On Sat, Oct 27, 2012 at 3:14 PM, Eugen Leitl wrote: <...>

When I'm trying to form an opinion about something, I try to research it first. In general I did not care about minting other than a means to obtain play money to test transactions. I find this curious that so many are focusing on the most irrelevant aspect of a P2P monetary system, the distributed mint, and expect a personal, handsome profit from seigniorage. There's a reason that difficulty is adaptive. The system is supposed to homeostate so that the rate of production is limited. This is by design.

Limiting the rate of production as an inverse to popularity is an interesting choice, and worth experimenting with. It increases the effects of existing vertical dynamics, however, as those that already have coins and/or mining facilities wield increasing power as those new to the game, eager to participate, have only these vertical actors as recourse to engage in the currency.

...

...

This is a currency based on scarcity, just like gold or cowry shells. If you intended to become rich by mining, you should have been a year or two sooner to the party.

I would like to comment further on the cowry shell concept at a later time, but I want to point out that cowry shells are renewed along life cycles---as a currency it exhibits the notion that an absolute total number of 'credits' is not a healthy concept. That there is a maximum to the number of bitcoins is a major reason why I say that it is inherently flawed.

...

you are saying proves my point about the stupidity of building a currency on scarcity: it's not going to lead us to anywhere new

I understand when inventors and patent holders of cryptocurrencies scoffed at the first cryptocurrency to succeed wildly, by solving the issue of double spending without resorting to centralism, and hence a single point of failure. A simple case of sour grapes.

What is your track record, so far?

...

or 'revolutionary'.

If you figure out a tamper-proof way of measuring underlying economy and a tamper-proof way of issuing a matching volume without any single point of failures, feel free to publish. It will make quite a splash, I assure you.

It is interesting how you seem to conflate my right to make critical statements about BitCoin with the amount of success I have had in launching my own currency.

...

You have to 'get there first' and 'mine harder/smarter'. What stupid advice, "oh you should have been there earlier".

Look, I just pointed out the problem with where you focus and your approach. If you think that issuing P2P currency with the intent to make a personal profit is stupid, I agree.

But isn't this exactly what BitCoin does when it gives those with the most capital to put into the system the ability to become (the most successful) mints? Wouldn't that be a significant reason that it has been so 'wildly' successful, namely that there are a finite number of bitcoins and if one approaches with a 'collect them all' attitude then PROFIT. A P2P currency should strive to limit the effects of capital-derived vertical dynamics. This means that joining "two years too late" does not put someone at a significant disadvantage. (And yes, in my opinion, having to purchase BitCoins from someone who 'got there first' in order to engage in the currency is a significant disadvantage).

...

...

The value of bitcoin is ability to do P2P transactions in real time without requiring a third party, using a naturally deflationary monetary system which however is highly frangible.

That by itself is of obvious enough utility.

That is about the only interesting thing about it, yes. But the ability to engage in P2P transactions is hardly a result of the means of the

Why are you so focused on production?

The flippant answer would by: why aren't you? I don't see the point in buying into a currency where the actual unit of value reinforces existing vertical dynamics: cash to make a mine, earliness of adoption, hoarding of resources. Let's say that you seem content with a currency that embodies libertarian ideals, and that I am not.

...

currency's production, nor is it a feature unique to bitcoin itself.

As compared to which successful digicash system, exactly?

BitCoins successes outside of the Silk Road (a brilliant hack, FWIW) is highly debatable. My point is that P2P currencies in general have these aspects. As you can tell, I only really care about the first one.

...

Also "naturally deflationary" in the scope of something that is more

Deflationary in the sense is that the total amount is limited, and will be approached asymptotically.

...

hoarded than traded seems like a misnomer to me. Since there are a limited

If you want the currency to be useful, you need to grow the underlying economy, so people are more incited to spend than to be unable to spend.

So what kind of business that is accepting BTC are you running, personally?

First I tell you that I do not believe in the currency, and then you ask why I'm not building a business around it?

...

number of bitcoins, there is a "natural" tendency to hold on to as many of them as possible. That way when the pie is all spoken for, one's slices

Nobody prevents you from designing a P2P cryptocurrency with built-in demurrage.

You're hating on an experiment. As I understand the designer was unhappy with the rate of adoption, it would be indeed been much better if the minting craze didn't happen. I don't think that flaw needs to be fatal.

Nowhere did I say anything about hate. The first respondant, Nick, said he was interested to "read more about the interplay of traditional capitalist power structures and bitcoin." My response is that bitcoin does very little to escape these traditional power structures, as is evidenced by the fact that only the privileged can play, and the more people that are playing the more privileged you have to be to engage. # distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission # <nettime> is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: http://mx.kein.org/mailman/listinfo/nettime-l # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@kein.org ----- 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