In other news, I live in Pakistan, and I used a debit card to buy a steam game 3 days ago and it worked instantly + frictionlessly, without having to worry about confirmation times + exchange rates + getting scammed + getting on a government list.
A lot of people don't have debit cards. A lot of kids can't own debit cards legally. For them Bitcoin might be the only option.
The guy who made the reddit announcement had to wait 1day+ because his txn didn't get the 6 confirmations. Compared to that, my visa txn took approximately.. 10 seconds? While I was in Lahore, Pakistan.
> No exchange rates are involved in any meaningful way.
That's a dishonest statement to make.
> A lot of people don't have debit cards.
That's what you think. Its trivial for anyone who wants to get one (and doesn't have a criminal background) to get one.
If you mean people who don't know how to open a bank account, they're even less likely to know how private / public key encryption works and use bitcoin.
> A lot of kids
Gift cards.
Card payments take far longer to process than bitcoin payments
> exchange rates
Just as much as with bitcoin.
> getting scammed
Why?
I can't remember the last time I stood in line at the supermarket for an hour because VISA was clogged with "dust" transactions. Hmm.