I am trying to do something very quickly. (Over the next few months, I expect things to change greatly.)    I understand your concerns.  I believe that the presence of a "former Federal prosecutor" within Coinbase will be approximately the least of my worries.  I fully expect that everything I do will come under the highest level of observation. And yes, I understand the issue about holding one's private keys.  (at least, from a beginner's standpoint.)  I have read up on the subject of Mt. Gox, etc.   Soon enough, I will have my own BTC  wallet.  (Actually, I already do, but I don't trust this.)  My immediate concern is that I am not sufficiently confident in my ability to reliably maintain such a wallet on a small, ordinary personal computer, 24 hours per day, etc..  Obviously a crash could be a disaster.  I have decided that at least for a few months, placing this on Coinbase is a reasonable compromise.  I am not aware of of an impending liquidity problem with Coinbase.  There are other considerations.                    Jim Bell On Thursday, September 28, 2017, 12:27:47 PM PDT, juan wrote: On Thu, 28 Sep 2017 07:19:26 +0000 (UTC) jim bell wrote:

I am trying to test three digital cash addresses, BTC, LTC, and ETH.  They are set up in the Coinbase system,

    Jim, I strongly suggest you close your coinbase account ASAP.         https://blog.coinbase.com/kathryn-haun-joins-coinbase-board-of-directors-65b...     "We are excited to announce former federal prosecutor Kathryn     Haun has joined our parent company Board of Directors."     "federal prosecutor with the U.S. Department of Justice and its     first-ever Digital Currency coordinator."     "She also held a significant role in the case of two federal     agents’ role in the investigation into Silk Road."     https://cointelegraph.com/news/coinbase-is-tracking-how-users-spend-their-bi...         Jim, coinbase is THE ENEMY.

but I have found that system to be very confusing:  

    Also, you are NOT using bitcoin if you use any middleman. You     must use a bitcoin client and you must have control of the     private keys. If you use coinbase or any service like that THEY     OWN your bitcoins, not you.

Lots of pitfalls and booby-traps. Can some one send me a tiny amount of each currency to the following addresses.  I will only need one try to tell me if it's successfull, so if you are intending to do so, call it out, and that will alert others that they need not follow. --------------------------------Bitcoin (BTC) Address:                 12QM4GU2WSjGiKacCKhsY4LJGf6rrtdBty -------------------------------- Litecoin (LTC) Address:     LKFu2gAaRitruUgJeeVUeWobbE8dMwVQfK

-----------------------------------Ethereum (ETH)         0xDB39D5f16645892AF9be93ddcF8e5d6E74BC2b83

For BTC, 0.0001 seems to be the smallest number represented in the Coinbase system, at least with an empty account.  (It shows 0.0000)

Similarly, LTC and ETH are shown with a last-digit resolution of 0.0001. Thanks,                  Jim Bell

On Sep 28, 2017, at 4:25 PM, juan wrote:

On Thu, 28 Sep 2017 19:42:11 +0000 (UTC) jim bell wrote:

...

My immediate concern is that I am not sufficiently confident in my ability to reliably maintain such a wallet on a small, ordinary personal computer, 24 hours per day, etc.. Obviously a crash could be a disaster.

You could also use a light client like electrum. Such clients don't need to be online all the time. You only connect to a server if you want to make a payment. And you can backup all your keys by writing down a bunch of words on paper (The only risk would be your computer being stolen and the thief spending your coins before you can move them to a new 'wallet')

(on the other hand if you also want to use ethereum I don't know how their clients operate)

I’ve been using electrum on android and Linux for the past 18 months or so, and can only second Juan’s recommendation - it’s worked quite well for me. There’s even a “bitcoin atm” near my house where you can deposit cash and specify a wallet address (or scan a qr code) - although I haven’t used the atm since prices got above 1k/btc, so it’s been a little while ;)

...

I have decided that at least for a few months, placing this on Coinbase is a reasonable compromise. I am not aware of of an impending liquidity problem with Coinbase. There are other considerations.

