Acta Informatica Pragensia 2019, 8(2), 112-131 | DOI: 10.18267/j.aip.12720404

A Probe Survey of Bitcoin Transactions Through Analysis of Advertising in an On-Line Discussion Forum

Zoltan Ban, Jan Lansky, Stanislava Mildeova, Petr Tesar
Department of Computer Science and Mathematics, Faculty of Economic Studies, University of Finance and Administration, Estonskį 500, 101 00 Prague 10, Czech Republic

Cryptocurrencies have become a major phenomenon in recent years. For IT, a breakthrough is both the cryptocurrency itself as a commodity and the technology that cryptocurrency development has brought. The article focuses on the bitcoin cryptocurrency as the most important cryptocurrency. A relatively unexplored topic is what goods or services are purchased for bitcoins. To track what bitcoins are spent on, it is necessary to look for places that are dedicated to trading cryptocurrencies. The bitcointalk.org forum was chosen as a source for our data mining. The aim of the article is to find an answer to the research question: What are bitcoins on the discussion forum bitcointalk.org planned to be spent on? As part of the research, an application was developed using a PHP script to gather information from the discussion forum (bitcointalk.org). There is some evidence which suggests what types of products or services people spend cryptocurrencies on. This research has proven that cryptocurrencies are used to buy and sell goods or services in the electronics and computer world segments. Today, these segments are widespread, which may speed up the integration of cryptocurrencies into everyday life. This applies, of course, only if the risks associated with cryptocurrencies do not increase.

Keywords: Cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, On-Line Advertisement, Text Mining, Cybersecurity, Discussion Forum

Received: September 19, 2019; Revised: December 18, 2019; Accepted: December 19, 2019; Prepublished online: December 27, 2019; Published: December 31, 2019  Show citation

ACS AIP APA ASA Harvard Chicago Chicago Notes IEEE ISO690 MLA NLM Turabian Vancouver
Ban, Z., Lansky, J., Mildeova, S., & Tesar, P. (2019). A Probe Survey of Bitcoin Transactions Through Analysis of Advertising in an On-Line Discussion Forum. Acta Informatica Pragensia, 8(2), 112-131. doi: 10.18267/j.aip.127
Download citation
  • BibTeX (.bib)
  • Bookends (.ris)
  • EasyBib (.ris)
  • EndNote (.enw)
  • EndNote 8 (.xml)
  • ISI WoS (.isi)
  • Medlars (.medlars)
  • Mendeley (.ris)
  • MODS (.xml)
  • Papers (.ris)
  • RefWorks (.txt)
  • RefManager (.ris)
  • RIS (.ris)
  • MS Word (.xml)
  • Zotero (.ris)
    • Open full article

