The main story of crypto currency is: "We have found a new way to print money and keep some of it". I wonder how much of the economy is like this.
-
-
Replying to @Plinz
It's more like "we have found a way to disallow others from unilaterally printing money for themselves."
1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes -
Replying to @Polycephaland
The basic principle of money is that people are not able to simply make more. Crypto currencies circumvent that by obfuscating counterfeiting with computationally expensive mathematics.
2 replies 0 retweets 0 likes -
Replying to @Plinz
No one can counterfeit more bitcoin into existence. The supply is capped at 21 million.
1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes -
Replying to @Polycephaland
But there is no upper limit to the value of bitcoin, only a guarantee that the number of new coins does not outrun demand.
1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes -
Replying to @Plinz
Why should there be an upper limit on the value of bitcoin? The important guarantee is that there will be a fixed number of coins, irrespective of demand. Bitcoin is the first money to have this property, to have absolutely no supply response to demand changes.
1 reply 0 retweets 1 like -
Replying to @Polycephaland
I was not criticizing bitcoin or questioning its mechanism. I was just pointing at a thing.
1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes -
Replying to @Plinz @Polycephaland
Mining bitcoins isn't really "printing", it's highly competitive. In theory at least, in practice, there's an advantage for certain Chinese outfits. But this should mitigate over time, so it should become harder and harder to "keep it". Not much different to any other industry.
1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes -
Replying to @herzmeisterderw @Polycephaland
The issue I wanted to point at is that while you are allowed to mine gold, you are generally not allowed to mint a currency from it. That’s the right of the kings. Bitcoin manages to subvert this somewhat, which is its main innovation
2 replies 0 retweets 0 likes -
Replying to @Plinz @herzmeisterderw
I disagree. The main innovation is consensus without authority. The lack of authority means it can't be shut down externally by kings (and yes this is important), but it also means it can't be subtly corrupted *by anyone else.*
1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes
I know this libertarian argument in support of crypto currencies. I just think that it is orthogonal to the reasons for adopting and using them.
Loading seems to be taking a while.
Twitter may be over capacity or experiencing a momentary hiccup. Try again or visit Twitter Status for more information.