It is bizarre that a bunch of people who want to save money and obtain bitcoins with the least amount of trouble, won't invest a tiny amount of time in working out how OTC or over the counter bitcoin works. Less risk, more money, less arbitrary rules, more anonymity, faster access to bitcoins. These are typical improvements. Using exchanges only seems straight forward, but this is an illusion as many of you have been finding out with frozen accounts, stalled payments, hidden fees, not necessarily to do with the exchange but with your bank etc. I'm just not seeing very many downsides here. There are downsides (danger of scammers mostly) but these are marginal in comparison to the benefits, esp. if you invest time in a little research on your chosen OTCV.Learn this or go home. Seriously. Bitcoin will be illegal soon, and then this will be the only option.I shall spam the acronym OTC until I'm as ubiquitous as the forum's spammer :)You do not need to be a "tech person" to grasp OTC./complaintRead this: http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/1829/how-does-one-use-bitcoin-otcGoogle the following:http://www.bitcoin-otc.comhttp://www.tradebitcoin.comhttps://localbitcoins.comhttp://btcnearme.comhttps://btcspot.comThere are others, those are just the ones I know of.And all these IRCs:Server                          Channel          Descriptionirc://irc.freenode.net/bitcoin-otc-eu    #bitcoin-otc-eu European OTC trading marketplace.irc://irc.freenode.net/bitcoin-otc-uk    #bitcoin-otc-uk United kingdom OTC Trading Marketplace.irc://irc.freenode.net/bitcoin-otc-ru    #bitcoin-otc-ru Russian OTC trading marketplace.irc://irc.freenode.net/btc.chat         #btc.chat     Russian bitcoin community.irc://irc.freenode.net/bitcoin-aus       #bitcoin-aus     Aussie bitcoin community.irc://irc.freenode.net/bitcoin-br        #bitcoin-br     Brazilian bitcoin community.irc://irc.freenode.net/bitcoin-cad       #bitcoin-cad     Canadian bitcoin community.irc://irc.freenode.net/bitcoin-cn        #bitcoin-cn     Chinese bitcoin community.irc://irc.freenode.net/bitcoin-de        #bitcoin-de     German bitcoin community.irc://irc.freenode.net/bitcoin-il         #bitcoin-il     Israeli bitcoin community.irc://irc.freenode.net/bitcoin-dk        #bitcoin-dk     Danish bitcoin community. Again, there are many many others out there.I'm pretty sure somebody is out there who will relieve you of your USD/AUD/GBP/EUR in exchange for bitcoins.