That's a great rate.

It seems to me that when I put in the amount of LR I want to trade it should calculate the number of bitcoins I will receive and not a number of dollars. Even on the preview page it has dollars and not the number of bitcoins. 

Noted. I'll change the presentation. Bitcoin is different from the other digital currencies.

But the exchanges contrary tend to consolidation and centralization.
Unfortunately,exchanges play an important role.

Apparently mtgox takes 1% and LR takes another 1%? If so, better to have fees on withdraws than on every trade. That way market makers can still keep very tight spreads.

I wonder what the deal is with deposits. Just one 1% from LR?

Yeah, I remember it does say that, but he did charge $1 before for PP withdraws and for checks, so I think the best guess is that he took 1%.

Withdrawal... from what account?

mtgox noted at the beginning of this thread that PayPal froze his account, possibly up to 180 days.  After reviewing mtgox's posts, I don't see anything that has changed that fundamental situation.

And creating a second PP account, just for withdrawals, would not only endanger the first (frozen) PP account, but would inflict additional LR->PP transfer fees on the withdrawer.

jimbobway: yes once paypal unfreezes my account I'm pretty sure I will be able to send you your money from it. If I can't then I'll open a 2nd account to do this.

Volume is dropping on the exchanges (MtGox, etc.).

What is the reason for it?
* is it that people hold on to their coins?
* is it that people spend their coins in games, other services, etc.?
* is it because MtGox does not accept new users? WHAT IS THE STATUS
* is it because MtGox only offers Liberty Reserve to add funds which itself takes ages to buy and is complicated?

I know it is tough and not easy and MtGox is doing a great job trying to work this out, but it would be good to see what the timeline is to re-establish a proper exchange (incl. make it open to new users and easy to add withdraw funds).
maybe some other experts here can help.

thanks for perspective

According to the MtGox "All Time, Show Volume Data" chart, volume has been generally higher since MtGox lost the use of PayPal than it was before then. And that's BTC volume; if you wanted to look at USD volume that would show even greater increases.

Of course, it would be even higher if MtGox could still do PayPal, but I don't think there's anything to worry about.