I don't know about coinbase's liquidity, but it is a fact that they close accounts whenever they feel like it. But maybe they won't close yours since spying on you is valuable to them.

Anyway, best of luck!

Jim Bell

...

On Thursday, September 28, 2017, 12:27:47 PM PDT, juan wrote:

On Thu, 28 Sep 2017 07:19:26 +0000 (UTC) jim bell wrote:

...

I am trying to test three digital cash addresses, BTC, LTC, and ETH. They are set up in the Coinbase system,

Jim, I strongly suggest you close your coinbase account ASAP.

https://blog.coinbase.com/kathryn-haun-joins-coinbase-board-of-directors-65b...

"We are excited to announce former federal prosecutor Kathryn Haun has joined our parent company Board of Directors."

"federal prosecutor with the U.S. Department of Justice and its first-ever Digital Currency coordinator."

"She also held a significant role in the case of two federal agents’ role in the investigation into Silk Road."

https://cointelegraph.com/news/coinbase-is-tracking-how-users-spend-their-bi...

Jim, coinbase is THE ENEMY.

...

but I have found that system to be very confusing:

Also, you are NOT using bitcoin if you use any middleman. You must use a bitcoin client and you must have control of the private keys. If you use coinbase or any service like that THEY OWN your bitcoins, not you.

...

Lots of pitfalls and booby-traps. Can some one send me a tiny amount of each currency to the following addresses. I will only need one try to tell me if it's successfull, so if you are intending to do so, call it out, and that will alert others that they need not follow. --------------------------------Bitcoin (BTC) Address: 12QM4GU2WSjGiKacCKhsY4LJGf6rrtdBty -------------------------------- Litecoin (LTC) Address: LKFu2gAaRitruUgJeeVUeWobbE8dMwVQfK

-----------------------------------Ethereum (ETH) 0xDB39D5f16645892AF9be93ddcF8e5d6E74BC2b83

For BTC, 0.0001 seems to be the smallest number represented in the Coinbase system, at least with an empty account. (It shows 0.0000)

Similarly, LTC and ETH are shown with a last-digit resolution of 0.0001. Thanks, Jim Bell

On Thursday, September 28, 2017, 2:19:19 PM PDT, juan wrote: On Thu, 28 Sep 2017 16:34:32 -0400 John Newman wrote:

...

I’ve been using electrum on android and Linux for the past 18 months or so, and can only second Juan’s recommendation - it’s worked quite well for me. There’s even a “bitcoin atm” near my house where you can deposit cash and specify a wallet address (or scan a qr code) - although I haven’t used the atm since prices got above 1k/btc, so it’s been a little while ;)

   For completness' sake I guess we should mention that one has to     be reasonaby sure that the machine running electrum (or other     client) isn't 'compromised' / has some sort of coin stealing     malware.  Yes, I recall reading on a blog of this potential problem.  Do ordinary anti-virus programs have the ability to detect such problems before they BECOME real problems?                Jim Bell

    Also, best practice is to have most of your funds in cold     storage.     https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Cold_storage

...

Do ordinary anti-virus programs have the ability to detect such problems before they BECOME real problems?

AV are by nature behind the race, and junk ones are full of junk themselves. Microsoft's AV probably doesn't have the coverage but is free and when combined with good practice can be a thing. Good practice might be running one of the aforementioned Unix OS on the iron, and Windows in a rollback VM container, with data on encrypted USB or samba share. The fuck people use Microsoft for anyway.

The two most secure options in this case are using an offline computer, or using a hardware wallet.

Yep achieves the same sig thing. Though HW wallets are usually more portable, may come with PINpad feature, but lack any utility tools.

...

Also, best practice is to have most of your funds in cold storage.

Like backups, this definitely applies if your balance is more than you wish to lose. HW disk and wallet can, do, and will fail. Print them out and stash them in the woods or wherever. You can simple braincrypt them against being found with 'openssl enc -e -aes128 -a'.