Bitcoin & the crypto-currency revolution. (get some here).

[Skepticus]

Any chance of writing a little bit less at a time skep?

Yeah. I do get carried away don't I

[Svartalf]

Interesting as what you say surely is, you're part of the tl:dr brigade... then again, I've got less concentration powers than Calvin on chocolate frosted sugar bombs.

[Pappa]

The one problem I see ahead with bitcoins is that the ability to mine them is proportional to the amount of money you're willing to spend on hardware. At the moment it's a reasonably level playing field, but with dedicated Bitcoin miners now starting to appear on the market, it won't be long before wealthy people start buying a room full of dedicated miners and churning out masses of coins. Once there are people with large stocks of coins, there'll be lots of speculative trading and the bedroom Bitcoin miner, eeking out a few fractions of a coin as part of a pool will be left a little out in the cold.

Or am I missing something which would prevent this?

Pappa, let me ask you this. How does the ability to 'mine' USD cash affect that currency? Unless somebody wants to be a miner, the mining thing doesn't even enter the equation. If the price goes up, then more mining rigs are possible, so the number of miners increases to take advantage. Then the difficulty goes up as the share of coins being mined is spread that much thinner. If the price goes down, less efficient mining rigs will go of line, reducing the difficulty. There's an equilibrium that is established between the price and the difficulty. Wealthy people are welcome to buy lots of hardware for mining but it isn't going to earn them a proportional amount of coin. That's because the supply is constant (albeit halving every four years aprox). Of course, nobody needs to bother about it if they don't care about mining. To the consumer they only need to know that 25 bitcoin will be released into circulation every10 minutes approximately, which makes the supply stable. I haven't really bothered much with mining since ASIC's came out. I only have one Butterfly Labs Jalapeno, which I received 8 months after my pre-order (bad mistake). FWIW at about 7Gh/s I might just as well have bought a mouse on a treadmill.

There may be people with large stocks of bitcoin, but they won't get them any easier than anybody else per unit of money invested. It's the equilibrium you see. At some point you would be better off just investing the money into buying bitcoin directly. Even then, those bitcoin bought by wealthy people, will appreciate at the same rate as everybody elses. So there's really no 'inside track' for the wealthy. Speculation is fine also. Hoarding (or saving) bitcoin might return a handsome profit, but the moment you spend it, it ceases to be savings. Saving bitcoin just keeps part of the supply out of circulation, thereby driving up the value of everybody else's bitcoin. I'm totally down with that. The supply side of bitcoin is the really clever bit. Never underestimate the genius of Satochi Nakamoto.

I wasn't aware that the amount of bitcoins released over a given time period was fixed. I assumed it would increase as the number of miners increased.

Tangentially, I wonder if companies that run server farms are starting to put miners on their servers. Presumably they have a lot of spare GPU capacity.

[Skepticus]

Interesting as what you say surely is, you're part of the tl:dr brigade... then again, I've got less concentration powers than Calvin on chocolate frosted sugar bombs.

Sugar bombs away Calvin!

[Skepticus]

I wasn't aware that the amount of bitcoins released over a given time period was fixed. I assumed it would increase as the number of miners increased.

Oh no. There is a difficulty adjustment algorithm that makes it harder to mine bitcoin in proportion to the amount of hashing power on the network. It is calibrated to fix the difficulty, so that there is only one block mined every ten minutes aprox. One block is currently 25 bitcoins, but that also is adjusted so that about every four years (it is a target number of blocks) the number of bitcoin released in each block is halved. Mining continues to be done until there are 21 million bitcoin in the wild. So that's why it's harder and harder to get bitcoin, both because the difficulty increases with number of miners, and also because mining slows down over the years. The blocks used to be 50 bitcoin and you could mine effectively on CPU.

Tangentially, I wonder if companies that run server farms are starting to put miners on their servers. Presumably they have a lot of spare GPU capacity.

Don't know if anybody still mines with GPU. We've had FGPA (field programmable gate arrays) since then, and now ASICs (Application Specific Integrated Circuits) Not sure but I think GPU's are dead in the water. Once they began cutting chips for bitcoin mining a lot of folks realized that this shit is getting real. I know I did. We've got till about 2140 to mine bitcoin and the efficiency factor will force the older technology off the network, not just because difficulty goes up with more miners, but because the block reward tapers off to simulate gold mining. It will get to the point that mining bitcoin won't be effective unless you have free electricity. That's why I say that it not only can, but that it will incentivise solar R&D for more cost effective solar cells. It's very clever on the supply side.

[MrFungus420]

You still haven't shown it to be of any use except as a novelty.

You failed miserably with the one real-world example given and, with it, demonstrated an incredible level of naive ignorance which, frankly, casts serious doubt on your ability to be rational about this.

[Hermit]

I wasn't aware that the amount of bitcoins released over a given time period was fixed. I assumed it would increase as the number of miners increased.

Oh no. There is a difficulty adjustment algorithm that makes it harder to mine bitcoin in proportion to the amount of hashing power on the network. It is calibrated to fix the difficulty, so that there is only one block mined every ten minutes aprox. One block is currently 25 bitcoins, but that also is adjusted so that about every four years (it is a target number of blocks) the number of bitcoin released in each block is halved. Mining continues to be done until there are 21 million bitcoin in the wild.

So, what happens once the 21 million bitcoin limit is reached? Stockmarket type speculation?

[JimC]

I wasn't aware that the amount of bitcoins released over a given time period was fixed. I assumed it would increase as the number of miners increased.

