Silk Road forums

Discussion => Newbie discussion => Topic started by: bobbysblueshoes on April 08, 2013, 04:56 pm

Title: Questions from a complete beginner to bitcoins, slikroad and tor
Post by: bobbysblueshoes on April 08, 2013, 04:56 pm
I am brand new to EVERYTHING involved in browsing and buying from silk road and dealing with Tor and Bitcoin. I am not particularly computer savvy. I own an old mac. Most of the guides I see online seem aimed towards people who know their way around computers (like programmers and people who work with computers) and I hardly understand any of the guides, language and instructions.

I want to familiarise myself with the processes, terminology, applications, safety mesaures etc. involved in purchasing from this website, bitcoin etc.. Is there any guide online that can explain all of this in layman's terms that I can familiarise myself with before I actively engage with this site, so as to minimise my risk of harming my computer or getting into any unwanted trouble and prevent myself from doing anything stupid like leeking my personal details to some scammer?


I am very hesitant about proceeding until I have a working knowledge of the aspects involved. Bear in mind, I am not tech savvy, so most of the guides I've looked for have been little use to me.


I would appreciate suggestions! thanks
Title: Re: Questions from a complete beginner to bitcoins, slikroad and tor
Post by: methodz on April 08, 2013, 05:34 pm
Hey Bobby, I am new, too, but as a fellow Mac user I found it hard to get the right PGP program and figure it all out. Most guides are geared toward PC and Linux. The PGP software I use is GPGTools. It's a free download here: http://gpgtools.github.io/GPGTools_Homepage/

They have a full tutorial video and will walk you through how to create a key, import someone elses key, and how to encrypt messages - really wish I had found that first! Went through a few shitty PGP programs before I found that one.

For bitcoin, there are a ton of ways to earn micro amounts by doing various things (watching videos, taking surveys) but the amount is MICRO. You will do 10 years of surveys before reaching 1 BTC. If you're super new to bitcoin, first step is to get a wallet. There are online wallets, but I prefer a desktop client that I can encrypt and backup. I use Bitcoin Qt (Mac compatible) http://bitcoin.org/en/download

There are a lot of good threads in the forums, too, for best steps, but the most difficult part might be PGP so I would head over the the sticky thread here and read through it. When you feel like you get the idea, you can post your pub key and practice.

Hope that helps a little!
Title: Re: Questions from a complete beginner to bitcoins, slikroad and tor
Post by: NoName4534 on April 08, 2013, 05:41 pm
Hi LEO.
Title: Re: Questions from a complete beginner to bitcoins, slikroad and tor
Post by: jackofspades on April 08, 2013, 06:32 pm
If you already have a SRF account then you already have TOR and
you should know how to get an SR buyers account. So do that. Once you
have an SR account click on 'account' to ind your BTC wallet address(this is
where your online currency known as bitcoin or btc is stored) then go buy Bitcoin
you can do this online if you just clearweb search for 'buy bitcoin' (by the way clearweb
is non-tor browsing) Once you have acquire bitcoin transfer them to your SR account by copy and pasting that
33-digit long number-letter series to your main wallet. Good luck.

PS not every newb is LEO
Title: Re: Questions from a complete beginner to bitcoins, slikroad and tor
Post by: monicabarratt on April 08, 2013, 09:25 pm
I also use Mac and have endorse methodz advice.

It is also useful to have someone to test encryption with. I actually went to twitter and searched for #cryptoparty - people who do local 'parties' about cryptography. One was in my city so I went and actually met (in person!) some of these crypto experts. One of them then sold me bitcoin, and helped me sort out a wallet, etc. Might be worthwhile for you, depending on where you live in the world!