Silk Road forums
Discussion => Silk Road discussion => Topic started by: onesickpuppy on March 20, 2013, 01:04 am
-
Sorry for asking but, been trying for a while now and can't even get to the login screen. Unfortunately the site http://zw3crggtadila2sg.onion/downornot/ is also down for me so I can't use it to find out if silkroad is down.
-
yeah it was just working to
-
Guys, this is the way SR works, get used to it, please.
-
I can't access it either, seriously wtf is powering it? Some Ethiopian on a treadmill or sumthin
-
I can't access it either, seriously wtf is powering it? Some Ethiopian on a treadmill or sumthin
Ya the country known for their long distance runners.
Nice try, idiot.
-
i think dirty is right. and btw awesome quote man
-
Guys, this is the way SR works, get used to it, please.
Yeah but usually when tor is trying to connect to it, I see silkroadvb5piz3r.onion:80 being tried in the Tor Network Map window. I see the status change from connecting to open, or closed, but now I don't even see that.
Maybe the site is under maintenance. If that was the case I'd stop trying to access it for a bit. I gotta spend these BTC 's asap before the value goes down! That's probably why it feels like it's taking forever
-
I can't access it either, seriously wtf is powering it? Some Ethiopian on a treadmill or sumthin
Ya the country known for their long distance runners.
Nice try, idiot.
Haha this made me LOL for real, good one!
-
I tried all the usual tricks, new identity in vidalia control panel, new identity button, exiting then restarting, and nothing. I guess I must have been very lucky for the past 14 months...
-
it definitely happens from time to time. idk if its maintenance or just the sheer volume of people using it....
but usually just try alot later or another day and i can get on. nature of the beast!
-
It ain't down:
00:00:00 INFO Average time required for activity update cycles: 80.19 seconds.
It's taking an average of 1 minute and 20 seconds just to contact the site and d/l a page or two, but it ain't down.
-
I can't access it either, seriously wtf is powering it? Some Ethiopian on a treadmill or sumthin
Ya the country known for their long distance runners.
Nice try, idiot.
Haha this made me LOL for real, good one!
AAAAHAHAHAHAHAHHAA u win this round spiderman
-
Can't connect over here either. Damn, even for TOR it's a slow site. C'est la vie I guess.
-
ok so its not down... prob just sheer volume try an off peak time maybe :-\
i cant get on either at the moment.
-
●▬▬▬▬▬▬▬ஜ۩۞۩ஜ▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬●
❖ Pharmington Rex ❖
●▬▬▬▬▬▬▬ஜ۩۞۩ஜ▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬●
Ciao a tutti,
When SR go down, it is like my favorite time of month. Make me just as moody. Same headache too. But at least with favorite time of month, I can take remedy.
Here, you can only wait for post from DPR which say for you to suffer a little more. :)
Caro saluto,
♥♕♥ Lady Lucia Nella Skye Con Diamanti
Her Most Vividness, Dame LSD.
●ஜ۩۞۩ஜ▬▬▬▬ஜ۩۞۩ஜ▬▬▬ஜ۩۞۩ஜ●
The Gentleman Lords (and Lady) of Pharmaceuticals.
Serving US Patrons from within the US.
●ஜ۩۞۩ஜ▬▬▬▬ஜ۩۞۩ஜ▬▬▬ஜ۩۞۩ஜ●
-
In all my time here over the months, I've never seen it actually down. It gets timed out and other server errors due to heavy traffic.
If you try a proxy site for a quick minute , you see that SR is up just fine. It's TOR that is the problem. Reset it.
-
Nightmare ahhhh!!
-
Yeah but usually when tor is trying to connect to it, I see silkroadvb5piz3r.onion:80 being tried in the Tor Network Map window. I see the status change from connecting to open, or closed, but now I don't even see that.
The hidden service is down. The hidden service descriptor is not being published. That's what this means:
[Notice] Closing stream for '[scrubbed].onion': hidden service is unavailable (try again later).
If your Tor client can't fetch the descriptor, it won't know what the intro points are, and it won't build circuits to them.
-
my tor message log says: "[Notice] Closing stream for '[scrubbed].onion': hidden service is unavailable (try again later)."
Does this mean that the silkroad hidden service is unavailable due to a DDOS or that I just cant reach it? Believe me I've tried everything, restarting tor, new identity, countless minutes waiting...
-
It ain't down:
INFO Average time required for activity update cycles: 80.19 seconds.