Oh no. There is a difficulty adjustment algorithm that makes it harder to mine bitcoin in proportion to the amount of hashing power on the network. It is calibrated to fix the difficulty, so that there is only one block mined every ten minutes aprox. One block is currently 25 bitcoins, but that also is adjusted so that about every four years (it is a target number of blocks) the number of bitcoin released in each block is halved. Mining continues to be done until there are 21 million bitcoin in the wild.

So, what happens once the 21 million bitcoin limit is reached? Stockmarket type speculation?

A strange, obsessive billionaire will devote his life to buying each and every of those 21 million bitcoins in existence, by fair means or foul...

Images of Scrooge McDuck diving into a pool of virtual bitcoins...

My precious, my precious...

[Pappa]

Oh no. There is a difficulty adjustment algorithm that makes it harder to mine bitcoin in proportion to the amount of hashing power on the network. It is calibrated to fix the difficulty, so that there is only one block mined every ten minutes aprox. One block is currently 25 bitcoins, but that also is adjusted so that about every four years (it is a target number of blocks) the number of bitcoin released in each block is halved. Mining continues to be done until there are 21 million bitcoin in the wild. So that's why it's harder and harder to get bitcoin, both because the difficulty increases with number of miners, and also because mining slows down over the years. The blocks used to be 50 bitcoin and you could mine effectively on CPU.

I knew about the halving process, but not the other adjustment. It doesn't really change the point that an individual persons ability to mine coins is proportional to the amount of money they're willing to spend on hardware. Perhaps it's irrelevant, as currently anyone with a computer is still able to make a bit of free money on the side by leaving their home PC mining away all day and night.

Tangentially, I wonder if companies that run server farms are starting to put miners on their servers. Presumably they have a lot of spare GPU capacity.

Don't know if anybody still mines with GPU. We've had FGPA (field programmable gate arrays) since then, and now ASICs (Application Specific Integrated Circuits) Not sure but I think GPU's are dead in the water. Once they began cutting chips for bitcoin mining a lot of folks realized that this shit is getting real. I know I did. We've got till about 2140 to mine bitcoin and the efficiency factor will force the older technology off the network, not just because difficulty goes up with more miners, but because the block reward tapers off to simulate gold mining. It will get to the point that mining bitcoin won't be effective unless you have free electricity. That's why I say that it not only can, but that it will incentivise solar R&D for more cost effective solar cells. It's very clever on the supply side.

Well, my understanding was that aside from dedicated mining hardware (which has a pretty expensive initial outlay) the majority of mining software still relies on GPU.

[pErvinalia]

As I'm on dial up now, I can barely submit a post, let alone download and read one. So I'll just briefly make a few points:

The stuff about the fractional reserve lending... The mistake libbos make is that you don't need to keep creating money to pay off the debt from previously created money. The error in this thinking is that it equates money to wealth. Wealth isn't a zero sum game. Each $1 of money in the system can generate many multiples of dollars of wealth. THAT wealth is what is used to pay back the initial debt.

Here's a tl;dr article about the monetary system and frb, but since you are into tl;dr, you'll love it! - http://home.hiwaay.net/~becraft/FRS-myth.htm#hd25

The other concern I talked about earlier was if competitor currencies spring up. The benefit of a state backed currency is that it is more or less guaranteed to be the only acceptable currency. So when you have a stash of your local dollars, you don't need to worry about them being massively devalued or worthless in the near future. As long as you economy is reasonable stable, like most Western economies. You know that inflation usually stays between a narrow band, so you know what your money will be worth, more or less, in the future. With an unregulated currency, you don't have that assurity (I swear that's a word). If competitor currencies spring up and dominate, unless you act in a timely manner, your holdings could lose considerable value. You may also be unable to convert your bitcoin to the new currencies. That's why a state backed monetary system is advantageous. This is the problem with laissez faire. And no, I didn't argue just on assertion. But I don't now need to rehash the basic problems with laissez faire. It's a juvenile ideology, and like other juvenile things, I'm not willing to give it more than the minimum amount of my time.

The final thought I had is regarding the increasingly complex algorithm to mine the bitcoins. The first person to create a working quantum computer is going to smash the mining industry if they put it to bitcoin mining! I wonder if the creators have factored that into their calculations. Because we will almost certainly have quantum computing long before 2040.

Actually, one other point... I'm an anarchist of sorts, so I appreciate the goals of wanting to subvert the dominant power structures in the currency/financial markets. Even if bitcoin itself wasn't successful, I back its efforts, and as such I will eventually create a wallet and accept your donation, and probably buy one or two more for myself. Anything that undermines the potentially illegitimate power structure of today's societies, I'm all for.

[Skepticus]

So, what happens once the 21 million bitcoin limit is reached? Stockmarket type speculation?

What happens? Nothing much that wouldn't already be happening. The value will rise as the supply tappers, but more so initially as the number of adopters increases. We already have over half the bitcoins in the economy now. This is what the price looks like so far charted on a log scale:

Mining will increasingly have less and less effect on the price. The price is a function of supply and demand. That's not so much initial supply but market supply and demand. People already speculate with bitcoin and good luck to them I say. If you have strong nerves and can predict a trend, it could be a lucrative pass time. I've tried speculating with a few bitcoin (back in the low teen price days), but I don't have the talent. It's better for me to just hold.

The pertinent question is what will happen to the price once the broadest adoption is reached. As a universal currency the possible size of the market is enormous. It's already larger than several national currencies. The market cap (number of bitcoin X price) in USD currently stands at 1.6 billion. Fortunately bitcoin values are divisible to 8 decimal places and that too can be increased in the future if needed. When 21 million happens well all be long gone. So too I hope, will the banks. The world could be a very different (and fairer) place in just 10 or 20 years, thanks to the advent of cryptocurrency. I'd like to see that.

