Re: [P2P-F] Bitcoin donation

On Fri, Jan 21, 2011 at 6:14 AM, Michel Bauwens wrote:

ok, I get it, so there are people out there actually wanting to 'buy' bitcoins, and I wasn't aware of that, and obviously, this needs to be bought and expressed by another existing currency, hence the 'value'

Yes, from what I can tell, *now* the best way to get bitcoins is to buy them. However, it seems based on reading online discussions that in the earliest days of bitcoin activity, that it was a bit easier to contribute your personal computer power to the network and "generate" coins. Now, it the calculations are over a year for a typical laptop (ref: http://www.alloscomp.com/bitcoin/calculator.php ) A whole history of trading can be viewed here: https://mtgox.com/trade/history Again, I think there is only one real issue with bitcoin: that it is a homogenous currency. I am looking at the idea of soliciting donations towards extending bitcoin software so that users may either issue new currency (with new rules), or participate in existing currencies all from the same protocol/software.

I 'got' it <g>

By the way, alt.currency/credit commons expert Thomas Greco is in Chiang Mai!

Michel

On Wed, Jan 19, 2011 at 9:14 PM, Sepp Hasslberger wrote:

...

Basically Michel, the value of any commodity is determined by whether people believe it is of value. The fact that you can buy and sell something establishes a base-line value for it. The value is a balance between how much of the stuff is available, and how much demand there is for it from potential buyers. Economists called it the law of supply and demand. In the case of bitcoin, we are looking at a commodity (exchangeable electronic "coins") that is scarce - there are only so many coins in existence, and making more of them is a slow, difficult prcess - and for which there is a demand. People are looking around for some kind of means of exchange that can de-link them from the official currencies. Potentially, we have a great demand for bitcoins ... if the idea of using them as a means of payment ever really catches on. Even as it is, there is enough of a demand for bitcoins to "feel their scarcity", and thus, to make them valuable. A price is being set for bitcoins in exchange services. The price is entirely dependent on how badly people want bitcoins, and it seems that the price is on the upswing. This is really the same mechanism as with any kind of money. As long as there are people who want to use it to conduct their business (or to put away for future use), and as long as there is a restricted amount of it, money can be said to have value. The value of any commodity or any kind of money will go up if 1) more people want it or 2) some of it is destroyed or withdrawn from circulation, making it more scarce. Similarly, the value of any commodity or any kind of money will go down if 1) less people want it or 2) more of it is put into circulation, making it comparatively more abundant.

...

That is the mechanism that determines the value of money - ANY kind of money. Sepp

"The individual is supreme and finds the way through intuition" http://www.newmediaexplorer.org/sepp/ http://www.laleva.org http://blog.hasslberger.com/ http://www.facebook.com/hasslberger http://twitter.com/healthsupreme . On Jan 19, 2011, at 2:19 PM, Michel Bauwens wrote:

there are still basic aspects of bitcoin I don't understand

how can a self-invented coin have any value at all,

who determines that value?

what makes people accept that it has the value it says

which bank is willing to give me other types of money in exchange for that value?

On Mon, Jan 17, 2011 at 8:04 PM, Samuel Rose wrote:

...

On Mon, Jan 17, 2011 at 5:40 AM, Sepp Hasslberger wrote:

...

Although I have misgivings about the stability of bitcoin, I support its use. (It's the only thing out there that is completely de-linked from official currencies and from things like precious metals, that is workable for more than just local exchange). To explain my perplexity on bitcoin stability, I quote from the site cyclonite linked: "How much is a Bitcoin worth?

More all the time...

As you can see, over a 4 week period, recently...

The value of B `8?1.00B BTC (one Bitcoin), went from B US$0.06B B to B US$0.50B B ...within only about 4 weeks. B Yes... B That was an 833% increase in it's value. B Wow." (http://www.bitcoinme.com/) For me, a currency that is to be widely used, should be stable. Stable means it doesn't go down in value, but it also doesn't go up in value excessively. It should be roughly keeping its value. Going up as much as bitcoin evidently does, is a form of instability that will bring disturbance to a marketplace using bitcoin as its means of exchange.

bitcoin does seem to have stabilized after that initial jump. I think the initial jump was due to the network effect of how fast the current group of adopters jumped on board and started using bitcoin.

Still, this is a of course a valid point. Although, the value increase seems to have been mostly beneficial to the early adopters. But, I could see how if the system stabilized, then a new wave of adopters jumped on board, it could suddenly become very unbalanced for the initial participants if various scenarios unfold.

Although, I am not sure *if* the bitcoin system would automatically inflate in an exponential way each time a new wave of participants joins the system.

One real potential problem is making sure that "honest nodes" control the majority of CPU power. So far, so good. It won't be easy for anyone to spoof this system. But, if a group of people wants to intentionally attack the system, there could be problems. Bitcoin is a good candidate for complex systems models as a means to put more foresight into stability, health, etc

...

This instability could and should be remedied by adjusting the target total of bitcoin creation with an algorithm that takes into account the number of active bitcoin users. As the number of users increases, the total target amount of bitcoins to be created (which currently is fixed at 21,000,000) should increase, slowly creeping up to accomodate the demand of new users for bitcoins, in a way to keep the value of one single coin roughly stable. I do not know whether the creators of bitcoin would be willing to do this. For me, such an adjustment will be necessary to take bitcoin from experimental status to widely-used alternative means of payment status.

Sepp, this is a great point.

One of the nice things about bitcoin is that it is F/LOSS, so it is ultimately fork-able. If bad decisions are made about the growth, the project could be forked, a different governance scheme could be implemented, etc.

I don't yet know enough about bitcoin to be 100% sure, but the system at least for the time being does seem to have stabilized (it could simply mean that participation has stabilized).