It's taking an average of 1 minute and 20 seconds just to contact the site and d/l a page or two, but it ain't down.
It may have been doing that when you tried, but now I'm getting the error that I posted.
-
Yeah but usually when tor is trying to connect to it, I see silkroadvb5piz3r.onion:80 being tried in the Tor Network Map window. I see the status change from connecting to open, or closed, but now I don't even see that.
The hidden service is down. The hidden service descriptor is not being published. That's what this means:
[Notice] Closing stream for '[scrubbed].onion': hidden service is unavailable (try again later).
If your Tor client can't fetch the descriptor, it won't know what the intro points are, and it won't build circuits to them.
Yes, yes it makes sense... So it is down right now. I wonder if it has to do with everyone with BTC's wanting to spend them NOW before they go down in value by $10 tomorrow. Not that I know that for a fact, but that would suck
-
Just went to the site via a clearnet proxy and got the login screen. (Obviously didn't login.. would NEVER do that or recommend it.. proxy or not).. and the site itself seems to up. It's TOR that's PMSing.
-
It's not down for maintenance. I'm just as frustrated as you guys resetting Tor over and over and over... >:(
Probably just sheer volume due to the bitcoin's purchasing power going up today.
-
Yes, yes it makes sense... So it is down right now. I wonder if it has to do with everyone with BTC's wanting to spend them NOW before they go down in value by $10 tomorrow. Not that I know that for a fact, but that would suck
A lot of people bought BTC yesterday, which bumped the price by 20%. Looks like they finally got those BTC into their SR accounts. ;)
-
It's not down for maintenance. I'm just as frustrated as you guys resetting Tor over and over and over... >:(
Probably just sheer volume due to the bitcoin's purchasing power going up today.
^ This is my guess as well.
-
It's not down for maintenance. I'm just as frustrated as you guys resetting Tor over and over and over... >:(
Probably just sheer volume due to the bitcoin's purchasing power going up today.
I knew it! That's what every one is thinking! And who says that people are hoarding BTC's and not spending them? :):)
But seriously, then why isn't it available as a hidden service according to tor? Usually when I get a timeout the error on the page says that it is a timeout. In tis case it says it can't even establish a connection
-
+1 for what colorblack said. I went there via clearnet to http://silkroadvb5piz3r.onion.to and got the login screen. I, of course, did not enter my login information, but the site is still up. Tor is acting like a little bitch though. Plus i was able to login through my dummy account to see if things were really up and they area.
-
I can't access it either, seriously wtf is powering it? Some Ethiopian on a treadmill or sumthin
Ya the country known for their long distance runners.
Nice try, idiot.
well done.
-
Everyone stop trying to connect.
Let me go first, my order is more important than yours!
We can take turns! hah
-
But seriously, then why isn't it available as a hidden service according to tor? Usually when I get a timeout the error on the page says that it is a timeout. In tis case it says it can't even establish a connection
It could be that the server is up, the web server is running, but the Tor client crashed or there's something preventing it from publishing its descriptor.
I know that's definitely what that error means. Here's a bug report saying the same thing:
https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/5363
"It seems Tor is still broadcasting the hidden service descriptor (otherwise it would say "hidden service unavailable, try again later") but nobody is actually able to make a connection."
-
+1 for what colorblack said. I went there via clearnet to http://silkroadvb5piz3r.onion.to and got the login screen. I, of course, did not enter my login information, but the site is still up. Tor is acting like a little bitch though. Plus i was able to login through my dummy account to see if things were really up and they area.
Ok, so the tor network is over saturated with requests right now. I'll just have to wait....
-
http://silkroadvb5piz3r.onion.to/ doesn't work for me, just get bad gateway
-
But seriously, then why isn't it available as a hidden service according to tor? Usually when I get a timeout the error on the page says that it is a timeout. In tis case it says it can't even establish a connection
It could be that the server is up, the web server is running, but the Tor client crashed or there's something preventing it from publishing its descriptor.
I know that's definitely what that error means. Here's a bug report saying the same thing:
https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/5363
"It seems Tor is still broadcasting the hidden service descriptor (otherwise it would say "hidden service unavailable, try again later") but nobody is actually able to make a connection."
Yeah but if that was the case then the clearnet onion.to site wouldn't be able to access SR either right? It has to make a tor connection on your behalf. Unless the hidden service descriptor is being selectively published to only a small part of the tor net?