[Skepticus]

I wasn't aware that the amount of bitcoins released over a given time period was fixed. I assumed it would increase as the number of miners increased.

Oh no. There is a difficulty adjustment algorithm that makes it harder to mine bitcoin in proportion to the amount of hashing power on the network. It is calibrated to fix the difficulty, so that there is only one block mined every ten minutes aprox. One block is currently 25 bitcoins, but that also is adjusted so that about every four years (it is a target number of blocks) the number of bitcoin released in each block is halved. Mining continues to be done until there are 21 million bitcoin in the wild.

So, what happens once the 21 million bitcoin limit is reached? Stockmarket type speculation?

A strange, obsessive billionaire will devote his life to buying each and every of those 21 million bitcoins in existence, by fair means or foul...

Images of Scrooge McDuck diving into a pool of virtual bitcoins...

Oh no Jim. He can't get my bitcoin unless I want to sell them. Meanwhile if somebody will pay the cost for the demand they are creating (buying without selling) they will face an exponential rise in the price. The more they accumulate and keep out of circulation, the more value will accrue to those bitcoin that are left in the wild. At the other end, if you can imagine the reductio, there's this guy holding all the bitcoin in the world and nobody else using it as currency. What will his loot be worth? The thing is; it isn't worth a lot unless it's being used by a number of people. If bitcoin became 'monopoly coin' (which isn't realy feasable anyhow), there'd be nothing preventing a code fork into a new bitcoin work-alike and the enormous value taken by the monopoly bubble could be traded into the new cryptocurrency. It's an interesting scenario when you consider the possibility of some larger body (say a government) trying to do this. I'd love to see them try this. They'd get to the point they had to start accepting it as legal tender.

My precious, my precious...

[Skepticus]

I knew about the halving process, but not the other adjustment. It doesn't really change the point that an individual persons ability to mine coins is proportional to the amount of money they're willing to spend on hardware. Perhaps it's irrelevant, as currently anyone with a computer is still able to make a bit of free money on the side by leaving their home PC mining away all day and night.

What I think you are missing Pappa, is the efficiency factor. Buying ever larger amounts of mining equipment, tends towards a self defeating result. As you dilute the mining dividend across the board, you also take on more and more of the liability for redundancy. When the equipment you invest in has a limited effective window of efficiency, you can over capitalize and make the ROI smaller than it could have been. Nobody wants to be left with redundant hardware that has taken 95% of it's working life to pay itself off. They want to pay it off in the first 30%, put the next 30% towards upgrading and take the last 30% as profit for their efforts. Having said that, yes, there is a market opportunity that may be more lucrative to investors who have much more capital than the 'bedroom miner' to start with, but the important thing is that they don't get to profit by increasing degrees, as they throw more money at their investment. It's the opposite in fact. Each dollar spent on mining, has slightly less earning potential than the last. While the difficulty of hashing is shared, the liability of redundancy is not.

Well, my understanding was that aside from dedicated mining hardware (which has a pretty expensive initial outlay) the majority of mining software still relies on GPU.

AFAIK, the GPU days are almost over for bitcoin. Certainly CPUs are long gone, as the power to mine in such an inefficient manner, costs much more than the product returned. I'm guessing a bit but I think If you used GPUs that were stock standard in shop built PCs, they would be far too inefficient to be worth burning them out with a constant workload and paying for the energy they use. Even the most efficient and powerful GPU's would be pushing shit up hill to get a ROI that isn't false economy. What will make many people turn off their mining rigs is not zero ROI, but the fact that the money spent on the power they use, would be more profitably spent in the long term on cutting their losses (or diminishing gains) and investing in the newer generation of hardware, or even just buying bitcoin directly. There are online calculators that help with this, but I do think GPU's have all but done their dash. Here is a thread on bitcointalk.org that deals with this question more comprehensively. A predominant attitude there, seems to favor the use of GPUs for mining altcoins (alternative crypto-currencies) where the difficulty has not been diluted by ASICs. Altcoins can then be traded for bitcoins at many on-line exchanges.

The advantage of mining (even with older equipment) over buying bitcoin directly, is that as long as you can sustain the (very likely) less profit to higher cost ratio, you have a more secure (if not as lucrative) investment, than speculating/saving. Since I'm long term bullish on the price of bitcoin, I rather invest directly, but then I wouldn't 'bet the farm' on speculation. Just buying a little as savings and never more than I care to risk, seems to be working well IMHO.

A couple of other considerations for the bedroom miner:

A) Do you live in a sunny climate and can you get govt. rebates/tarrifs on home solar power? Of so you'd lower your whole household energy cost for an upfront investment, while your bitcoin mining would share the benifit.
B) Do you live in a colder climate and therefore use your mining rig to heat your home? If so the penny you save on heating, is a penny reused to hash out bitcoin. Miners are quite efficient at making heat.

[Skepticus]

As I'm on dial up now, I can barely submit a post, let alone download and read one. So I'll just briefly make a few points:

YES! YES! Tell us one of them.

The stuff about the fractional reserve lending... The mistake libbos make is that you don't need to keep creating money to pay off the debt from previously created money. The error in this thinking is that it equates money to wealth. Wealth isn't a zero sum game. Each $1 of money in the system can generate many multiples of dollars of wealth. THAT wealth is what is used to pay back the initial debt.

