9 Reader Responses

1. p Says:
   October 17th, 2007 at 1:35 pm

   Well, if your currency was commodity-backed, it would gain in value relative to the dollar during inflation. Free profit, relative to your neighbor.

   You could choose to refuse the currency at your business, as it is not mandated that you accept it by the govt. You could provide preferential exchange rates to different parties (screw you, MSFT!).

   You could create and destroy large quantities of money at will, manipulating the market for your currency.

   You could peg your money to some non-physical resource that is nonetheless not fiat, like http://www.hashcash.org, Whuffie, or throttled bandwidth.

   You could threaten the debt-industrial state, which wants fewer currencies in existence.

   —

   If local currencies are supposed to be fixed to the dollar, how do virtual currencies, which are surely not, fit in?

2. Tim Boucher Says:
   October 17th, 2007 at 2:18 pm

   Well, if your currency was commodity-backed, it would gain in value relative to the dollar during inflation.

   So how do you make a currency that is commodity-based?

   You could choose to refuse the currency at your business, as it is not mandated that you accept it by the govt.

   Is it mandated by US federal or state business laws that you accept US federal currency?

   You could provide preferential exchange rates to different parties (screw you, MSFT!).

   Any real world examples of this?

   You could create and destroy large quantities of money at will, manipulating the market for your currency.

   is this what the Fed does?

   You could peg your money to some non-physical resource that is nonetheless not fiat, like http://www.hashcash.org, Whuffie, or throttled bandwidth.

   I think we’re going to need elaboration on this!

   You could threaten the debt-industrial state, which wants fewer currencies in existence.

   Prosperity, mutually inspired abundance and post-scarcity economics really do threaten debt-based systems, don’t they! How can we make them not threatening, but complementary…

   If local currencies are supposed to be fixed to the dollar, how do virtual currencies, which are surely not, fit in?

   I have no idea, but this interests me greatly!

3. p Says:
   October 17th, 2007 at 2:54 pm

   So how do you make a currency that is commodity-based?

   1 unit of currency is defined to be worth x grams of gold, or wheat, or water. Some people have proposed energy-based currencies, measured in joules or something.

   There can still be change in the value of commodity currencies (amount of commodity is not fixed), but in the worst case, your money won’t turn worthless in your pocket because someone on the other side of the world decided to sell dollars.

   Is it mandated by US federal or state business laws that you accept US federal currency?

   I’m pretty sure it is, but can’t remember the term for it.

   Any real world examples of this?

   I dunno about anyone doing it explicitly, but any private currency/gold/cattle exchange is intended to partition the space of exchanges to some degree, right? Otherwise, you’d just trade in the “open” market. (fwiw, “dark liquidity pools” are apparently becoming all the rage these days, they’re privately-owned forex/stock exchanges.)

   is this what the Fed does?

   Sort of. It’s not so blatantly malicious when the Fed does it, but that QQ guy is a perfect example.

4. Tim Boucher Says:
   October 17th, 2007 at 3:25 pm

   Some people have proposed energy-based currencies, measured in joules or something.

   Technocracy!

   I’m pretty sure it is, but can’t remember the term for it.

   If you remember, do let me know!

   but any private currency/gold/cattle exchange is intended to partition the space of exchanges to some degree,

   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_currency

   “dark liquidity pools” are apparently becoming all the rage these days, they’re privately-owned forex/stock exchanges.

   Would love to see links and info on this for the layman/beginner. Also see: darknets, p2p file-trading, BitTorrent, old-school FTP mp3 trading sites which required upload/download ratios.

   What if our unit of currency was simply valuable information which was current?

   http://www.timboucher.com/journal/2007/10/17/current-currency/

   Also connects to:

   http://www.timboucher.com/journal/2007...10/17/ticketmaster-fights-off-robots/
   http://www.timboucher.com/journal/2007...ing-as-an-alternative-business-model/

   See also “human intelligence tasks”, human-intelligence web microservices, etc.

   This is becoming more and more exciting and interesting.

   What if you could trade information currency for energy currency?

5. p Says:
   October 17th, 2007 at 3:45 pm

   I first read about so-called dark markets here:
   http://www.castrader.com/2006/10/the_magic_alpha.html

   OT:
   another keyword relevant to your recent musings is “counter-economics”, the idea that black and grey markets are just as crucial and relevant as the authorized market.

6. Tim Boucher Says:
   October 17th, 2007 at 4:16 pm

   That reminds me: I want to begin writing about how money is laundered through the drug trade. I’ve also recently heard that people use World Of Warcraft gold and other virtual currencies to do the same thing.

7. Julia Says:
   October 18th, 2007 at 8:00 pm

   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause

   My understanding is that this regulates all business on the internet because all business on the internet is by nature interstate. The vast majority of Congressional regulatory power comes through the expansion of the meaning of this clause.

   BTW, commerce is ruled by Mercury. It’s a word origin thing. Mercy (which can be bought) vs. Justice (an eye for an eye). You purchase the services of Mercenaries vs. having a standing Army. You are a Merchant is you are Merchandising things. If you’re going to change the rulership of your life look into this.

8. Dan Says:
   October 19th, 2007 at 12:52 am

   That reminds me: I want to begin writing about how money is laundered through the drug trade. I’ve also recently heard that people use World Of Warcraft gold and other virtual currencies to do the same thing.

   Tim, check out a book called Hot Money and the Politics of Debt, by RT Naylor
   http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1316/is_v19/ai_5264890

   Very much on the topic of how drug, arms money moves through the systems and impact on the above the table economy.

9. Tim Boucher Says:
   October 19th, 2007 at 2:47 am

   Julia, those are useful language and symbolic tips for me. Thank you. I will digest them and get back to you with my findings.