> I've always thought teenagers are the biggest market for bitcoin, they're less likely to have a bank/credit card.
Which makes it rather difficult to obtain bitcoin in the first place.
> Knowing you can now exchange bitcoin for Xbox points makes accepting bitcoin a lot more attractive.
One major reason for the popularity of the cards you can buy in various grocery/department stores providing points/credit for the various stories (Google Play, iTunes, Nintendo, Xbox, etc) is precisely because you can buy them with cash, redeem them at the online stores, and use the resulting credit to make purchases, all without using a credit card. This really doesn't solve that problem, it just shifts that problem to "how do you obtain bitcoin?"
Idea for a business model: make Bitcoin gift cards, and get them into the various grocery/department stores.
> Which makes it rather difficult to obtain bitcoin in the first place.
True, but now with Bitcoin a teen can do work for pay over the internet (I assume minors cannot easily get a paypal account). I've seen teens draw incredible art, make avatars, do minecraft related tasks, light programming, etc. So while it's not easy, there is a way for them to obtain it.
I remember scheming for ways to make money online when I was a teen, but my only options were to get someone to send me cash in the mail, or have my parents cash a check (after asking me a bunch of questions as to why someone was sending their 14yr old a $100 check).
Hop over to btc-e and watch thousands of teens daytrade altcoins while chatting, it's eye opening.
I had a paypal account when I was 14. I used to build websites and sell them on ebay, it was pretty good money for a high school kid. But for some reason ebay/paypal thought I was running some kind of a scam and permanently banned me. I'm 28 and still banned and they refuse to even take a look at my account or listen to any kind of appeal.
Something similar happened to me too as a kid, but I was able to create a second account (first account was using my Dad's information, with permission).
They are notoriously difficult to work with as a vendor. I had someone pay for the last milestone of a project, then after the goods were delivered, filed a chargeback with their credit card company. The CC company ruled in his favor, and Paypal offered no way to dispute. I was left with the -$1,500 balance
> (I assume minors cannot easily get a paypal account)
They can, very easily. I've had one of my accounts banned after applying for their debit card, but I was able to open another one with the same SSN and still haven't been caught.
When I was 15/16 I was doing programming with the Bitcoin API for sites in exchange for Bitcoin. While it wasn't difficult for me to setup a Paypal, there was always a risk of it being shut down or Paypal asking me for verification (which actually didn't happen until about a month before I turned 18.) I had heard of it happening to many of my friends in the same age group.
If you're comfortable with meeting a stranger in a public place and paying a small premium over market rates there's always the option to purchase Bitcoins with cash in person. Simply find your counterparty on a message board or LocalBitcoins.
Meet a stranger and take a risk just to load funds into Xbox Live?! Hmmm, why not just buy a prepaid Xbox card at most stores? Also, add the fact that you can lose value with Bitcoin.
I'm sure parents are going to love the idea of their child going to meet a strange adult from the internet who has unorthodox ideas about the government.
>cards you can buy in various grocery/department stores
These are a stop gap measure. Say I have $500 and I put $400 into Xbox points and $100 into Steam points. Then some new game comes out on PC but I'm out of cash because its all tied into Xbox points. This transfer is one-way, so my money is now stuck.
With bitcoin, or some other non-vendor middle-man, I have value sitting in my wallet ready for any transaction that accepts this currency. For someone without easy access to credit, buying a couple bitcoins (or some other cryptocurrency) seems like the better move.
…accept this move by Microsoft makes you add value to your account, that you cannot withdraw. So, at least in this instance, Bitcoin has not solved any problems.
Once you can purchase content directly using XBT, instead of merely using it as a funding source, you might have a use case.
Otherwise, most people would just buy a prepaid Debit card. It solves actually the same problem you're saying XBT solves, but it's accepted at vastly mere merchants.
Except those cards aren't global. In countries with untrusted banking systems they aren't even for sale or they are via their own regional bank that a Western processor will just refuse to accept.
There's still a big problem out there with foreign transactions and the credit card system. Paypal kinda handles this in some scenarios, but it still is unsolved, especially when you're discussing non-trivial amounts of money.
In the UK there is some sort of electronic cash (I forget the name) that can be bought using cash in almost every newsagents. These can in turn be exchanged for bitcoins online. Pretty simple!
That said we also have pre-paid debit cards in some stores now, so it's even easier to have one of those.
(Also it is not uncommon at all for teenagers to have a debit card)
Making the equivalent of a coinbase card would be easy enough. Then you get all the app support for spending your coin. Having an actual BTC card could be done with a scratch-off private key I suppose. Buying the card funds the public address.
Which makes it rather difficult to obtain bitcoin in the first place.
> Knowing you can now exchange bitcoin for Xbox points makes accepting bitcoin a lot more attractive.
One major reason for the popularity of the cards you can buy in various grocery/department stores providing points/credit for the various stories (Google Play, iTunes, Nintendo, Xbox, etc) is precisely because you can buy them with cash, redeem them at the online stores, and use the resulting credit to make purchases, all without using a credit card. This really doesn't solve that problem, it just shifts that problem to "how do you obtain bitcoin?"
Idea for a business model: make Bitcoin gift cards, and get them into the various grocery/department stores.