To all: Am I the only one here to whom this just seems like absurd non-sequitur? Sorry fEv, I just don't understand this. Anyhow, I thought the point was to establish the consequences of an unsustainable economy. The inflation as I see it, can only lead to more debt based inflation and resource consumption. That depends on an environmental cost which IS a zero sum. The environment wont sustain endless growth. The fiat economy wont permit stasis or reduction of growth. It's like the bomb on the bus in the movie 'Speed'. If the bus slows down the bomb goes off. I've never insisted that the debt cant be paid off, as long as new money is introduced (increasing net debt) and the inflation by debt is perpetuated. If ONLY the artificial economy had no restrictions, then the expansion of debt could continue until your paycheck was a trillion $USD and a pack of gum costs 50 billion. Before that the necessary burden on consumption, would lead to environmental impacts (including economic ones caused by environment) and well... the only reason you can never get too much of a good thing, is because it gradually turns into a bad thing.

Here's a tl;dr article about the monetary system and frb, but since you are into tl;dr, you'll love it! - http://home.hiwaay.net/~becraft/FRS-myth.htm#hd25

How about if you watch that video, before diverting (and perhaps squandering) my attention. I still find I am trying to explain things that Money As Debt lays out clearly and entertainingly. These other issues you raise could all be dispelled with a little research on the part of the questioner. I don't mind addressing them, but It can be laborious to re-hash issues that have been dealt with abundantly as if the questioner were the first one to have ever considered them. Meanwhile we havn't made a lot of headway on the original point above. You seem to have side stepped my careful efforts to point out the link between economy and environment. I'd much rather stick to one subject and try to find some agreement, before rehashing the wild goose chases below. There are two issues outstanding that you have not addressed here. Those are:

Who is it that actually makes new money?
and..
How can economic growth be kept apart from environmental sustainability? Those

On the first point. If I am wrong, then somebody is telling bald faced lies. Those are some apparently well informed and highly intelligent individuals. Again. See: Money As Debt.
On the second point. I have gone to strenuous effort to point out my reasoning and addressed your points in detail. I can wait for a response, but these new strawmen you foist...

The other concern I talked about earlier was if competitor currencies spring up.

Theres hundreds of them. Some are useful in their limited sphere and others are just so much 'me-too-koinz'. Without a competitive advantage, the altcoins will never outpace the first mover advantage of bitcoin. There would be no reason to adopt a me-too crypto-currency. If there were a reason (and it became consensus), then I would simply trade my bitcoin for the new coin. It's a free market. The only problem I see, is that for some reason, I don't have the right to trade into the new coin. Say only the elite were allowed to buy it. Then it would sit there and rot. The value of bitcoin is a consensus reality. Same goes for any other alt coin. In free market economics, competition is a HEALTHY thing and it's welcome. ANYONE can make a currency now. Nobody can force anybody else to use it.

Another way to see the triviality of multi-currency issue, is that forms of money or currencies, do not need to be a monopoly in order to be stable and successful. The world is full of hundreds of traditional fiat currencies, issued by national state governments. The markets in those currencies are traded in huge sums on a daily basis. Nothing ever suggested that a free market exchange of multiple currencies was detrimental to any of them. What does appear to be detrimental, is the insanity of the games being played by the powers that can control and manipulate them.

The benefit of a state backed currency is that it is more or less guaranteed to be the only acceptable currency.

Somehow you conveniently manage not to acknowledge or mention the principal fact, that this 'guarantee' is a double edged sword. One edge for them and the other for us. The edge given to consumers/taxpayers, is so blunt it wont cut a wet turd. The govt./bankster edge is a finely honed lethal razor sharp edge and it's used to slice the fuck out of profits and the value of the dollar. As for the only acceptable currency. That's up to the people. It's what people choose to accept, that makes a currency acceptable. Since we now have crypto-currencies the government fiat currencies are NOT the only ones that are acceptable. The cat is out of the bag. The whole 'you MUST use fiat money as legal tender' is blown out of the water, as of over three years ago. Your fiat money is NOW as vulnerable as any other since nobody can be prevented from using crypto-currencies. The government can no longer guarantee anything other than it will take payment for tax in govt. fiat dollars. Governments them selves are prone to losing their grip at this time in history. crypto is a HUGE deal man. It's a potential uprising, with all the power but no bloodbaths or riots.

And you think stability is of even anything than the most trivial significance. Yet again. Anybody who had watched Money As Debt (with an open mind) couldn't possibly come away with a perspective that govt. fiat was benign. It's a festering, rancid, malignant pustule of toxic evil. Your one sided evaluation of Govt. fiat money, fails to account for so much grievous economic evil, it's hard to know where to begin. Banks for starters. Those are propped up by regulatory capture. I've already gone over this stuff man. It's getting frustrating Banks with their ripoffs fees and their protected monopoly are now redundant and can be bypassed. That is fucking HUGE. The economic benefit to society alone is phenomenal. The ethical incentive for kicking these bastards out is enormous, to anybody with a conscience. The governments have only been able to 'protect' the money market because they have had local monopolies. Governments however have been increasingly growing both irresponsible, greedy and evil. The motive they have for maintaining that monopoly, has nothing to do with what is in your interest or mine. They are nothing more than puppets for the banksters who control govt. fiat money, to milk us of the highest possible dividend.

So when you have a stash of your local dollars, you don't need to worry about them being massively devalued or worthless in the near future.

No. You only have to worry about them being dependably eroded of value into the long term. Savings is hopeless in govt. fiat. You are trivializing a truly foul insedious quality of govt. fiat.

And you don't have to worry about the value of bitcoin being massively devalued in the short OR the long term. Anybody who can see past their nose, can see that the short term fluctuations in bitcoin, are very short and mostly (by a large margin) in the upwards direction. Fluctuations in bitcoin have been mostly subject to the much smaller volume it has had. As it grows the size of the market evens out the fluctuations and it continues to grow more and more stable. Intelligent punters who see a drop in value (usually after a strong rally), do not panic and realize that the price will return to a new average and it will ultimately be higher than the last. If you understand the economics of bitcoin, particularly the fixed/tapering total supply, you don't flinch at the trivial short term fluctuations. Also, if you are so confident about the potential of loosing value in bitcoin, there are now some places where you can even short your position on it. Also you wouldn't be making such bold statements about the security of govt. fiat, if you were a citizen of Cyprus, with life savings in the bank earlier this year. Governments are not there to protect you or your money. WAKE UP!

