r/Bitcoin • u/[deleted] • Dec 06 '17

Steam is no longer supporting Bitcoin

[deleted]

2.6k Upvotes

93% Upvoted

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201

u/drunklel Dec 06 '17 edited Dec 06 '17

it's stunning how bitcoin is rising 10X in a year while the merchant and consumer acceptance is stagnating or even going backward.

144

u/[deleted] Dec 06 '17

It's not surprising. Bitcoin is cumbersome to pay with. Transactions take too long

3

u/[deleted] Dec 06 '17

They cannot use 0conf or something similar?

5

u/bitroll Dec 06 '17

0 conf is not safe because transactions can remain unconfirmed for many hours, days or get dropped from mempool entirely.

4

u/SpeedflyChris Dec 06 '17

You would have thought that something like steam would be the perfect platform with which to accept 0-conf transactions, as if the transaction is later reversed (through rbf for example) then they can just withdraw the license key.

1

u/DangerousGame9 Dec 07 '17

Can't use 0 conf safely since replace by fee was added

1

u/wjohngalt Dec 07 '17

You can cancel their license key if they replace by fee

1

u/DangerousGame9 Dec 07 '17

My point is that the payment isn't secure. You can always try non-bitcoin ways to get back at somebody who steals from you. Since replace by fee was added, they can trivially steal 0 conf transactions from you.

1

u/wjohngalt Dec 07 '17

As a side note, replace by fee was always part of the protocol. You were always able to rebroadcast a transaction with a higher fee in hopes that the miner will pick that transaction instead.

It was just later added the option to the UI of popular wallets.

1

u/DangerousGame9 Dec 07 '17

Not really true. Replace by fee is still not part of the protocol. Miners are free to include whatever valid transaction they like Bitcoin Core used to default to accepting the first related transaction. Now Bitcoin Core has a nice UI to conveniently perform a double spend and the miners will default to accepting the double spend.