Is Bitcoin The Future Of Transactions?
In today’s world of transactions, one can notice that cash is slowly being phased out for more digital forms of currency. Money is now stored on plastic cards and apps with digital links to the bank. Payments are made with relative ease without having to carry physical money. Cash has always been limited by the fact that it can only be useful when both parties are present. Since most banks have already set up a system of digital payments, how does Bitcoin fit into the future of everyday online transactions?
Where To Spend Your Bitcoin
Not long ago you couldn’t purchase much with Bitcoin. The first purchase was a pizza for 10,000 bitcoin when they were only 8 cents each. How times have changed, and value too. Nowadays, you can spend your bitcoin on much more than pizza, in a lot of different places, both online and offline.
Tipping
One of the more popular ways to spend your bitcoin is tipping online content creators and writers. If you like their content or their stories, you can let them know by tipping them directly with bitcoin. You can usually find their public wallet address somewhere on their site.
Gift Cards And Virtual Debit Cards For Products And Food
While we wait for places like BestBuy and Cracker Barrel to accept bitcoin directly, some folks have found a way around this. Services like eGifter and Gyft, just to name a couple, allow you to use bitcoin to purchase gift cards from hundreds of retailers and redeem them at their stores and restaurants. Companies like Bitpay and Blockcard allow customers to use bitcoins to load VISA prepaid cards and can use them anywhere in the world VISA is accepted. This option is convenient for overseas travelers that don’t want to go through the hassle of exchanging currencies as VISA is accepted in more than 200 countries.
Videos And Video Games
Microsoft has added bitcoin as a payment option for adding money to your Microsoft accounts, which can then be used to buy things like apps, videos, and Xbox games from their platform. Eric Lockard, corporate vice president of Universal Store at Microsoft stated:
“The use of digital currencies such as bitcoin, while not yet mainstream, is growing beyond the early enthusiasts. We expect this growth to continue and allowing people to use bitcoin to purchase our products and services now allows us to be at the front edge of that trend.”
Travel
Using bitcoins for travel seems to be growing fast. You can use bitcoins to pay for hotel stays with Expedia, or book flights through CheapAir. There are even some cruise lines that accept Bitcoin. Although you can’t buy gas directly with bitcoin yet, some car dealers like Cars.com are accepting bitcoins as payments. Believe it or not, Virgin Galactic will even take you to space if you have enough bitcoins.
Increased Adoption
For Bitcoin to gain increased adoption and become more mainstream, there needs to be more ways for it to be a daily use case. In other words, you need to be able to spend it on typical everyday items. Also, getting the general public to accept a different type of currency is a big challenge. Everyone is used to the current system in place so, making Bitcoin easy to spend is important.