As long as you economy is reasonable stable, like most Western economies. You know that inflation usually stays between a narrow band, so you know what your money will be worth, more or less, in the future.

More?! MORE?! where the hell do you get MORE from? Do I need to post a chart for you?

With an unregulated currency, you don't have that assurity (I swear that's a word).

I think I've covered this. Now, if the powers that be, could only demonstrate their ability to preside over economies which steadily deflate and were just as stable, while NOT relying on exponential economic growth, and unsustainable environmental resource depletion, to continue their trajectory, we might have a stability function that's worth a damn.

If competitor currencies spring up and dominate, unless you act in a timely manner, your holdings could lose considerable value.

Surely you don't think that altcoins could put anything but the slightest dint in bitcoin over a space of time less than months? The infrastructure that is behind the crypto economy, has been built up for years now and as I've mentioned over 90% of it is to support bitcoin. Any rival would need one hell of a run up and a very good reason to capture the market. Nothing wrong with competition and evolution, and I'd feel very sorry for the person who fell asleep under a rock for a year and woke up to find their bitcoins were worthless, but I'm wiling to bet 50 to 1 that a massive disruption of that sort happens to the US dollar before it happens to Bitcoin. Let's say a loss of 50% in value over one 30 day period. $20 (fixed at the current exchange rate). What sort of stake can you afford?

You may also be unable to convert your bitcoin to the new currencies.

Sorry rEv, I shouldn't laugh. You really don't understand man. When I see somebody clutching at straws, I always suspect they are making a strawman. P2P technology doesn't work that way. Its not a walled garden. Thats the point, the WHOLE point, and nothing but the point. So help me noodlly one. Crypto-currency was invented specifically to circumvent central authority and monopoly. Only an idiot would invest in a walled garden currency. Private currencies like eGold and such were only useful because P2P crypto-currency hadn't been invented yet. Those were susceptible to corruption and market manipulation by the trusted third party, as well as the malevolent government who finally shut them down and arrested their management. P2P Crypto-currency circumvented all that and made free trading between autonomous parties instant and ubiquitous.

Now, lets look at the practical shortcomings of this scenario ever happening. S'pose you have some of this new currency (let's call it non-bitcoin or NBC) and I decide to buy some. What if I make you an attractive offer of bitcoin, (or BTC) say 10% above the equivalent value, for a couple of your NBC. Assuming theres nothing preventing anybody downloading and using the clients of either software and nothing otherwise preventing free trade, then theres nothing (AFAIK) that could prevent you and I from settling on a market price, and trading P2P bitcoin for non-bitcoin. Talk about pushing shit up hill. If it weren't hard enough to even establish a viable altcoin, the one feature that is indispensable, is that it can be traded for bitcoin or any other alt currency on the open market. Why the hell would anybody with more brain cells than bitcoins, even think of getting into such a crypto-currency? And what by the way, would one use to buy into this nonbitcoin? Govt. Fiat money? No? You're kidding aren't you? How 'bout I take five minutes to spend some bitcoin out to an on line exchange, cop a 2% fee for transacting and have the fiat money deposited in my bank within 24 hours. Now! How much were those nonbitcoin? I got me some o dat wonderful gubbmint phiat you wuv Sooooo much. Can haz NBC plz? People can be stupid, but if they're smart enough to get into crypto-currency, they're NOT going to get into one that defeats the whole purpose of P2P trading.

Besides what if another currency crops up? Call it extra-non-bitcoin. What if the unfortunate sods with non-bitcoin get trapped with useless currency, wakeup from under their rock and find what they have left, cant be traded for ENB? It's an infinite regress, like the creationist teleological argument. Once people get a taste of freedom, theres no going back. There is healthy competition in the alt currency scene and to the extent that some have found a niche, they have found a market. It's no different than the multitude of govt. fiat currencies traded around the world. They don't have to be monolithic and universal to remain valuable and useful and NONE of them are in-expendable.

That's why a state backed monetary system is advantageous.

WRONG! Thats why the state backed monetary system is insidious and defective by design. It's the govt. fiat currencies that are walled gardens and monopolies, which are being jealously guarded from competition by trying to prevent it's fiat money being traded for bitcoin and other crypto. Bitcoin is no more threat of subversion by a walled garden competitor, than it is by PoxPal. It's the other way around. PoxPal's arse is clapping for fear that bitcoin will make it irrelevant, as it very likely will. It's more a question of when than if. Being able to subordinate and control the masses is only a privilege of the few, until that is they find a way around the evil.

This is the problem with laissez faire. And no, I didn't argue just on assertion.

Well now that you mention it... but I think you knew you did, or why foist the pre-emptive defense?

But I don't now need to rehash the basic problems with laissez faire. It's a juvenile ideology, and like other juvenile things, I'm not willing to give it more than the minimum amount of my time.

= empty rhetoric and baseless assertion.

The final thought I had is regarding the increasingly complex algorithm to mine the bitcoins. The first person to create a working quantum computer is going to smash the mining industry if they put it to bitcoin mining! I wonder if the creators have factored that into their calculations. Because we will almost certainly have quantum computing long before 2040.

You don't understand how bitcoin works and NO this isn't a concern. If you had put that as a question (with some humility) rather than an arrogant assertion, you might sound a little less like an ignorant creatard arguing that the Palluxy river man tracks prove dinosaurs lived with humans.

