RE: Crypto Read/Watch/Listen Picks: new Date(12/16/2017)
LIked the "50 shades" article bc it harks to a future where governments will lasso cryptos. just a matter of WHEN?
Been reading Medium articles for awhile, and have YET to see a useful one. This "blockchain economy" is no different. Here's our beef:
Ledger isn't what makes crypto special, digital ledgers have existed since computers were born, see the entire programming language (one of the first dozen) which was invented for "business" (COBOL).
the ONLY thing special about cryptocurrency, is the de-centralization which allows for PRIVATE transactions. Period. When you boil it (any "technology" involved) all down, bitcoin is a collection of technologies sprung together to take the form of money-- PRIVATE money. To the extent it's a "Revolution", we agree, it's a revolution like all others--> against centralized authority.
If you think about it, no other living species abides by rules set by a central authority. All rules are dictated by survival and mother nature herself, not other animals. A Lion can't write down a rule, and have other lions abide by it, or punish those who violate the rule. The head Lion can only punish by full-on fight, and rarely if ever with the support of his minions.
bitcoin and successor "dark coins" will be the future only in that either
- it becomes the medium of exchange of rulebreakers, such as "criminals"
- A nation not only adopts it as currency, but is able to defend itself against other nations wishing to destroy the currency
This is the future of all crypto currencies.
Think about Steem, is is a better social/blogging network than stuff that already exists? Definitely not, it's lacking TONS of features the others have. It's special bc writers/creators can get paid. So we're right back to the CURRENCY, no? And Steem is created essentially from nothing. It's based on more currency coming into the system, which really is a form of ponzi scheme as all the crypto-tokens values rely on more people buying into crypto vs those leaving it. If everyone decides at once crypto is worthless, it becomes worthless. Ponzi schemes operate EXACTLY the same.
So crypto is ALL about currency, a currency which defies central governments. The crypto underneath bitcoin has been around for a long time. Byzantine Quorom methods help make bitcoin de-centralized, but is merely digital voting. The mining and difficulty algos are simply algos, it's just how they are used which is "clever".
We think Szabo, and we assume he's Satoshi, is pretty brilliant and VERY studied into the history of money and contract law. What he built is rather awesome, in that it CAN usurp central authorities. But always remember, EVENTUALLY the usage of crypto will be criminalized, and those braving the storm will be labelled "terrorists" and "criminals". It's in the history, owning GOLD was a criminal activity inside the very borders of the US empire, not even 100 years ago.
I agree that the decentralized/distributed, and public blockchains weaponized withe a useful currency are the more disruptive use case. But the private blockchains (in-house, or industry-specific) applications will also be highly disruptive -- just in terms of the jobs they will displace. Both will happen, both will be impactful.
As for Government criminalizing it all or shutting it down, I'm still on the fence. This has come up multiple times with folks I know over the last couple months.
I'd love to do a thought experiment discussion with folks where we sit down and map out (1) how the government will kill cryptos and (2) what would the resistance from the crypto community look like.Ultimately, I think there is a lot of game theory involved here and there is no way to know just how effective Government will be in controlling it. Like the encryption battle, you can't just make it illegal when it simply exists in the wild whether you like it or not. Clearly there will be an inverse relationship with a Government's commitment to human rights and it's aggressiveness to shutting down cryptos (the less they care, the more they suppress). So there will be dictators that try to shut it down, and we'll get our first glimpses into what resilience looks like.
If only the USA "Founding Fathers" had put the "right to bear cryptography" in the Bill of Rights.
Luckily like Szabo, we harpooninvestor's are students of history, and have an example of EXACTLY how the gov't, backed by guy's losing their power like Zberg, will attack crypto; the "playbook" has already been written...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_6102
and yes, the Revolutionary Founding Fathers dealt with all of this same stuff as relates the "crown" (@kingscrown ?)-- look up the Stamp Act and then remember what Ben Franklin did for a living (Newspapers-- each daily paper requiring a "stamp").
I'm curious what the end result would be if something similar to EO 6102 were enacted for cryptos. How easy would it be to enforce? If it's too hard to enforce and it's impact is too broad, could there be any Constitutional issues? What happens if other world governments don't go along and instead see an opportunity by supporting cryptos?
I think of this a little like encryption -- it's hard to put all this back in the bottle.
Thank you for the reminder of the Stamp Act! I believe the Founding Fathers (FFs) in spirit supported the idea of cryptography. I always find literalists frustrating -- like Christian denominations that will only play musical instruments specifically mentioned in the Bible (as if that is more "truthful"). I daydream of a world where the FFs specifically mentioned cryptography so all the literalists would be appeased.