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Stripe vs Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies

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When comparing Stripe vs Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, the Slant community recommends Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies for most people. In the question“What are the best peer-to-peer payment systems?” Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies is ranked 1st while Stripe is ranked 5th. The most important reason people chose Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies is:

There are no names and no accounts in the Bitcoin ecosystem: only anonymous Bitcoin wallets. It makes transactions with people less of a hassle and doesn't require you to input confidential data such as your personal information or credit card details.

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Common Questions

What are the best peer-to-peer payment systems?

Pros

Pro
Very Easy to Setup

Stripe is very simple for developers to integrate into their application as it is a "works out of the box" solution with a fantastic API.

The Stripe API is incredibly simple to setup, for example creating a new charge with Ruby is simply:

require "stripe"
Stripe.api_key = "vtUQeOtUnYr7PGCLQ96Ul4zqpDUO4sOE"
Stripe::Charge.create(
  :amount => 400,
  :currency => "usd",
  :card => {
    :number => "4242424242424242",
    :exp_month => 1,
    :exp_year => 2014,
    :cvc => 314
  },
  :description => "Charge for test@example.com"
)

Pro
Very competitive fees

Pro
Great Documentation

Pro
Supports online marketplaces

Stripe have recently announced support for online marketplaces. This means a service can now enable their users to seamlessly collect payments using the Stripe API.

Pro
A truly peer-to-peer and anonymous solution

Pro
Personally untraceable money transfers

Pro
Allows you to choose a wallet of your choice

Bitcoins are stored in digital wallets, which is a unique identifier for your balance. You can choose to keep your bitcoins offline, but there are also hundreds of online wallet services to keep your bitcoins in.

Pro
Convert bitcoins to a currency of your choice

Bitcoins can be converted to 'real' currency in online marketplaces. You'll often pay a small fee, but that's negligible compared to the average charges. The worth of your sold bitcoins can be transferred to your bank account. This also makes Bitcoin an ideal solution for global payments with different currencies.

Pro
High security with offline storage

Users can secure their wallet though encryption all while keeping this info offline. They can be backed up as well, meaning many encrypted copies of the wallet (and the funds contained) can be stored securely.

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Cons

Con
They have very complicated and expensive pricing for marketplaces

See here.

Con
Not truly anonymous unless you take extra precautions

you must figure out how to buy enough btc without providing any personal data, sadly most mayor exchanges now follow kyc and aml policies so those are out of the question, this leaves only a few services or using a btc atm or mining (but that is no longer realistic)
you must tumble the coins after to further obfuscate their origin
the merchant you are buying from will know your delivery address, the btc address that the payment came from and the ip used when ordering which they will happily give to law enforcement should they get in trouble (and most eventually do get caught)

All the interactions between your wallet and the internet should be done over tor as should any purchases and you must find a way to get the products delivered to a fake address.

Only after all of this are you at least close to anonymous. Unless law enforcement is really trying to get you (unlikely unless you are also distributing the products in large amounts, buying smaller quantities for personal use is safe).

Con
Transactions are not instant

Bitcoin payments take place in the 'blockchain', and must be processed before a payment is completed. This can take anywhere from a couple of minutes up to a couple of hours. However, if you pay a small fee, your transaction is more likely to be completed faster.

Con
Not yet widely accepted as a payment method

Altough the popularity of Bitcoin is on the rise, there aren't many individuals who use bitcoin as a payment method. Hewever, webstores and services that allow Bitcoin payments are increasing.