Actually, one other point... I'm an anarchist of sorts, so I appreciate the goals of wanting to subvert the dominant power structures in the currency/financial markets. Even if bitcoin itself wasn't successful, I back its efforts, and as such I will eventually create a wallet and accept your donation, and probably buy one or two more for myself. Anything that undermines the potentially illegitimate power structure of today's societies, I'm all for.

See... Now you're talkin rEv, even if it is out both sides of your mouth.

[pErvinalia]

The stuff about the fractional reserve lending... The mistake libbos make is that you don't need to keep creating money to pay off the debt from previously created money. The error in this thinking is that it equates money to wealth. Wealth isn't a zero sum game. Each $1 of money in the system can generate many multiples of dollars of wealth. THAT wealth is what is used to pay back the initial debt.

To all: Am I the only one here to whom this just seems like absurd non-sequitur? Sorry fEv, I just don't understand this.

A COMMON refrain from those that argue against frb is that you need to create more debt-funded money to pay off the previously debt-funded money debt. I haven't watched your vid (and I can't now that I'm on dial up) but I'd be very surprised if it didn't foist this canard. Otherwise, there is no need to get concerned by the fact that money is created out of debt. Why would you think that was a problem, if you understood that wealth isn't a zero sum game and isn't directly equated with "money"? And why did you mention the "exponential" equation earlier? THAT is the exact same argument that is used by people to explain why money created out of debt is unsustainable. So I apologise if I read your argument wrong, but if you don't think like this, then you are unique amongst the hundreds of ant-fiat currency/frb 'ers that I have come across in the past.

Anyhow, I thought the point was to establish the consequences of an unsustainable economy. The inflation as I see it, can only lead to more debt based inflation and resource consumption.

This is the point I have been trying to explain to you about the different types of growth, and recycling. And inflation is only a problem if you sit on your money. If you invest, then inflation is your buddy. You haven't adequately addressed either of these points. You like to condescendingly accuse your interlocutors of avoiding your sermonised points, but you yourself don't adequately front up to the points others make. If you want more respect for your points, then treat others' points with more respect.

Your point about economies being about consumers, not producers, doesn't feel right to me. If I work as a coal miner, and then decide that I'm not going to mine coal any more but become a singing teacher, how can you say that the little chunk of the economy that I contribute to is equally as resource intensive? The person who pays for my singing lessons, is going to forgo something else (perhaps more resource intensive, like say a second TV and the extra energy that it uses) to afford my singing lessons. Your characterisation of the economy being about never ending resource consumption doesn't quite add up to me. Can you try and explain it a bit more?

That depends on an environmental cost which IS a zero sum. The environment wont sustain endless growth.

It theoretically could, if recycling could approach 100% efficiency, or we could mine off planet. Now, we probably won't ever approach 100% efficiency in recycling in the near future, but the point is, it's not a simplistic dichotomous situation like you portray. We could possibly go on for a lot longer with the right types of economic growth and recycling and mining off planet before that particular crunch hits. That's why I claim we'll be fucked by global warming and ecosystem collapse before that point.

But to be clear, we are on the same side of this environmental debate. The reason I take issue with what you say is not from an anti-environmental perspective, but from your false beliefs in regards to the monetary system.

I've never insisted that the debt cant be paid off, as long as new money is introduced (increasing net debt) and the inflation by debt is perpetuated.

Well hang on. Why then did you claim what I said above is a non-sequitur? What I said directly debunks this idea. You don't need to introduce new "money" to pay off debt. As long as the original money generates wealth growth in excess of the interest rate on the debt, then it is payable without any new money needing to be created.

Here's a tl;dr article about the monetary system and frb, but since you are into tl;dr, you'll love it! - http://home.hiwaay.net/~becraft/FRS-myth.htm#hd25

How about if you watch that video, before diverting (and perhaps squandering) my attention. I still find I am trying to explain things that Money As Debt lays out clearly and entertainingly. These other issues you raise could all be dispelled with a little research on the part of the questioner. I don't mind addressing them, but It can be laborious to re-hash issues that have been dealt with abundantly as if the questioner were the first one to have ever considered them. Meanwhile we havn't made a lot of headway on the original point above. You seem to have side stepped my careful efforts to point out the link between economy and environment. I'd much rather stick to one subject and try to find some agreement, before rehashing the wild goose chases below.

Well you're going to have to try and address them if you want to get your idea across, as I can't watch that video now (even if there was anything in that video that I haven't heard and seen debunked 50 times before). That link I posted debunks a lot of the common claims of anti-fiat/frb 'ers. If some of those claims are shared by your video (which I bet they are) then that article will debunk a lot of them too.

There are two issues outstanding that you have not addressed here. Those are:

Who is it that actually makes new money?

The government ultimately makes new money via the central reserve.

If you love comicky videos, watch this one, it explains it: https://s3.amazonaws.com/cm-us-standard ... -en-08.mp4

and..

How can economic growth be kept apart from environmental sustainability?

I've already answered this. Recycling (and off planet resources - i.e. mining and solar). Whether that comes fully to fruition or not (and it probably won't) is a separate question. The point is that there are different levels of resource use for different types of economic growth. But ALL types of economic growth can pay back debt.

The benefit of a state backed currency is that it is more or less guaranteed to be the only acceptable currency.

Somehow you conveniently manage not to acknowledge or mention the principal fact, that this 'guarantee' is a double edged sword. One edge for them and the other for us. The edge given to consumers/taxpayers, is so blunt it wont cut a wet turd. The govt./bankster edge is a finely honed lethal razor sharp edge and it's used to slice the fuck out of profits and the value of the dollar.