Bit coin claims:

"Once a predetermined number of coins have entered circulation, the incentive can transition entirely to transaction fees and be completely inflation free."

And yes Michel, I will post this on the blog and in wiki :)

...

Kind regards Sepp

On Jan 17, 2011, at 4:44 AM, Samuel Rose wrote:

Cyclonite, personally I am ready to work with bitcoin today, although the rest of p2pf may not be, which I'll respect

On Sun, Jan 16, 2011 at 5:17 PM, Cyclonite wrote:

Hi Guys,

I think there is some kind of misunderstanding here, you do not need to manually generate any kind of public/private keys as with OpenPGP.

You can even sign up in a website as mybitcoin.com and start making or receiving donations.

In my opinion the best available info for beginners is http://bitcoinme.com. Please take a look and you will get your doubts clear.

Best regards,

Cyclonite.

--

Secure Email contact: https://privacybox.de/cyclonite.msg

Bitcoin donations jar: 16FVZweaaJLvhAy91oDugqaf84kXiDJ9PG

-------- Original Message --------

From: Samuel Rose

To: james burke

Cc: Michel Bauwens , cyclonite@safe-mail.net, p2p-foundation , Sepp Hasslberger , Georg Pleger

Subject: Re: Bitcoin donation

Date: Sat, 15 Jan 2011 09:30:23 -0500

On Sat, Jan 15, 2011 at 5:54 AM, james burke wrote:

Hi Michel,

Yes, I do have a public key, but yet again,

another nice idea with terrible interaction design and userbility

- most people have no clue about public private keys, so this keeps it a

geek thing

I agree, although as far as I can see, the application at least takes

care of this for the user. Still, your point is valid in that some

people may not understand what is happening.

Most of the users of bitcoin now are early adopters, however. So, if

p2pf did support donation via bitcoin, it would be joining an ecology

of early adopters, and would likely only receive donation from those

early adopters.

- the actual app upon launch is unclear. Where to click, what to do,gah!

I can't really support this even if it is a p2p solution.

James

Seems reasonable. If p2pf changes it's mind, I'm willing to

participate in any experiments with bitcoin

On Sat, Jan 15, 2011 at 5:57 AM, Michel Bauwens

wrote:

James,

do you have a public key?

Michel

On Sat, Jan 15, 2011 at 11:20 AM, Samuel Rose

wrote:

This is a p2p application, so we would need to post your's or James's

public key, and people who want to donate bitcoins would need then

send you the bitcoins by downloading the bitcoin application and

sending it to you

quote:

"Bitcoin utilizes public/private key digital signatures (ECDSA). A

coin has its owner's public key on it. When a coin is transferred from

user A to user B, A adds Bbs public key to the coin and signs it with

his own private key. Now B owns the coin and can transfer it further.

To prevent A from transferring the already used coin to another user

C, a public list of all the previous transactions is collectively

maintained by the network of Bitcoin nodes, and before each

transaction the coinbs unusedness will be checked."

On Fri, Jan 14, 2011 at 11:17 PM, Michel Bauwens

wrote:

Sam, can you help us install it on the wiki and blog?

On Sat, Jan 15, 2011 at 11:16 AM, Samuel Rose

wrote:

I've downloaded and installed and am game to try with p2pf network

folks.

This could actually be really useful for lots of local economy efforts

too.

On Fri, Jan 14, 2011 at 5:32 AM, Michel Bauwens

wrote:

Dear,

thanks a lot for this email,

it seems that it is worthwhile for us to experiment with this, but I

will

forward this to James Burke for possible implementation

James, I think we should do this, what doB you think?

Michel

On Thu, Jan 13, 2011 at 11:42 PM, wrote:

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----

Hash: SHA1

Dear friends,

I have been looking in your site for any reference to Bitcoin for

making a

small donation.

As B you B probably B know, B Bitcoin B (bitcoin.org) B is B a B new kind

of a

P2P

crypto-currency in which the general public can B make donations,

macro

B or

micropayments B in B a B secure B and B anonymous B way B usually

B without

B any

transaction fee involved.

You can change Bitcoins for real money (eg: https://mtgox.com) or

purchase

services or goods in an increasing number of sites.

In B order to B receive B donations you B only have B to B publish B one

B of

your

accounts B as generated B by the B bitcoin client B or any specialized

bitcoin

trader (eg: mybitcoin.com).

Currently B some B projects B as B www.i2p2.de,

B www.torrentservers.net

and

organizations like the EFF are accepting donations.

In B my B opinion B this B kind B of decentralized solution without the

need

to

trust B any B middlemen B is much better than B Paypal, Visa or

Mastercard

for

security-minded people as most of your donors are.

If B you B are B interested in B pushing B Bitcoin forward, B do not

hesitate

to

contact me if you have any doubt.

Yours,

Cyclonite

-- -- Sam Rose Future Forward Institute and Forward Foundation Tel:+1(517) 639-1552 Cel: +1-(517)-974-6451 skype: samuelrose email: samuel.rose@gmail.com http://forwardfound.org http://futureforwardinstitute.org http://hollymeadcapital.com http://p2pfoundation.net http://socialmediaclassroom.com

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-- -- Sam Rose Future Forward Institute and Forward Foundation Tel:+1(517) 639-1552 Cel: +1-(517)-974-6451 skype: samuelrose email: samuel.rose@gmail.com http://forwardfound.org http://futureforwardinstitute.org http://hollymeadcapital.com http://p2pfoundation.net http://socialmediaclassroom.com "The universe is not required to be in perfect harmony with human ambition." - Carl Sagan _______________________________________________ P2P Foundation - Mailing list http://www.p2pfoundation.net https://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation ----- End forwarded message ----- -- Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://leitl.org">leitl</a> http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com http://postbiota.org 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE