Bitcoin: Led By Example

Exactly this is wrong:
US players currently need to pay 35 US$ or sometrhing like that to withdraw 1000 PEDs from Entropia... due to bank fees. With any cryptocurrency it would go down to a few cents.

It's been quite some time since my last withdrawal, but I do not recall it being anywhere near that much. I thought it was more like a few percent.

Regardless, MA keeps a 1% fee, and there will be some cost of transaction for MA to buy them and for you to sell them, so I am not seeing a huge savings. Plus, it won't do anything to speed up the withdrawal time.

I don't hate Bitcoins. I think they're cute and funny and silly, just like an online version of Beanie Babies. But, I do think it's a little misguided to think that the player base is going to significantly increase if MA starts taking Beanie Babies (sorry, I meant Bitcoins) as deposits directly as opposed to taking them through Netteller as they already do. And that was the premise of this thread.
 
I've just checked Coinbase's site just now and it seems they now charge a 1% fee. This fee is waved on the merchant's first $1,000,000 US in merchant processing. So yeah, free until they go over $1 million, then it becomes 1%.

First of all, if MA is to believed, it probably wouldn't take that long for them to hit that $1,000,000 turnover mark.

Second, right now, transaction fees for processing BTC are being "paid" by the fact that people are still receiving the odd coin for doing the actual processing. Unfortunately, the system is reaching a point where that will most likely not be the case. Once that happens, there will have to be an actual fee or no one will process the transactions.
 
Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are very interesting as 'tokens of value' or means of payment. But there is more than that in bitcoin and blockchain technology.

Digital items in games have always had fake scarcity because the company can always create more, making it quite difficult to value or price. Blockchain-based digital goods, however, are truly mathematically scarce, and can be traded like other financial assets, outside of the game. Some games are entering this field and MA will probably have to look at it if it wants to preserve its real cash economy on the long term.
 
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It's been quite some time since my last withdrawal, but I do not recall it being anywhere near that much. I thought it was more like a few percent.

Correct, but a few month ago, MA made this statement:
https://account.entropiauniverse.com/support-faq/pages/2015/06/26/7937/index.xml?

Today Entropia Universe via MindArk sends all its payments/bank transfers to US-residents via Bank of America. We have been informed that Bank of America will increase their fees (starting July 1, 2015) and they will start charging an intermediary fee of 30 USD, that on top of the fee that your bank charge you for receiving the transfer.

[...]

The bank fees will be about 36 USD in total.

To make everything extra clear:

This option is today only available for residents in the US that have made a withdrawal in USD.
It is not MindArk that deduct the $30 intermediary fee from the amount, the fee will be deducted during the transfer.

So as said: the problem is not MA, the problem are the banks. Cryptocoins help to avoid a LOT fees.

Another example:
You donate 1 US$ to a charity with credit card, and you are charged 2.50€uro when doing this from Europe. Doesn't make any sense in my opinion.
 
Correct, but a few month ago, MA made this statement:
https://account.entropiauniverse.com/support-faq/pages/2015/06/26/7937/index.xml?



So as said: the problem is not MA, the problem are the banks. Cryptocoins help to avoid a LOT fees.

Another example:
You donate 1 US$ to a charity with credit card, and you are charged 2.50€uro when doing this from Europe. Doesn't make any sense in my opinion.

That 30$ fee can be avoided by using PayPal, which is explained in the same post. The issue would in that case be the remaining few dollars, since the 30 dollars can already be avoided. You should compare it to the current options, and not the worst of the current options.
 
For me BTC is a better option than Paypal. So of course I compare it to the best possible solution, that I already can use on other websites.
 
it's all about eliminating transaction fees..

the stability of bitcoin with a payment processor like bitpay is irrelevant..
but I am also aware that some people's skulls are so thick that they will never understand that.
 
For me BTC is a better option than Paypal. So of course I compare it to the best possible solution, that I already can use on other websites.

Which is why I pointed out you should compare the fees to the ones of PayPal and not the bank transfers, as PayPal as of today seems to be a better option than bank.

it's all about eliminating transaction fees..

the stability of bitcoin with a payment processor like bitpay is irrelevant..
but I am also aware that some people's skulls are so thick that they will never understand that.

We are looking at a 1% for bitcoins compared to 1% of current methods (https://account.entropiauniverse.com/support-faq/deposits-and-withdrawals/withdrawal-faq/). I am not aware of any additional fees using PayPal as of today, but need to look it up.

----

And I would like to add; I'm in neither of the camps at the moment. I am curious and would like to see arguments from both sides in order to be able to make my mind up.
 
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Which is why I pointed out you should compare the fees to the ones of PayPal and not the bank transfers, as PayPal as of today seems to be a better option than bank.

PayPal charges nothing in most Casey for most countries. But it has two problems:
1) it uses your data for more than just the transactions (like most websites do)
2) it locks down company accounts pretty quickly and has no transparent process how to get the money out.

I don't know exactly what automatic BTC services do with their clients data, but when I use BTC I don't need to care, as there is no data string tied to my personal data, email, social ID or what else I buy.
 
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PayPal charges nothing in most cases for most countries. But it has two problems:
1) it uses your data for more than just the transactions (like most websites do)
2) it locks down company accounts pretty quickly and has no transparent process how to get the money out.

I don't know exactly what automatic BTC services do with their clients data, but when I use BTC I don't need to care, as there is no data string tied to my personal data, email, social ID or what else I buy.

The only time PayPal "locks down" accounts is when you are a vendor and your customer claim that you did not provide the goods or services that you were being paid for. I highly doubt that MA will request that PayPal lock your account. :laugh:

If you want to be truly paranoid, create a PayPal account for the specific purpose of receiving money from MA. That way, no lock downs and no personal data to share.

I think that most people truly misunderstand the anonymity (or lack thereof) with BTC.
Can you actually remain anonymous using BTC? Yes. Is it a lot of work? Yes.
In practice, using BTC can be much more invasive of your privacy than any other payment source.
 
The only time PayPal "locks down" accounts is when you are a vendor and your customer claim that you did not provide the goods or services that you were being paid for. I highly doubt that MA will request that PayPal lock your account. :laugh:

I think, you totally misinterpret my posting. It's not the question, if MY account gets locked. I am refering to Paypal's business behaviour in general, not towards me.


I think that most people truly misunderstand the anonymity (or lack thereof) with BTC. Can you actually remain anonymous using BTC? Yes. Is it a lot of work? Yes.
In practice, using BTC can be much more invasive of your privacy than any other payment source.

This is a complete false statement. But together with your statement above ("paranoid"), it shows how you argue.
 
Usualy cheapest way to deposit in EU is direct bank transfer.
Appart that cons are many, you dont need to have pay pal, you dont have headache finding someone to accept bitcoins to get rid of them, you dont have problems with avoiding taxes, money laundry ect.
 
I think, you totally misinterpret my posting. It's not the question, if MY account gets locked. I am refering to Paypal's business behaviour in general, not towards me.

Well, maybe I did misunderstand you. Are you actually saying that, on principal, you refuse to use PayPal to transfer money out of EU because you have heard stories and rumors of people somehow getting their PayPal accounts "locked"? In your world, has PayPal also been clubbing baby seals or shooting lions in Africa?


This is a complete false statement. But together with your statement above ("paranoid"), it shows how you argue.

A) You really need to get someone to explain to you how the entire Blockchain concept works.
B) And unless you were referring to your own post, I think you might want to actually do a little more research into the meaning and standard usages of the word ("paranoid").
 
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