On A Bitcoin Standard - Your Phone Dies - How Do You Pay? \ stacker news ~bitcoin

On A Bitcoin Standard - Your Phone Dies - How Do You Pay?

634 sats \ 27 comments \ @SatsMate 12 Jul bitcoin

Hey All - I was thinking of a time I was in El Zonte at a nice fish restaurant and because I was using my phone all day spending Bitcoin, eventually it ended up dying in the evening.

I racked up quite the bill (about 100K Satoshis at the time), and I had no way to pay. I was living on a Bitcoin standard, and all my cards/cash were back in the hostel.

In this case, I walked back to my hotel and was able to retrieve some cash and settle the bill. It was unfortunate because I was trying to live fully on Bitcoin but my phone died.

On a Bitcoin standard, if your phone dies, how do you pay? I know there are some avenues out there such as Bitcoin NFC cards, and QR codes on pieces of paper you can exchange with others - but is there a solid and scaleable solution for the entire world to transact if things go offline? Curious about some thoughts here as it was someone I experienced firsthand and had to transact with fiat.

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113 sats \ 5 replies \ @Undisciplined 12 Jul

I know people have proposed various solutions for various situations, but I think there will always be a place for physical specie.

Can bitcoin ever take a functional physical form? That's a question I don't know the answer to.

211 sats \ 2 replies \ @ek 12 Jul freebie

Can bitcoin ever take a functional physical form? That's a question I don't know the answer to.

You can pay offline with ecash. But the receiver has to be online to verify the ecash note wasn't spend already.

But you could argue that's not bitcoin, only a bitcoin IOU.

13 sats \ 1 reply \ @Undisciplined 12 Jul

That’s the type of thing I’m thinking of. What about when the receiver is the one offline, though?

34 sats \ 0 replies \ @zklsbn 12 Jul

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0 sats \ 1 reply \ @AJ1992 12 Jul

You mean in the form of coins or notes? That would defeat the whole purpose of Bitcoin..

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Undisciplined 12 Jul

How does that defeat the whole purpose of Bitcoin?

23 sats \ 0 replies \ @398ja 12 Jul

With cash, of course!

34 sats \ 1 reply \ @kdnolan 12 Jul

Boltcard ⚡

10 sats \ 0 replies \ @DarthCoin 12 Jul

require internet for receiver

55 sats \ 0 replies \ @OT 12 Jul

Portable battery bank.

76 sats \ 0 replies \ @DarthCoin 12 Jul

You have to make the distinction between paying and receiving. Bitcoin and LN require at least one trade party to be online. As Radentor said, Bitcoin is a P2P electronic cash. Do not forget that.

For receiving only, offline options you have: Opago Pay devices - @OPAGO_PAY, LNbits offline TPoS devices, any LNURL printed or LN address.

For paying only, offline options you have: NFC LNURL cards, ecash.

23 sats \ 0 replies \ @redlight_pleb 12 Jul

So I’ve heard about some Of the people in an African nation (sorry don’t know what one) they are using sms to transfer bitcoin and honestly I feel like this should be fleshed out to be really reliable and foolproof.

Yes it doesn’t solve a dead battery but it does solve localised internet dropouts.

If the wider internet does drop out does being able to broadcast via your own relay network, wonder if you could cover enough distance to do p2p transactions over a local network

13 sats \ 0 replies \ @BallLightning 13 Jul

I asked about bitcoin banknotes in the past and some people obviously didn't like that. There can exist bitcoin banknotes issued by some entity (state) that the state can promise to redeem in real bitcoin... And if this solves a real problem, such things will appear despite the extreme hate from some people in this community (like ecash is gaining steam despite the extreme hate... guys, if you want ecash to die, solve the problem it solves instead of insulting people developing or using it).

But I am wondering something very simple in your case. Couldn't you just ask the venue for a charger to connect your phone to and make the payment?

13 sats \ 0 replies \ @netstatic 12 Jul

I’d things go offline (meaning no one has internet), we’d go back to other proxies for payment. We’d also have non-trivial long distance communication problems (since I treat any telegram connections as being online) and would need to form local coalitions to find an appropriate currency to use in the meantime such that enough people will think is fair enough to adopt

13 sats \ 1 reply \ @anon 12 Jul

OpenDime

13 sats \ 0 replies \ @criptopanas 12 Jul

Would you use an OpenDime to pay a breakfast?

