[trevelyan]

No it isn't. I use bitcoin for currency exchange and it saves me about a hundred dollars each month by lowering my transaction costs. Rather than pay a percentage to the banks and often another percentage to VISA, I pay a flat fee to transfer assets into bitcoin, and then another flat fee to transfer them out. Total costs end up being something like 1 percent instead of 3-5 percent. And the exchange rate typically ends up being better too.

So I am bullish on bitcoin, although I think it will be less a currency than an asset store for many early adopters. The way to deal with volatility if you are worried about market fluctuations is simply to buy and sell on multiple exchanges simultaneously, ideally holding a small float so the exchanges are near-simultaneous and you aren't exposed to downside risk.

On a side note, I pay for server hosting using a credit card now and am interested in saving the 3 percent VISA fee, since that adds up to almost a thousand dollars a year at this point. So if anyone can recommend a professional server colocation and leasing company that accepts bitcoin and is based in California (ideally the Wilshire facility) I would be interested in hearing about your experiences. Please note that I'm not looking for shared hosting or VPS provision -- I need to lease actual hardware.

[machilin]

Agreed on how it helps lowers transaction fees. Can be a real life-saver. Good to know that it's always good to diversify. But I really wish people could focus more on it be an actual currency for transactions rather than as an 'assest'. Thank you.