So, I'm all about seeing Steem get into the world at large. Not just the crypto land, but also into the terrestrial world as well. I'm very keen on the idea that I can live, work, and function off of crypto. I essentially believe the world is run by immoral banksters, and they operate the Federal Reserve. Every time I use a dollar I give it value, and I would prefer alternatives. Another one arrived today.
@steemgiftcards
Just launched their account and their website.
I feel an obligation to try these things
I'm getting witness rewards. I should risk some of those to test things out to help the ecosystem. So, that's what I did. I purchased a $100 amazon gift card. It had $9.95 in fees. At the time I paid 21.8SBD.
I paid using Steem connect. Then nothing happened right away.
A few minutes later
I got confirmation from them by email-
and a few minutes after that I got the actual giftcard.
I passed it along to muh wife, and now we have $100 more sitting in an Amazon account. Seems like an excellent way to turn Steem into tangible goods with just a few clicks.
Nice job @xtrodinarypilot and team.
What a fitting meme! People have actually asked "which color pill did you take?" while I discussed the impending industry disruptions of blockchain. And by the end of the conversation, they had already changed their tune and recently bragged about buying during this crypto sale.
Thank you for utilizing your rewards to support these important advancements with the steem blockchain. Hodlers love to bring up the billion dollar bitcoin pizzas but we all know that the purchase of goods and services with the currency is important to its value as well. Thanks!
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Hey, if crypto is the red pill, I think I'd take it again and again if I had to re-choose.
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We can keep taking em and sharing em with more minds! Wheeee (steem) blockchain!
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Ethereum talks big about having the biggest community, they say as an example that more than half of the too 100 coins are ERC20 tokens.. I dont think those ERC20 coins are necessarily supporting the coin..
Steem on the other hand has 100s of website that just support the steem blockchain. There are community created apps, and websites that do all kinds of things.
Steem community is the most robust community any crypto coin could hope for!!
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that's my take too
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Oh man this is great news. I've been trying to figure out a streamlined way to spend a couple rewards -- and one of the things I have in mind is an affordable drone, which would let me get higher quality content into my climbing blog. Instead of having to go through additional steps with exchanges, being able to get an amazon giftcard so easily is HUGE.
Thanks for taking a bit of a leap and testing it out. Despite my reservations about amazon, it's hard to ignore that they're the easiest way to get a lot of items. Hopefully a decentralized market place will start to get a bit of traction in this space -- but I think that's a long ways off for the time being.
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Couldn't people be encouraged to start up online shops directly on steemit ? If steemit could offer us some sort of escrow service to encourage transparency and trust, direct exchanges via blocktrade maybe ?
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I think this will happen eventually. Or at least online stores that can be listed to this site for transferring steem and sbd to gift cards. But imagine one day when there is a “SteemShop” and you can link your account and pay for items directly. Wow. The future looks great. I wish. Was a developer and could do these things
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I think with the upcoming SMT update, there's going to be a lot of innovation happening in this regard. I can imagine a lot of markets developing on here in the coming year. I know for excample, that myself and @caitycat are interesting in setting up a photography / art print store, and I think it would amazing to have SMT based "certificates of authenticity" that are produced with each numbered print. Blockchain verified art.
We're in the future, y'all.
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Yeah. That sounds pretty cool. The opportunities are endless
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Good luck with that! Its like a whole new internet is opening up before our eyes !
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Oh wow, this is brilliant! Some of the best news I've heard in my short time in Steemit. Looking forward to building up that bank and give these gift cards to my wife too. Happy wife happy life and all :)
This could be such a huge win for anyone investing their time into Steemit. not only to see it grow but getting the payback of these cards too.
Such a win across the board!
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This is awesome. Will try out too.♨️🚀
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Glad you've tried it: i saw your resteem of the original post about the gift cards and that got me curious. Glad you've followed through!
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Nice experiment and it definitely goes into the right direction!
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This is they way it should go - but there will be the day when amazon will not be able to afford to not accept crypto currencies. To be honest, I would hope that some day nobody would do business on amazon anymore but instead sell their good over the blockchain...
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Thank you for doing the test for us.
That $10 fee seems really high, but it is not really. Not compared to the fees of getting it through an exchange into a bank.
What would be better is if more online stores took cryptos directly.
I have been working on the definition of a enterprise level wallet would be.
Businesses need a lot more than just a password protection on their funds. They need to be able to delegate to people to spend cryptos, or to put in a "purchase request" to be reviewed and approved, to spend cryptos.
And then, you need the refund mechanism almost automated, which means being tied into the emails, and the store database back end, and...
I really would like a stand alone piece that would plug into the various parts of an online store. I want to avoid writing something so monolithic.
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I think the fee is definitely too high. Exchanges and such are more expensive but that’s a whole nother issue.
This said I might be getting myself a gift card soon too lol. Awesome initiative @steemgiftcards!