-
Yeah but if that was the case then the clearnet onion.to site wouldn't be able to access SR either right? It has to make a tor connection on your behalf. Unless the hidden service descriptor is being selectively published to only a small part of the tor net?
If a lot of people access SR through onion.to (which I believe is the case), then it would already have an established circuit to SR and wouldn't need to fetch the descriptor.
Anyway, I'm getting this error:
onion.to
silkroadvb5piz3r.onion is currently unavailable. Proxy timed out while trying to connect. (4).
You might have been able to access it through an existing circuit that has been severed now. Try again.
-
When the site is down it gives me time to come into the forums and read. Holy shit are these forums terrible. There is so much bad information on here. Its also amazing how many people do not understand btc and don't realize that it makes no difference how much btc is...the price for drugs stays the same. Also for those of you who do not know...when SR is back up, go to account at the top, then click settings on the right hand side, then click display on dollars. That way you see everything in US dollars instead of btc prices. Also if you want to know how much the btc is on SR at the moment, just add something to your cart and it will then give you the current value of the btc on Silk Road.
Also for those of you that are worried that while SR is down you could lose money if the btc gos down. Relax, it is only going up. In fact it will be even higher the longer SR is down as SR is on a 24hr weighted average of Mt.Gox.
If you read a thread and the OP asks for some help and you do not 100% know the answer.....do not post.
-
the site has been working fine for me all night :)
dpr is my home boy
-
Okay, so I cannot access SR through Tor nor can I access SR through Tor via onion.to; however, I can access SR via the onion.to through clearnet browsers on multiple devices. SR is not down. SR is not dead. Just give it time. Our drugs are safe.
-
+1 for what RxKing said. Most (I think everyone!)'s prices are pegged to the dollar. BTC can be worth $5 dollars or $97, that would be irrelevant to our purposes. That $30 dollar oxy or $85 dollar gram of coke will stay that same price in *dollars*. Your drugs will not get super cheap or super expensive because of BTC fluctuations.. hence why I just have everything displayed in dollars, and you all should too!
I would find it hilarious if any vendor had their product prices pegged to the BTC and NOT the dollar.
-
Yeah but I get my btc through virtex and today paid 5 dollars more per coin than the mtgox usd price because from the time I deposited cash to the time I was credited with that cash it spiked, and honestly I'm worried it will go down again overnight because there seem to be more sell orders then buy order listed now. Anyhow I honestly don't know what affects the price. I just don't want to be 0.01 short on my dope. I want to order it now while it is what it is and hedge that shit so I don't have worry about it ever again and I can just wait for the mailman. That's why I'm grumpy.
-
Well, those who have a stockpile of bitcoins can now buy about 20% more drugs then they could a day ago. Also, you'd be surprised but there are some vendors who don't peg their prices to the dollar. Obviously most do, but there's more than you'd expect that don't.
-
Well, those who have a stockpile of bitcoins can now buy about 20% more drugs then they could a day ago. Also, you'd be surprised but there are some vendors who don't peg their prices to the dollar. Obviously most do, but there's more than you'd expect that don't.
Yup! ive made a few hundred since my deposit yesterday!
Knowing how volatile itcoins can be, i want to get in there and spend them ASAP
-
Yeah but I get my btc through virtex and today paid 5 dollars more per coin than the mtgox usd price because from the time I deposited cash to the time I was credited with that cash it spiked, and honestly I'm worried it will go down again overnight because there seem to be more sell orders then buy order listed now. Anyhow I honestly don't know what affects the price. I just don't want to be 0.01 short on my dope. I want to order it now while it is what it is and hedge that shit so I don't have worry about it ever again and I can just wait for the mailman. That's why I'm grumpy.
Well you shouldn't be grumpy! When Sr comes back up you will have more money then you had when it was down...that is a fact! So it willbe Impossible for you to be .01 short...as SR uses a 24 hour weighted system to mt.gox..so even if right now the btc went down(it didnt.. in fact it went to $60+) it would take 6+ hours for it to be seen on SR... so you are all good.
When Sr went down, btc was valued at $52 on SR and it was obv going up...so again..you are all good..so don't be grumpy and answer my question! (in fact you should be really happy as you can get even more dope! then if SR was up...because if it was up...you would have already bought your drugs:) )
But I quoted you because I wanted to know what you meant by you want to "hedge" that shit...
-
the silkroadvb5piz3r.onion.to site works now.
Just be careful no to use your real account.
But works if you just need to check some prices or whatever.
