Bootstrapping is growing daily: http://bit.ly/bitcoinnodes though there are too many areas where Bitcoin does not yet exist.
Hmm ... a benefit? How about "no payment network fees"? When you send $20 to a friend, your friend gets all $20. Not $19.12 like if you paid your friend with PayPal, ... Not $19.50 like if you paid your friend with SquareUp. No, .. the transaction settles at par value (all $20 goes to the recipient). Do you buy gas from the fueling station that charges $0.10 less per gallon because they only accept cash? Not everyone does, but enough do such that it continues to stay in business.
Does Bitcoin need "a significant portion of the market" to succeed, or can it succeed simply by growing just in the niches that it already excels at today (transactions that benefit from anonymity, transactions that benefit from having no fees whatsover, transactions that are too small to be cost effective on other payment networks, etc.)?
Bootstrapping is growing daily: http://bit.ly/bitcoinnodes though there are too many areas where Bitcoin does not yet exist.
Are these places that are generating bitcoin, or are they places where I could spend bitcoin if I had it? If it's just people producing bitcoin, the fundamental problem is still that it can't generally be exchanged for anything. Unless bitcoin is accepted a lot more widely than I thought, you'll have an easier time convincing me to take payment in the form of gift cards for the local grocery store.
You can buy tea, socks, domain names, t-shirts, nightlights, video games, books, pen testing, and more using bitcoins: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Trade
Hmm ... a benefit? How about "no payment network fees"? When you send $20 to a friend, your friend gets all $20. Not $19.12 like if you paid your friend with PayPal, ... Not $19.50 like if you paid your friend with SquareUp. No, .. the transaction settles at par value (all $20 goes to the recipient). Do you buy gas from the fueling station that charges $0.10 less per gallon because they only accept cash? Not everyone does, but enough do such that it continues to stay in business.
Does Bitcoin need "a significant portion of the market" to succeed, or can it succeed simply by growing just in the niches that it already excels at today (transactions that benefit from anonymity, transactions that benefit from having no fees whatsover, transactions that are too small to be cost effective on other payment networks, etc.)?