Yes, well that's the claim that is continually made, and one that is continually debunked by many people. I've got no doubt that bankers make a killing in the system, but I don't feel that it is because of fiat currency, but more the case of being privileged by a poor regulatory system and also being in a position of power to act powerfully. I don't think frb has anything to do with their power. It sounds like a conspiracy theory to me and many others.

As for the only acceptable currency. That's up to the people. It's what people choose to accept, that makes a currency acceptable. Since we now have crypto-currencies the government fiat currencies are NOT the only ones that are acceptable. The cat is out of the bag. The whole 'you MUST use fiat money as legal tender' is blown out of the water, as of over three years ago. Your fiat money is NOW as vulnerable as any other since nobody can be prevented from using crypto-currencies. The government can no longer guarantee anything other than it will take payment for tax in govt. fiat dollars.

As explained to you earlier, a point you didn't address, governments could regulate crypto-currencies out of any meaningful use if they so choose. And I'd suspect that this is exactly what will eventually happen as a crypto currency starts to approach any form of critical mass. It's the exact same thing we are seeing with the internet. The internet has proved to be beyond government reach in it's early days and we are seeing strict and draconian measures to pull it back under it's control. Governments backed by rich corporations aren't going to cede power to individuals without a very big fight.

And you think stability is of even anything than the most trivial significance. Yet again. Anybody who had watched Money As Debt (with an open mind) couldn't possibly come away with a perspective that govt. fiat was benign. It's a festering, rancid, malignant pustule of toxic evil. Your one sided evaluation of Govt. fiat money, fails to account for so much grievous economic evil, it's hard to know where to begin.

Well, until you do begin, it's just your own one-sided evaluation of the system. See how this works? I put it to you that you have your mind made up, and anyone who questions your beliefs is deluded and/or ignorant. That's not a sound basis from which to start an honest debate.

Banks for starters. Those are propped up by regulatory capture. I've already gone over this stuff man. It's getting frustrating Banks with their ripoffs fees and their protected monopoly are now redundant and can be bypassed. That is fucking HUGE. The economic benefit to society alone is phenomenal. The ethical incentive for kicking these bastards out is enormous, to anybody with a conscience. The governments have only been able to 'protect' the money market because they have had local monopolies. Governments however have been increasingly growing both irresponsible, greedy and evil. The motive they have for maintaining that monopoly, has nothing to do with what is in your interest or mine.

I largely agree with all this, BUT it's irrelevant to my point. THE POINT is that government fiat is more or less stable. Whereas crypto-currencies aren't that, while ever the governement can legislate them out of practical existence. Not to mention how they could be exploited by powerful interest from within the community while ever there is little to no regulation. What's to stop some rich group manipulating the price of bitcoins and exploiting that for profit? While there aren't enough regulations at present to stop that totally with traditional currencies, there are at least some rules and prohibitions.

They are nothing more than puppets for the banksters who control govt. fiat money, to milk us of the highest possible dividend.

Yeah, conspiracy stuff, as I said. "Banksters" don't control government fiat money. The central reserve controls fiat money, and the central reserves are under the control of the government.

So when you have a stash of your local dollars, you don't need to worry about them being massively devalued or worthless in the near future.

No. You only have to worry about them being dependably eroded of value into the long term. Savings is hopeless in govt. fiat. You are trivializing a truly foul insedious quality of govt. fiat.

I've already addressed this. It encourages investment, which encourages growth. Now, in terms of the environment, that's not a particularly good thing. But you are referring to the economics of the system. And it makes excellent sense in terms of what the system is devised to do: encourage investment to create and innovate. And that very feature means that you CAN save your money without it devaluing, as the banks want it to provide for all the investors out there. Anyone who loses money through devaluation in this economy deserves to lose it. It's almost not possible to lose it via devaluation.

And you don't have to worry about the value of bitcoin being massively devalued in the short OR the long term. Anybody who can see past their nose, can see that the short term fluctuations in bitcoin, are very short and mostly (by a large margin) in the upwards direction. Fluctuations in bitcoin have been mostly subject to the much smaller volume it has had. As it grows the size of the market evens out the fluctuations and it continues to grow more and more stable. Intelligent punters who see a drop in value (usually after a strong rally), do not panic and realize that the price will return to a new average and it will ultimately be higher than the last. If you understand the economics of bitcoin, particularly the fixed/tapering total supply, you don't flinch at the trivial short term fluctuations. Also, if you are so confident about the potential of loosing value in bitcoin, there are now some places where you can even short your position on it. Also you wouldn't be making such bold statements about the security of govt. fiat, if you were a citizen of Cyprus, with life savings in the bank earlier this year. Governments are not there to protect you or your money. WAKE UP!

That's why I mentioned "stable western economies". Greece and Cyprus weren't ever stable.

Regarding the price of bitcoin forever going up, one of the points I was trying to make about the addition of new digital currencies in the marketplace is that it would instantly devalue your holdings. Simply, if there is 'X' dollars of good and service to purchase in the world and there is 'x' digital dollars in the world, when a new currency comes online, there is still 'X' dollars of products, but now there is 2'x' dollars of digital money. So immediately your original holdings are devalued. That's why the government fiat system is stable in the sense that you know more or less what your money will be worth in the near future, as you know that no new currencies or large sums of inflationary money are going to enter the system. But with unregulated digital currency, you have no such security. Essentially, there is no cost to produce digital money. There is a cost to produce fiat currency (debt repayments and inflation).

As long as you economy is reasonable stable, like most Western economies. You know that inflation usually stays between a narrow band, so you know what your money will be worth, more or less, in the future.