-
Yeah but I get my btc through virtex and today paid 5 dollars more per coin than the mtgox usd price because from the time I deposited cash to the time I was credited with that cash it spiked, and honestly I'm worried it will go down again overnight because there seem to be more sell orders then buy order listed now. Anyhow I honestly don't know what affects the price. I just don't want to be 0.01 short on my dope. I want to order it now while it is what it is and hedge that shit so I don't have worry about it ever again and I can just wait for the mailman. That's why I'm grumpy.
Well you shouldn't be grumpy! When Sr comes back up you will have more money then you had when it was down...that is a fact! So it willbe Impossible for you to be .01 short...as SR uses a 24 hour weighted system to mt.gox..so even if right now the btc went down(it didnt.. in fact it went to $60+) it would take 6+ hours for it to be seen on SR... so you are all good.
When Sr went down, btc was valued at $52 on SR and it was obv going up...so again..you are all good..so don't be grumpy and answer my question! (in fact you should be really happy as you can get even more dope! then if SR was up...because if it was up...you would have already bought your drugs:) )
But I quoted you because I wanted to know what you meant by you want to "hedge" that shit...
When I'm holding bitcoins their value fluctuates,;it can go up or down. When I place an order the value gets locked to the time of the order assuming the vendor uses hedging. I want to place my order so I get the drugs I paid for, and so my purchasing power stops fluctuating.
-
We are up and running !
-
Working fine now.
Just a part of being on the road
-
still down, wait for dpr to finish cleanin himself out and he'll get roun to it
-
The site is NOT down. I'm on it right now. Patience people.....just keep trying.
-
i'm on it now too. it's loading faster than the forums for me. this is through tor not a proxy. i don't need to order or anything though so i'll stop adding to traffic. just wanted to see what all the fuss was about.
-
Fuck you RON I'm a kill your family too say somethin bitch
-
Yeah but I get my btc through virtex and today paid 5 dollars more per coin than the mtgox usd price because from the time I deposited cash to the time I was credited with that cash it spiked, and honestly I'm worried it will go down again overnight because there seem to be more sell orders then buy order listed now. Anyhow I honestly don't know what affects the price. I just don't want to be 0.01 short on my dope. I want to order it now while it is what it is and hedge that shit so I don't have worry about it ever again and I can just wait for the mailman. That's why I'm grumpy.
Well you shouldn't be grumpy! When Sr comes back up you will have more money then you had when it was down...that is a fact! So it willbe Impossible for you to be .01 short...as SR uses a 24 hour weighted system to mt.gox..so even if right now the btc went down(it didnt.. in fact it went to $60+) it would take 6+ hours for it to be seen on SR... so you are all good.
When Sr went down, btc was valued at $52 on SR and it was obv going up...so again..you are all good..so don't be grumpy and answer my question! (in fact you should be really happy as you can get even more dope! then if SR was up...because if it was up...you would have already bought your drugs:) )
But I quoted you because I wanted to know what you meant by you want to "hedge" that shit...
When I'm holding bitcoins their value fluctuates,;it can go up or down. When I place an order the value gets locked to the time of the order assuming the vendor uses hedging. I want to place my order so I get the drugs I paid for, and so my purchasing power stops fluctuating.
Well thank you for answering my question...and I figured that is what you meant...but you are wrong about something.....
When the vendor hedges an item...that has NOTHING to do with the buyer..NOTHING.. That vendor has decided to pay 6% to lock in the price it is at the time you purchase it. And it is actually one of the WORST ....no it is THE WORST thing a vendor can do! In the past 12 months..there has been a 1 week period where the btc went from 13-14 to 10..but it was right back up... and that was the only time it might have made sense.... But even that 1 week it was not the right thing to do...
The biggest problem is lets say the vendor is selling a gram of coke for $ 100. And the btc is worth $10. That means the gram cost 10 coins.. so you as a buyer make the purchase and the vendor gets 10 coins put in escrow...notice I said 10 coins...and not 100 dollars.. and after he marks it in transit...the 17 day auto finalize clock begins.. So he is hoping that you the buyer...finalizes that order (10 coins) while they are still worth $10 a piece...now if he hedged it...then it makes no difference when you finalize..as $100 goes into his account in escrow ..and no matter when the buyer finalizes...he will get $100. Now one of the bad things is...not only did he pay 6% for this option...if when the buyer finalizes...the btc went up to $13...it does not matter..he gets $100 or $10 per coin. So he does not see the upside (in this case the extra $30 or 30%)..and as we all know..in the last 12 months..all the btc has done is gone up...and again by the time you finalize who knows how long it is before that vendor converts it to cash... so the vendor paid 6% to lock in $100....not a good deal..
