On Sun, 29 Nov 2009, Tyler Durden wrote:
As the population increases and physical world collateral goes to zero, seems to me the only thing many humans will "own" is their reputation: Their physical world assets will be uninteresting or negligible. Is this the same thing as anonymity?
The population may very well increase, and the true value of physical collateral may indeed go to zero (how much is that big circa-2006 flat panel and that big luxury SUV wih a chevy truck under the body pieces actually worth ?) But that does not mean that the average reputation will be worth anything, or that physical goods (of substance) are worthless. It just means that a lot of people are poor.
Of course, many folks will have many reputations and will choose to burn one every now and then to cash in or take a big risk. But even now it's possible to detect when a reputation is about to blow and so any loans are quickly ramped down.
Or a no-knock raid is quickly ramped up. A reputation can be "about to blow" in all kinds of ways.