More?! MORE?! where the hell do you get MORE from? Do I need to post a chart for you?

No, you need to step back and take your argumentative blinkers off. "more or less" is a common saying. Reread what I have written and you'll see where you have gone wrong. What it means is that I know that my money will be worth 'x' (that could be less than it is today) + or - a little bit. Get it? Stop being so defensive.

With an unregulated currency, you don't have that assurity (I swear that's a word).

I think I've covered this. Now, if the powers that be, could only demonstrate their ability to preside over economies which steadily deflate and were just as stable, while NOT relying on exponential economic growth, and unsustainable environmental resource depletion, to continue their trajectory, we might have a stability function that's worth a damn.

The system doesn't rely on "exponential" economic growth. It needs growth which covers population increase and the interest repayments. Any extra above that is an increase in standard of living. THAT is what drives insane growth. Our insatiable need for increases in quality of living. Although, to be fair, that's on average, but in reality most of that growth in quality of living is coming to the upper end of town. So it's certainly not equitable.

If competitor currencies spring up and dominate, unless you act in a timely manner, your holdings could lose considerable value.

Surely you don't think that altcoins could put anything but the slightest dint in bitcoin over a space of time less than months? The infrastructure that is behind the crypto economy, has been built up for years now and as I've mentioned over 90% of it is to support bitcoin. Any rival would need one hell of a run up and a very good reason to capture the market. Nothing wrong with competition and evolution, and I'd feel very sorry for the person who fell asleep under a rock for a year and woke up to find their bitcoins were worthless, but I'm wiling to bet 50 to 1 that a massive disruption of that sort happens to the US dollar before it happens to Bitcoin. Let's say a loss of 50% in value over one 30 day period. $20 (fixed at the current exchange rate). What sort of stake can you afford?

Well there's a couple of problems. You are assuming that people's holdings are perfectly liquid. What if they are tied up in investments while the value of the bitcoins drops? And anyway, as I said, when new digital money is introduced into the system of existence products and services, then each unit of digital money will go less far.

You may also be unable to convert your bitcoin to the new currencies.

Now, lets look at the practical shortcomings of this scenario ever happening. S'pose you have some of this new currency (let's call it non-bitcoin or NBC) and I decide to buy some. What if I make you an attractive offer of bitcoin, (or BTC) say 10% above the equivalent value, for a couple of your NBC. Assuming theres nothing preventing anybody downloading and using the clients of either software and nothing otherwise preventing free trade, then theres nothing (AFAIK) that could prevent you and I from settling on a market price, and trading P2P bitcoin for non-bitcoin. Talk about pushing shit up hill. If it weren't hard enough to even establish a viable altcoin, the one feature that is indispensable, is that it can be traded for bitcoin or any other alt currency on the open market.

Yeah, good point. I guess that is one benefit of the currency.

Why the hell would anybody with more brain cells than bitcoins, even think of getting into such a crypto-currency?

Why does anyone get trapped into scams and ponzy schemes? Because our society dictates that we consume and consume and beat the Jones's. People are so trapped in making it rich as easily as possible, that people regularly fall for dodgy schemes. I don't think bitcoin is a "scheme", but I think it's inherently unstable and I'd recommend a LOT of caution when investing in it.

And what by the way, would one use to buy into this nonbitcoin? Govt. Fiat money? No? You're kidding aren't you? How 'bout I take five minutes to spend some bitcoin out to an on line exchange, cop a 2% fee for transacting and have the fiat money deposited in my bank within 24 hours. Now! How much were those nonbitcoin? I got me some o dat wonderful gubbmint phiat you wuv Sooooo much. Can haz NBC plz? People can be stupid, but if they're smart enough to get into crypto-currency, they're NOT going to get into one that defeats the whole purpose of P2P trading.

Besides what if another currency crops up? Call it extra-non-bitcoin. What if the unfortunate sods with non-bitcoin get trapped with useless currency, wakeup from under their rock and find what they have left, cant be traded for ENB? It's an infinite regress, like the creationist teleological argument. Once people get a taste of freedom, theres no going back. There is healthy competition in the alt currency scene and to the extent that some have found a niche, they have found a market. It's no different than the multitude of govt. fiat currencies traded around the world. They don't have to be monolithic and universal to remain valuable and useful and NONE of them are in-expendable.

You're ranting. Take a breath.

This is the problem with laissez faire. And no, I didn't argue just on assertion.

Well now that you mention it... but I think you knew you did, or why foist the pre-emptive defense?

You're defensiveness is getting in the way of your thinking clearly. YOU accused me of previously arguing on assertion alone, hence why I chose to mention what I mentioned above. I.e. it WASN'T pre-emptive. It was in direct response to an accusation you made.

But I don't now need to rehash the basic problems with laissez faire. It's a juvenile ideology, and like other juvenile things, I'm not willing to give it more than the minimum amount of my time.

= empty rhetoric and baseless assertion.

And? I answer this point with my last sentence: "It's a juvenile ideology, and like other juvenile things, I'm not willing to give it more than the minimum amount of my time.".

The final thought I had is regarding the increasingly complex algorithm to mine the bitcoins. The first person to create a working quantum computer is going to smash the mining industry if they put it to bitcoin mining! I wonder if the creators have factored that into their calculations. Because we will almost certainly have quantum computing long before 2040.

You don't understand how bitcoin works and NO this isn't a concern. If you had put that as a question (with some humility) rather than an arrogant assertion, you might sound a little less like an ignorant creatard arguing that the Palluxy river man tracks prove dinosaurs lived with humans.

Man, your defensiveness is shocking. I didn't put it any way at all. It was a genuine point. If the system can take account for the power of quantum computing, then just simply explain it. No need to rant.