Now if the btc was to go down to $8 a coin his 10 coins would have been worth $80... so you take out the $6 he spent...and in this example it would have been good...but the problem with this example is this has not happened in over a year..and 90% of vendors do not understand that you don't get the upside...SR keeps that!!
So if the hedge worked where you paid 6% to lock in a minimum of $10 a coin and you also got to keep whatever the plus side is then it would be a different story...still not a good deal...as it is hard to over come the 6%...but at least as a vendor you would lock in a min price you are going to get...with no max... but this is fantasy..so who cares..lets go back to how it is...
A vendor that has an item hedged gets that amount he sold the item for...now back in the day...especially for non domestic vendors that could wait for 17+ days to get there money...they were willing to pay 6% because in that time the coin could go from $8 to $1.25!!!! But in this time and age it is a terrible option for vendors...and I believe it is "left over" and is a HUGE money maker for SR. Now it is the vendors responsibility to learn everything and do their homework...but I can also say it is not exactly explained in great detail anywhere and in fact has a "recommended" next to it when you get a vendor account for the settings...and A LOT of vendors have that box checked in their settings because it has a "recommended" next to it and they do not know what it even is or how it works...
So that is the hedge system.....You can see that it has no bearing at all on buyers...
-
lol theres a ron swansn, thought it was just some guy who used my alias
-
Im fuckin Kill you
-
There was a bitcoin crash so to speak back in September of 2012. I know cause it fucked me when the coins I just bought went down like 5 bucks a coin and I was prepping to get a qp. It wasn't a huge thing but it pissed me off that it happened on the same day I was trying to do my deal. Since then the btc has done nothing but head skyward. Wish I hadn't spent all the coins I had bought for as little as $5....but hindsight is always 20/20 as they say. I don't know too many people that predicted the rate to be hitting the $60 mark as it did today. Crazy fuckin currency that's for sure. Agreed that hedging now is just more money in DPR's pockets. Vendors with large stash's of coins must be loving this dramatic rise.
-
Yeah but I get my btc through virtex and today paid 5 dollars more per coin than the mtgox usd price because from the time I deposited cash to the time I was credited with that cash it spiked, and honestly I'm worried it will go down again overnight because there seem to be more sell orders then buy order listed now. Anyhow I honestly don't know what affects the price. I just don't want to be 0.01 short on my dope. I want to order it now while it is what it is and hedge that shit so I don't have worry about it ever again and I can just wait for the mailman. That's why I'm grumpy.
Well you shouldn't be grumpy! When Sr comes back up you will have more money then you had when it was down...that is a fact! So it willbe Impossible for you to be .01 short...as SR uses a 24 hour weighted system to mt.gox..so even if right now the btc went down(it didnt.. in fact it went to $60+) it would take 6+ hours for it to be seen on SR... so you are all good.
When Sr went down, btc was valued at $52 on SR and it was obv going up...so again..you are all good..so don't be grumpy and answer my question! (in fact you should be really happy as you can get even more dope! then if SR was up...because if it was up...you would have already bought your drugs:) )
But I quoted you because I wanted to know what you meant by you want to "hedge" that shit...
When I'm holding bitcoins their value fluctuates,;it can go up or down. When I place an order the value gets locked to the time of the order assuming the vendor uses hedging. I want to place my order so I get the drugs I paid for, and so my purchasing power stops fluctuating.
Well thank you for answering my question...and I figured that is what you meant...but you are wrong about something.....
When the vendor hedges an item...that has NOTHING to do with the buyer..NOTHING.. That vendor has decided to pay 6% to lock in the price it is at the time you purchase it. And it is actually one of the WORST ....no it is THE WORST thing a vendor can do! In the past 12 months..there has been a 1 week period where the btc went from 13-14 to 10..but it was right back up... and that was the only time it might have made sense.... But even that 1 week it was not the right thing to do...