    References

    1. Acheson, A. (2018). What Can You Buy with Bitcoin? Coindesk. Retrieved December 17, 2019, from https://www.coindesk.com/information/what-can-you-buy-with-bitcoins/
    2. Antonopoulos, A. M. (2015). Mastering bitcoin. Sebastopol, CA: O'Reilly.
    3. Back, A. (1997). A partial hash collision based postage scheme. Retrieved December 17, 2019, from http://www.hashcash.org/papers/announce.txt
    4. Back, A. (2002). Hashcash - A Denial of Service Counter-Measure. Retrieved December 17, 2019, from http://www.hashcash.org/papers/hashcash.pdf
    5. Ban, Z. (2018). Analysis of bitcoin advertisements. Diploma Thesis. Prague: VSFS.
    6. Ban, Z., Lansky, J., Mildeova, S., & Tesar, P. (2018). Using cryptocurrency to buy and sell products online. In: Proceedings of the 26th EBES conference - Prague program and Abstract book. Istanbul: EBES.
    7. Barone, R., & Masciandaro, D. (2019). Cryptocurrency or usury? Crime and alternative money laundering techniques. European Journal of Law and Economics, 47(2), 233-254. doi: 10.1007/s10657-019-09609-6 Go to original source...
    8. Basl, J., & Doucek, P. (2019). A Metamodel for Evaluating Enterprise Readiness in the Context of Industry 4.0. Information, 10(3), no. 89. doi: 10.3390/info10030089 Go to original source...
    9. Bitpay. (2018). Bitpay. Retrieved December 17, 2019, from https://bitpay.com/
    10. BitPay. (2017). BitPay's Bitcoin Payments Volume Grows by 328%, On Pace for $1 Billion Yearly. Retrieved December 17, 2019, from https://blog.bitpay.com/bitpay-growth-2017/
    11. Ciaian, P., Rajcaniova, M., & Kancs, d'A. (2016). The economics of BitCoin price formation. Applied Economics, 48(19), 1799-1815. doi: 10.1080/00036846.2015.1109038 Go to original source...
    12. Conrad, C., Custovic, A., & Ghysels, E. (2018). Long-and Short-Term Cryptocurrency Volatility Components: A GARCH-MIDAS Analysis. Journal of Risk and Financial Management, 11(2), no. 23. doi: 10.3390/jrfm11020023 Go to original source...
    13. Cryptocurrency Market Capitalizations. (2019). CoinMarketCap. Retrieved December 17, 2019, from https://coinmarketcap.com
    14. Demieva, A. G. (2018). Cryptocurrency in Russia: Problems of Legal Regulation. Ad Alta, 8(1), 95-97.
    15. Dostov, V., & Shust, P. (2014). Cryptocurrencies: an unconventional challenge to the AML/CFT regulators? Journal of Financial Crime, 21(3), 249-263. doi: 10.1108/JFC-06-2013-0043 Go to original source...
    16. Dwyer, G. P. (2015). The economics of Bitcoin and similar private digital currencies. Journal of Financial Stability, 17, 81-91. doi: 10.2139/ssrn.2434628 Go to original source...
    17. Dyhrberg, A. H. (2016). Bitcoin, gold and the dollar - A GARCH volatility analysis. Finance Research Letters, 16, 85-92. doi: 10.1016/j.frl.2015.10.008 Go to original source...
    18. European Banking Authority. (2014). EBA Opinion on virtual currencies. EBA/Op/2014/08. Retrieved December 17, 2019, from https://www.eba.europa.eu/documents/10180/657547/EBA-Op-2014-08+Opinion+on+Virtual+Currencies.pdf
    19. Eurostat Statistics explained. (2017). E-commerce statistics for individuals. Retrieved December 17, 2019, from http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/E-commerce_statistics_for_individuals
    20. Eurostat Statistics explained. (2018). E-commerce statistics for individuals. Retrieved December 17, 2019, from https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/E-commerce_statistics_for_individuals
    21. Foley, S., Karlsen, J. R., & Putniņ¹, T. J. (2019). Sex, Drugs, and Bitcoin: How Much Illegal Activity Is Financed through Cryptocurrencies? Review of Financial Studies, 32(5), 1798-1853. doi: 10.1093/rfs/hhz015 Go to original source...
    22. Greenberg, P., & Bugden, D. (2019). Energy consumption boomtowns in the United States: Community responses to a cryptocurrency boom. Energy Research & Social Science, 50, 162-167. Go to original source...
    23. Haber, S., & Stornetta, W. S. (1991). How to time-stamp a digital document. Journal of Cryptology, 3(2), 99-111. doi: 10.1007/BF00196791 Go to original source...
    24. Han, J., & Kamber, M. (2006). Data mining: concepts and techniques. 2nd ed. San Francisco, CA: Morgan Kaufmann.
    25. Helisek, M. (2002). The Causes of Currency Crises - Theory and Practice. Czech Journal of Economics and Finance, 52(9), 458-477.
    26. Chaum, D. (1983). Blind signatures for untraceable payments. In: Chaum D., Rivest R.L., & Sherman A.T. (Eds.), Advances in Cryptology (pp. 199-203). Boston: Springer. doi: 10.1007/978-1-4757-0602-4_18 Go to original source...
    27. Cheah, E.T., & Fry, J. (2015). Speculative bubbles in Bitcoin markets? An empirical investigation into the fundamental value of Bitcoin. Finance Research Letters, 130, 32-36. doi: 10.1016/j.econlet.2015.02.029 Go to original source...
    28. Chokun, J. (2016). Who Accepts Bitcoins as Payment List of Companies. Retrieved December 17, 2019, from https://99bitcoins.com/bitcoin/who-accepts/
    29. Jansen, B. J., Sobel, K., & Zhang, M. (2011). The Brand Effect of Key Phrases and Advertisements in Sponsored Search. International Journal of Electronic Commerce, 16(1), 77-106. doi: 10.2753/JEC1086-4415160103 Go to original source...
