".
Can you buy them with bitcoins?
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Burns the same (Score:2)
Wasn't the original point of crypto to act as a replacement for cash in order to purchase goods and services?
Yes, but the point is you would buy the bitcoin from the tobacco shop to use to purchase things you could not buy at the shop, hint hint...
Either way you are buying something to burn later for some form of enjoyment.
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Ah, you mean a way for the French to pay their outstanding taxes, right?
(Do those tax agency scammers even speak French? In Canada they seem to get upset if you ask them to speak in French. After all, service in your preferred language is your legal right...)
After all, you buy BTC (Back Taxes Credit) at BTC machines to pay your taxes owing. (Yes, that's what they call the
Re: Isn't that backwards? (Score:2)
Hurry! (Score:5, Funny)
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Perhaps each marchand de tabac could be issued a spinning wheel. When told the customer will pay with bitcoin, he gives it a spin and where it stops will indicate how many bitcoin his pack of Gitanes will cost, from 0.01 up to 999. It's just as likely to be right as any other means of determining its "value".
If you had any doubts before (Score:2)
This should convince even the most ardent cryptocurrency believer that it’s over - it’s time to move on.
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Funny thing about cultists.. when they realise they've been burned, some will leave. When burned again, a few more will leave. Each subsequent burning reduces the pool to a few fervid fanatics who WILL NOT give up.
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like the cults, they imagine themselves "the faithful" the "true followers" that God will bless
Of course it's really Jim Jones and the Koolaide
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no "the advocates" still are harping that it's the solution to all economic ills and the greatest investment vehicle conceived by the mind of man.
[favorite crypto currency currently going to shit] is POISED, ready to EXPLODE, going to go MAINSTREAM, AVOIDS THE FLAWS the fiat currencies have
bwhahaha, these idiots are pissing away their money on their delusions, have converts and followers pissing away their money....unbelievable!!!
Great timing (Score:2)
I am anticipating poor sales, as BTC is circling the drain.
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oh no, it's POISED to MOVE EXPLOSIVELY in the next SIGNIFICANT BULL RUN
How Appropriate (Score:2)
Now my financial investments can go up in smoke, in addition to my other purchases from that shop.
So now not only will you die of lung cancer (Score:2)
But they'll help you die penniless as well. What a brilliant idea.
How come (Score:2)
Currency or investment? (Score:2)
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bitcoin and all the others can't be a currency anyway by definition.
It's a game point, nothing more. soon enough people will leave the game it will collapse.
Re: Currency or investment? (Score:2)
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no, too illiquid, which is one of many problems the so-called cryto-currency have. that delay makes consistent valuation impossible. add the problem of not being accepted in most places and we find none of the cc can be called currency or money.
Where is the demand? (Score:2)
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Slashdot was always a disgusting hole, but this yuk. For a start, most of the things you're describing aren't even things a woman likes! Some young clueless man is going to read this and wonder why she ran away when he shat on her chest. Come on... I'm against censorship.
Don't make them wield it against valid but offensive opinions and facts that "trigger" people - with the excuse being *your* poor taste and disgusting attitudes to sex.
This stuff *reeks* of Anti-Fa and the far left false-flagging these post
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The unfortunate reality is that you are probably right. I can be so naive!
Also, to the idiot who called me a leftie. my posts years ago were from the left, but I left the left sometime in early 2010's. I felt very alone for a while!