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Hey. This is actually pretty cool. It helps you avoid going through exchanges like Coinbase to get out. You can essentially cash out all your crypto into steem, and then transfer it like you did. Awesome. Hopefully this is a long term program and doesn’t stop any time soon. Thanks for this because I’ve been trying to figure out how i would cash out one day. But with crypto, ill hold for a long time. No point in cashing out with minimal gains.
My crypto is money that i can live without. But it would be great to have it when its worth a lot lol
The fees through this method are still pretty hefty, but better than an exchange
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Great way to use your Steem! Finally! Not that I'll be able to afford one anytime soon... but working on it! thanks for being the guinea pig :)
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Wow, that is beautiful!! The more I learn about Steemit / Steem, the more I want it to succeed. This definitely creates a new level of opportunity to bridge the current system to the newer better one that Steemit is quickly becoming a major part of. Thanks and resteeming.
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@aggroed looks like a legit website, is it a reloadable visa card?
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idk. I haven't tried that.
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Hello @aggroed!
I saw you passed on my post to show support. Since you were in one of my cards and some of the people in them asked for their copy of an enlarged file, I came to drop yours here:
Cheers!
Hope you liked it :)
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Wow @aggroed ! That's pretty amazing ! I want to try it now!!! Need a quote a few more sbd for that though hahaha
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Nice post...
Please upvote my post...
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Thanks for sharing your experience. I didn't know you could do this.
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Excellent, great post.
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very nice. love the development, especially that it has not taken visa a month to ban prepayed credit cards with bitcoin and just go with steem instead :)
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This is a cool idea!
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That's super awesome, I read the thing you resteemed earlier about this and I was thinking about it and then I got to wondering what the transaction fees were, I was going to ask. How do they break down is it a set fee or a percentage of the sale?
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Now just don't forget to tell the IRS.
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Right. On it...
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great post 👍
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how visible is this for the government, or in other words:
Will the tax man come to the door if someone uses this feature in excess?
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idk.
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Well, assuming you didn't attach the name of your legal fiction to your Steemit account, there wouldn't be a connection.
There are 1000s of ways to get Amazon gift cards as well, and it seems unlikely that Amazon is reporting to the IRS who activated which gift cards on their site.
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It has become a relieving article for beginners' curiosity. I thank you as a beginner
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This is amazing and perfect for where we need this platform and currency to go! Great share here @aggroed!
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This is really cool.
Except I have an aversion to Amazon as part of the corrupt/monopoly system :(
Open to be convinced otherwise!
Thanks for the heads up.
Happy shopping Mrs.
xox
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meh. They may be an axis of evil. But I still gotta eat. So, the goal is to reduce reliance on fiat partners over time. Can't rebuild this whole thing in a day. When other good options exist I'll cease reliance on them.
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I do understand ~ gotta work with what is available.
I actually have an Audible account which is bloody Amazon.
So not so highly principled.
All in good time eh.
xox
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Always nice to see crypto, espescially Steem getting used in the mainstream. It shows how using the platform can translate into ones daily life. Excellent write-up!
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The fee is extremely high. 10% is easy to swallow if you have seen your STEEM rise greatly in value. For anyone new to the ecosystem it hurts. But I understand you generally have to pay for convenience.
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People brand new to the system really shouldn't be buying stuff with steem they should work on stockpiling some.
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Yeah, it's cool of aggroed to essentially help beta-test new steem-related services, but the fees are pretty high right now and there's no timetable on how or when fees are to be reduced. Steemgiftcards says it's contingent on their ability to produce volume and have a track record with blackhawk network, which is the company they're going through to get this done. And I wish I knew where along the line, if not immediately, the sbd gets converted into fiat (I'm going to assume that it is as that's how most merchants who accept crypto roll)
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yeah, they sell for btc and exchange it, but it's all automated. They aren't "charging 10% fees" so much as paying the fees that btc charges.
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Ew btc. Surprised the fee isn't 200% the value of the card.
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great post.thanks for sharing.
please carry on your activity.
i will wait for your next blog....
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Hoping the fees go down as time progresses and usage increases.
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To achieve mass adoption we need real world applications. This is excellent. Although you are technically converting it into fiat. I like this.
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THAT'S the spirit of the blockchain, real-life application and cutting out the bankers wherever possible !! It's so exciting at the moment.
but why no fanfare ? why no big launch ? :-(
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Wow great informative post,,,thanks for sharing
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Thanks for sharing this high quality content with us !
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That's pretty sweet. I like that the two worlds are coming together. I liked the meme.. .l probably laughed harder than I should. 🙃
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It is about making you think from a different perspective..
It is about writing without any expectations of UPVOTES..
Excellent post good analyses thanks for sharing.
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I have seen several other intelligent people predict huge prices in the future per steem. I, of course really hope those predictions are right!
But we must never forget the responsibility we have now as this community to make a steem a welcoming and positive place. I think we are important for the future success of the steem blockchain, so we need to keep making a steemit a great place for interactions.
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yep. That's a major reason I founded the Minnow Support Project.
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This is fantastic!! Congratulations to @xtrodinarypilot and to @aggroed for the info!
