On Thu, Apr 21, 2016 at 1:31 PM, juan <[1]juan.g71@gmail.com> wrote:

     On Thu, 21 Apr 2016 11:30:52 -0700
     Sean Lynch <[2]seanl@literati.org> wrote:
     > On Tue, Apr 19, 2016 at 2:32 PM, juan <[3]juan.g71@gmail.com>
     wrote:
     >
     > > On Tue, 19 Apr 2016 03:47:38 +0000
     > > Zenaan Harkness <[4]zen@freedbms.net> wrote:
     > >
     > > > There appears to be a multi country effort to (re)build gold
     > > > backed currencies, and there's every chance they will succeed,
     > > > certainly even in the face of crypto currencies - the
     robustness
     > > > and security levels of current computing facilities means
     > > > hoarding physical gold is likely seen by most, and certainly
     by
     > > > nations, as more secure and acceptable to the public psyche
     > >
     > >
     > >         It seems very very unlikely that any government will
     setup a
     > >         mechanism that destroys one their fundamental means to
     loot
     > >         their subjects : paper money and inflation.
     > >
     > >         Rather, what we are seeing is a move towards a fully
     > >         'electronic' system in which we won't be able to buy
     half a
     > >         potato without being taxed by the world government.
     > >
     > >
     > What Juan said (minus the Satoshi nonsense). ZeroHedge are
     notorious
     > gold bugs.
             I am a gold bug too, if gold bug means understanding of the
             fact that physical cash is a decentralized and anonymous
             system and that gold is a particularly good form of cash.

   I think in ZeroHedge's case their goldbuggery goes beyond your belief
   in gold's superiority (which I share) and into the realm of
   irrationality. It starts sounding like a long-term pump-and-dump scam,
   if there were such a thing.

             Being truly decentralized and anonymous are not properties
             that any cryptocurrency has, as far as I know.

   Indeed, though I think Bitcoin and related research have provided the
   necessary building blocks. ZeroCoin/ZeroCash, for example. As far as
   decentralized, it's not clear to me that Bitcoin is really worse than
   gold has proven to be in practice, with governments cornering the
   market on mining & minting.

             On the other hand, a cryptocurrency like bitcoin is threat
     to
             governments and the financial mafia, so it's reasonable to
             assume that the mafia is going to come up with some kind of
             countermeasure.

   Indeed. I'm just hoping it proves to be too little, too late.

             But yeah, it's also true that they've been 'developing'
     their
             own electric monies before bitcoin arrived into the scene...

   And I agree with you that they will probably try to coopt Bitcoin or at
   least blockchain technologies. If not to build their "cashless society"
   then at least to try to crowd out potential uses for anonymous
   transactions by ensuring that all the "legitimate" players are playing
   on a controlled & tracked blockchain.

References

   1. mailto:juan.g71@gmail.com
   2. mailto:seanl@literati.org
   3. mailto:juan.g71@gmail.com
   4. mailto:zen@freedbms.net