13 sats \ 0 replies \ @john_doe 12 Jul

I have heard in the past someone who said having done a transaction with Bitcoin fully offline. But he had a ham license and probably his partner was linked to Internet.

Unfortunately as far as I know the satellite to sync the Blockchain with the setup of Blockstream is only one-way, which is receive-only so we can't send transactions afaik.

Even if it were possible to send to a satellite or through any kind of radio waves it would still require anyway an electronic device with most likely a battery (although it could be a solar setup) so my guess is you would be better off buying a 20000mah battery.

13 sats \ 0 replies \ @e43a4abe51 12 Jul freebie

Your question is thoughtful..

22 sats \ 3 replies \ @AJ1992 12 Jul

This is another major issue that keeps Bitcoin from becoming a globally accepted currency. Don't forget those that live in extreme poverty as well that do not even have a cell phone. Like those on the African continent and elsewhere. You also need not just a phone but an Internet connection as well...which people fail to realize is still not available in huge parts of the world.

All you Bitcoin maxi's fail to realize these along all the other problems with Bitcoin that will ultimately keep it from being adopted as money like fiat is. You guys need to take off the blinders and realize these issues and address them instead of acting like they don't exist or ignoring them because that issue is not an issue to you. (transaction fee prices, possessing a phone, having data/internet on that phone.)

Unless you address them, Bitcoin has no chance at replacing Fiat.

10 sats \ 1 reply \ @SatsMate OP 12 Jul

I 100% agree here. I think Starlink will help with internet across remote regions of the world once it scales, but the phone things is gonna be a hard one to solve. In Africa they actually have projects that allow one to send bitcoin via SMS which is cool! Not as fluid as cash though.

21 sats \ 0 replies \ @AJ1992 12 Jul

I've heard of that. Other major issues include on-chain confirmation times or if your tx will ever be confirmed to be honest because there is no guarantee your tx will ever be included in a block.

Volatile and high transaction fees. (Compared to other cryptos and fiat which is free to transact a large majority of the time. At least to the consumer. People are naturally greedy also and don't want to pay any fee let alone the fees to transact Bitcoin. Also, what some consider a fee that is cheap others may consider a high fee.)

Lightning's payment in transition/can't find a route issues.

Bitcoin's price fluctuates sometimes at a volatile rate and that turns people off immediately.

Those are the major ones. I can list more but yeah. The maxi's refuse to admit any of these are issues or they justify them by throwing the whole anonymity thing out there. Which isn't even the case now a days unless you take precise steps to cover your tracks. 95% of people simply don't care about anonymity like they should anyway or believe it's useless since they aren't doing anything illegal/they want to hide.

13 sats \ 0 replies \ @wingalt 12 Jul

Disagree with that, even in very poor countries people have phones. It doesn't have to be a smart phone but they have phones, use bitcoin by SMS and poor countries have their currencies going to zero all the time so rather counterintuitively even with less tech and internet access they are driving the adoption much more than financially privileged countries

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @NaOD 12 Jul outlawed

stackers have outlawed this. turn on wild west mode in your /settings to see outlawed content.

334 sats \ 1 reply \ @zklsbn 12 Jul

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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @AJ1992 12 Jul

You mad bro? All you maxi's get like this anytime a criticism that's legitimate gets thrown at you. You get defensive and angry because you hate being challenged. Bitcoin's "bugs" are not "features." I love how you maxi's are trying to twist it now. How is having to wait an undetermined amount of time for a TX to confirm a feature? How is the fee volatility and the fact that there even is a fee to transact a feature and not a bug that's going to keep people away? You guys are a fucking cult. This is why Satoshi disappeared because he knew you guys would become a cult and didn't want to be worshipped. No wonder you fuck with Darth, you're just like him. Darth and people like you are a huge reason Bitcoin never will replace Fiat. You push people away with your arrogance and entitlement.

13 sats \ 1 reply \ @orthwyrm 12 Jul

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50 sats \ 0 replies \ @Bell_curve 12 Jul

https://opendime.com/