The biggest problem is lets say the vendor is selling a gram of coke for $ 100. And the btc is worth $10. That means the gram cost 10 coins.. so you as a buyer make the purchase and the vendor gets 10 coins put in escrow...notice I said 10 coins...and not 100 dollars.. and after he marks it in transit...the 17 day auto finalize clock begins.. So he is hoping that you the buyer...finalizes that order (10 coins) while they are still worth $10 a piece...now if he hedged it...then it makes no difference when you finalize..as $100 goes into his account in escrow ..and no matter when the buyer finalizes...he will get $100. Now one of the bad things is...not only did he pay 6% for this option...if when the buyer finalizes...the btc went up to $13...it does not matter..he gets $100 or $10 per coin. So he does not see the upside (in this case the extra $30 or 30%)..and as we all know..in the last 12 months..all the btc has done is gone up...and again by the time you finalize who knows how long it is before that vendor converts it to cash... so the vendor paid 6% to lock in $100....not a good deal..
Now if the btc was to go down to $8 a coin his 10 coins would have been worth $80... so you take out the $6 he spent...and in this example it would have been good...but the problem with this example is this has not happened in over a year..and 90% of vendors do not understand that you don't get the upside...SR keeps that!!
So if the hedge worked where you paid 6% to lock in a minimum of $10 a coin and you also got to keep whatever the plus side is then it would be a different story...still not a good deal...as it is hard to over come the 6%...but at least as a vendor you would lock in a min price you are going to get...with no max... but this is fantasy..so who cares..lets go back to how it is...
A vendor that has an item hedged gets that amount he sold the item for...now back in the day...especially for non domestic vendors that could wait for 17+ days to get there money...they were willing to pay 6% because in that time the coin could go from $8 to $1.25!!!! But in this time and age it is a terrible option for vendors...and I believe it is "left over" and is a HUGE money maker for SR. Now it is the vendors responsibility to learn everything and do their homework...but I can also say it is not exactly explained in great detail anywhere and in fact has a "recommended" next to it when you get a vendor account for the settings...and A LOT of vendors have that box checked in their settings because it has a "recommended" next to it and they do not know what it even is or how it works...
So that is the hedge system.....You can see that it has no bearing at all on buyers...
If my order was cancelled or refunded I would get the hedged value, not the btc value though, no?
And that is true that the bitcoin has only gone up recently, but I find it swings +-5 on some days now, and I just don't want the downside of that swing. I have ordered by now and I almost almost had enough to get an extra point of heroin, so as you said not being able to log in was in my favour. But it could have not been...
I just always want to spend my coins the second I buy them as a rule.
-
Yes if you order was cancelled or refunded then you would get the hedged value if the item was hedged.. but that should not happen very often if at all(cancelled and/or refunded)
And you saying that by rule you use the coins right away...it PERFECT and exactly what you should always do!!
I was just trying to tell people that today when SR was out...the coin was actually going up so no one had to worry about losing value.. Hope you got in and have your good on the way..
Take care :)
-
I can get to the site but it won't let me register a login. Are they still blocking registration? (edit) Nevermind I just read another thread that said I was using the wrong pathway. Naughty phishing sites. I was able to get in.
-
There was a bitcoin crash so to speak back in September of 2012. I know cause it fucked me when the coins I just bought went down like 5 bucks a coin and I was prepping to get a qp. It wasn't a huge thing but it pissed me off that it happened on the same day I was trying to do my deal. Since then the btc has done nothing but head skyward. Wish I hadn't spent all the coins I had bought for as little as $5....but hindsight is always 20/20 as they say. I don't know too many people that predicted the rate to be hitting the $60 mark as it did today. Crazy fuckin currency that's for sure. Agreed that hedging now is just more money in DPR's pockets. Vendors with large stash's of coins must be loving this dramatic rise.
You're talking about this: http://torimagesbp2vt3u.onion/i/gBgh.png
The drop doesn't look as big on that graph because BTC price is averaged over some time period.
That crash was caused by the pirateat40 scam. There was a lot of chatter on bitcointalk.org beforehand of people fleeing.
If you're going to mess around with bitcoins, you really should be reading the forum and keeping up on the latest news, rumors, etc.
Several factors are helping bitcoin right now. In the last few months, legal businesses like Wordpress.com and Reddit have started accepting it. The FinCen report a few days ago made bitcoin officially legal in the US. It wasn't illegal before, but the US gov had not taken an official position on it. Now it's explicitly legal. That paves the way for much wider adoption among mainstream businesses. And there haven't been any major hacks or thefts in a long while. That helps to build confidence.
Unless some catastrophic event happens, I expect BTC price to keep rising for some time. So not holding onto your coins from $5 is a sunk cost, but you can always buy now and still make money.