Bitcoin is alot, and its ALSO a collectible.
Now just look what people pay for magic cards or baseball cards, stamps, old hardware, whatever, if its rare, there are people "hoarding" it

It's not a currency in the same way that email is not mail and html is not text.

Right now most people don't even realize that the basic "currency" function is just a small subset of things that Bitcoin can do.  Once distributed contracts take off,  things are going to get really interesting.  There is nothing even remotely comparable in existence right now. No currency, no commodity, no collectible.

The biggest misconception in Bitcoin is that is fits into some historical asset class.  The truth is that is has created a whole new asset class of its own.

I'm shocked. You've always argued with me that it isn't a store of value!

I think currency will have to be redefined thanks to Bitcoin.

Real's gunna change.

A cell phone is not a store of value... quite the opposite, it starts losing value the moment it is created.

It's hard to talk to someone who is intentionally all over the place.

People collect things for nostalgia reasons. Or because it was made better in the past. Or because a famous person used it.

Bitcoins are not collector's items.

So, based on the Ron Paul reference, I assume you're making some political argument? Comparing it to the US dollar and saying that isn't currency either doesn't provide me any more information about why it matters whether or not bitcoin is a currency (though I guess it does eliminate a lot of potential reasons - you're obviously not using the term "currency" in any standard sense).

Anyway, now that I see where you're coming from given that you say the US dollar is not a UNIT...


How are bitcoins not definable in objective terms (the satoshi client) and constant (there are 21 million of them, of which ~12 million have been discovered).

Bitcoins are just as constant as gold. Moreso, in fact, if you count nuclear transmutation. Is that what the Ron Paul reference was getting at? You think gold is a currency and a unit but dollar bills and bitcoins aren't?