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It will be nice not to have to convert crypto to Fiat indeed. On the flip side I fear the banks and the powers-that-be elites eventually having control at some point of cryptocurrency. If they can control money they can control people. As Steam is digital it concerns me. If it was a hard asset it would be different. I believe it was one of the Rothschilds who said something paraphrase to... give me control of the money and I care not who makes the laws.
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This is defiantly going to be a gamechanger, can't wait to use it. But I have heard that the fees are outrageous like 10% processing fee I think.
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It's not that bad, and it's ultimately btc's fault.
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The callback on steem connect doesnt seem to function for me, so when it should redirect back to the gift card website it just lands on the steem connect dashboard page.
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A great development :)
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That´s so good to see that our community is already jumping to the "real world"...
Now everybody knows what I giving as presents next christmas... :D
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Thanks for your valuable and informative post.
We can gather a lot of information by your post.
I will always visit your site & wait for your upcoming post.
Thanks .
@Resteem done.
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That is great news, at least STEEM could get its independence from BTC. Even though the fee of $9.95 is a little steep.
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That is so cool! I’m impressed it was so easy and that 10% fee isn’t bad. I think this will revolutionize the way many people who have trouble with exchanges look at steemit!
Thanks for testing it! I voted for you as witness. Thanks for everything.
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Gives me even more reason to use this platform. Thanks for sharing!
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@aggroed thanks for sharing, glad it worked for you!
for all potential users what we need to understand is the all in cost of cashing out from steem into usd. the all in off ramp toll. if SBD is trading at $4 and I have a 100 of them, will I be able to get a $300, $350, $380 amazon card?
Also, can the same be done with STEEM (vs SBD) ?
Ideally, we see a calculator to tell you upfront what it would be. You click to lock-in that transaction.
@steemgiftcards please let us know
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Well, there are multilpe ways to do this. the most convenient is to use blocktrades.us to convert it to ltc that goes straight into your coinbase account and then sell at whatever discounted rate coinbase offers. That process is roughly 10%. I think blocktrades is 4% or so. Then you lose a few more percent from the rate that coinbase gives you. Then you lose some money for the fee. This is slightly more expensive, but still pretty good especially since it's more convenient.
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Wow this is revolutionary. Thank you for being the guinea pig!
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This is great news. I did a fundraiser post for my lad who's shaving his head for charity.
Getting the SBD from my account into the fundraising account was going to be a nightmare; then this.
Thanks, mate.
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This is so awesome! It's hard to keep up with all those great new steem projects, thanks for sharing :)
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Awesome way to get some easy online fiat. Sweet deal.
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It's a good start. Upvoted and resteemed!
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Nice to see! The use of STEEM is growing every day and soon everyone will know of STEEM instead of the crap that is Bitcoin.
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Thanks for the review and risking money to try it out. Exciting times.
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Nice, this is very interesting indeed, especially given how Amazon is extending into pretty much every commercial domain they can.
I wonder if, in the future, amazon giftcards will be valid in their grocery stores ?
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Wow its amazing its great news. Its a really good start keep it up . fantastic so informative post.Thanks for sharing.
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The only problem being that Amazon sit alongside the banksters at the Corporate table...!
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Nice! Are they planning to make this available to amazon sites in other countries? I would love to just get Amazon Gift cards direct using SBD, would cut out all the hassle of exchanging it to BitCoin for the current gift card site I'm using for Amazon cards.
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Question when you are at the checkout they ask for billing address. I assume that means they are tracking all this and can later be given the government as a form of income for users who purchases these giftcards? What I am trying to get at is taxes. We going to get taxed for using these? Thanks.
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Please pray and support brother...
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Weird when I tried buying a $100 Amazon card (wasn't actually interested in purchasing but wanted to see how much SBD it was going to ask for) it asked for like 10000 SBD...
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The issue has been fixed. The exchange calculator goes haywire once it hits 4 digits so i made adjustments which affected all pricing. Now the syore doent allow for any cart to be over $999 usd. I encourage you to try again. Thanks for the feedback although 10,000 sbd would be nice lol 😊
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Oh that's amazing, thanks for sharing!!
I'm waiting for the day when I can buy giftcards for my local grocery store.
No, scratch that - I'm waiting for the day when I can pay with crypto in my local grocery store!
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That's a amazing information of steem giftcards .I will buy this steem giftcards.Good job,thanks for share.
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Hi @aggroed - this really is most excellent.
I really want to see that Steem Accepted Sign everywhere.
Is the SBD exchange rate based on the CoinMarketCap rate?
Do you know what the exchange rate was at the time? Or what time you made the transaction?
I am interested to see how tight this system can keep to the prevailing exchange rates.
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Now it would be nice to compare it to a fiat exchange, get 28SBD to bittrex, to BTC, from there to another exchange, into USD.
What would the fees, order, transaction fees etc. be?
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roughly the same. Cause that's what they are doing.
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In that case, I wish they would have an Aliexpress gift card:)))
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Whoa - this sounds like a great idea.
Do they mail a physical card to you or is it just codes you have to print out?
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