Everyone’s talking about Bitcoins. Shame we didn’t have conversation a decade ago when they were worth nothing and 100 dollars’ worth bought then would now be worth about $1.6 billion. But no. They told us it was a ‘fad’. That it was a way for money launderers, dark webbers, drug dealers and arms buyers to pay for things in an anonymous way. Its like having a Swiss bank inside your computer. But in English. Or in numbers really. And this remarkable ‘currency’ really doesn’t exist in any real sense. Bitcoins are just assigned values to blocks of data which, and this is the really, really, REALLY important bit: are finite in number. There’s only so many, like shares, so you need to buy an existing one if you want to join the bubble. They can’t, as they do with currency, just print more.

They don’t ‘print’ anything, in fact. You have a virtual ‘wallet’ and in it you keep your Bitcoin(s) or part thereof. Because at the current day $17,000 valuation per Bitcoin, you can buy just a little bit of one, should you desire. Though, from personal experience, it ain’t quite that easy.

Two weeks ago I started thinking about the Bitcoin phenomenon. Because, like so many things, it seemed to have ‘easy money!!!’ written all over it. But when you dig a little deeper you learn about the potential pitfalls. Mainly that it is currently a ‘bubble’. Something that can burst, leaving you with, basically, the inside of a bubble. Nothing but air. Others think that ‘it is the future’ and can only just keep going up. Like the ‘dotcoms’ did?

Anyway, I joined a company called Coinbase who, according to everyone who knows, is ‘the place’ for Bitcoin. There are loads of others but these are ‘the guys’. And its not easy. And in fact three days after trying to register I received an email telling me that I’d passed security. Sorry ’bout the delay, busy here. Then I read, just yesterday that should you be Bitcoined up and need to sell, particularly if things were starting to look a little ‘downslidey’ or dubious, it could take you so long to sell the fuckers that in the 3, or 4, or 5 days it might take, the bubble would be certainly in gross deflation mode, at very least.

But what’s really scary is that these things aren’t real. You have this ‘wallet’ that is virtual and in it, a potential fortune. And most ironic for this totally virtual and online thing, as all the gurus stress massively, WRITE DOWN YOUR PASSWORDS (keys, as they’re known) ON PAPER. WITH A PEN. IN INK. KEEP A COPY. OR SIX. Because if you lose it, your money has gone. Forever. There is no ‘forgotten password?’ button in Bitcoinland because you wouldn’t be secure. They reckon there is currently about $40 billion in lost-password-hell, never to be claimed. Other than by me, but they won’t let me have it.

So to join the bubble or to not to join, that is the question. Fucked if I know the answer.

Happy Chanukah

A xxxx