    30. Lansky, J. (2017). Bitcoin System. Acta Informatica Pragensia, 6(1), 20-31. doi: 10.18267/j.aip.97 Go to original source...
    31. Lansky, J. (2018). Cryptocurrencies. Prague: C. H. Beck.
    32. Lansky, J. (2020). Cryptocurrency Survival Analysis. Journal of Alternative Investments, (in press). doi: 10.3905/jai.2019.1.084 Go to original source...
    33. Lecky-Thompson, E., & Nowicki, S. D. (2010). PHP 6: programujeme profesionalne. Brno: Computer Press.
    34. Knirsch, F., Unterweger, A., & Engel, D. (2019). Implementing a blockchain from scratch: why, how, and what we learned. EURASIP Journal on Information Security, 2019(2), no. 2. doi: 10.1186/s13635-019-0085-3 Go to original source...
    35. Lee, D. (2015). Handbook of digital currency: bitcoin, innovation, financial instruments, and big data. Amsterdam: Elsevier/AP.
    36. Mares, D., & Dlaskova, G. (2016). Small and Medium-Sized Enterprizes - Opportunities and Challenges. European Research Studies Journal, 19(4), 78-87. doi: 10.35808/ersj/582 Go to original source...
    37. McHugh, D. (2019). Facebook's Libra Gets Stark Warning From G-7 Finance Chiefs. The New York Times. July 18.
    38. Mildeova, S., & Brixi, R. (2011). The Limits of ICT for Innovations and Economic Growth. In: Proceedings of the 19th Interdisciplinary Information Management Talks (pp. 157-164). Linz: Trauner Verlag.
    39. Nakamoto, S. (2008). Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System. Retrieved December 17, 2019, from https://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf
    40. Narayanan, A. (2016). Bitcoin and cryptocurrency technologies: a comprehensive introduction. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
    41. Nova, A. (2018). Bitcoin takes on cash, as more places accept the cryptocurrency. CNBC. Retrieved December 17, 2019, from https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/02/spending-cryptocurrencies-on-everyday-purchases-is-getting-easier.html
    42. Nulicek, V. (2018). Interconnection between IPv4 and IPv6. Acta Informatica Pragensia, 7(1), 22-39. doi: 10.18267/j.aip.112 Go to original source...
    43. Number of Bitcoin ATMs. (2018). Number of Bitcoin ATMs worldwide from January 2016 to March 2018. Statista. Retrieved December 17, 2019, from https://www.statista.com/statistics/343127/number-bitcoin-atms/
    44. Popper, N. (2015). Digital Gold: Bitcoin and the Inside Story of the Misfits and Millionaires Trying to Reinvent Money. New York: Harper.
    45. Roubal, O. (2017) Janus' face of consumer culture. European Journal of Science and Theology, 13(6), 219-229.
    46. Russo, C. (2018). Bitcoin Speculators, Not Drug Dealers, Dominate Crypto Use Now. Bloomberg. Retrieved December 17, 2019, from https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-08-07/bitcoin-speculators-not-drug-dealers-dominate-crypto-use-now
    47. Saltz, J. S., & Stanton, J. M. (2018). An introduction to data science. Los Angeles: SAGE.
    48. Simek, P., Stoces, M., Vanek, J., Jarolimek, J., Masner, J., & Hrbek, I. (2013). Using of Automatic Metadata Providing. Agris on-line Papers in Economics and Informatics, 5(4), 189-197. doi: 10.22004/ag.econ.162301 Go to original source...
    49. Smutny, Z. & Vehovar, V. (2020). Social Informatics Research: Schools of Thought, Methodological Basis, and Thematic Conceptualization. Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology, (in press). doi: 10.1002/asi.24280 Go to original source...
    50. Statista. (2018). Statista - The Statistics Portal. Retrieved December 17, 2019, from https://www.statista.com/statistics/237974/online-advertising-spending-worldwide/
    51. Stieglitz, S., Mirbabaie, M., Ross, B., & Neuberger, C. (2018). Social media analytics - Challenges in topic discovery, data collection, and data preparation. International Journal of Information Management, 39, 156-168. doi: 10.1016/j.ijinfomgt.2017.12.002 Go to original source...
    52. Svec V., & Selby R. (2019). Encourage them to learn: Case Study of Fictitious Product and Virtual Market in Marketing Communications Degree Course. Journal on Efficiency and Responsibility in Education and Science, 12(3), 66-74, doi: 10.7160/eriesj.2019.120301 Go to original source...
    53. Witten, I. H., Frank, E., Hall, M., & Pal, C. (2016). Data mining: practical machine learning tools and techniques. 4nd ed. San Francisco, CA: Morgan Kaufman.
    54. Wolfson, S. N. (2015). Bitcoin: The Early Market. Journal of Business & Economics Research, 13(4), 201-214 doi: 10.19030/jber.v13i4.9452 Go to original source...
    55. Zhang, M. (2008). EUIRMSI: One Kind of Software Infrastructure for Enterprise Unstructured Information Resources Management System Development. In: International Symposium on Information Science and Engineering (pp. 345-349). New York: IEEE. doi: 10.1109/ISISE.2008.130 Go to original source...

    This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0), which permits use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original publication is properly cited. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.


    Return to the content