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'Could'? Why do media outlets persist in tiptoeing around these issues? A tiny, tiny minority of cashless systems are private and censorship-resistant. Almost

'Could'? Why do media outlets persist in tiptoeing around these issues? A tiny, tiny minority of cashless systems are private and censorship-resistant. Almost all of the solutions that are actually currently on the table already do help mass surveillance, already does give more control to the government. If we can get the general public to use open hardware without backdoors and a cryptocurrency or similar, we might be able to come close to the privacy of cash. But is that a realistic goal? Anyone knows how to use cash in a reasonably private way. Barely anyone knows how to use digital technology in a reasonably private way. It may not even be possible (are our systems backdoored? is x86 secure?) Taxation is always the problem hailed here. I think that fundamentally people should have the power to withhold information from the government. That action may result in negative consequences, but it should be possible nonetheless. There is a huge distinction between choosing to disobey the law and potentially being punished for it (civil disobedience), and having literally no choice because all other avenues have become impossible. That is what people are fighting for, that is what freedom is all about. Perfect enforcement is not desirable. Imagine a world in which homosexuality is impossible. Not illegal, but impossible. That's what perfect enforcement would have looked like in the 50s.

AckSyn 11y ago
> Why do media outlets persist in tiptoeing around these issues? Because we all know who runs the place, right? It's not like you can bite the hand that feeds you. It never used to be that way, but government overreach and control is, well, out of control.
- pm24601 11y ago
  > It never used to be that way, but government overreach and control is, well, out of control. It always was that way. Look up William Randolph Hearst. He is sometime portrayed as a crusader. But the reality is messier, Hearst would look for dirt on people who were not doing what he wanted. Teapot Dome Scandal is just such an example.
dota_fanatic 11y ago
Devil's advocate: Imagine a world in which theft, rape, slavery, and child abuse are impossible (more than once / for any meaningful period of time). Have you read any of Iain Banks's Culture series? I think the peace of mind that you and everyone you'll ever know will never get disappeared into someone's rape dungeon doesn't seem so bad. Or that you can go into business and actually win because you're doing it better, because your competitors aren't in bed with government, corruptly and systematically destroying the possibility of competition. Just also don't do stupid shit like control the expression of two consenting persons just because what they're doing is not your cup of tea. Is this really so hard to differentiate between? And does perfect enforcement really mean minds can't changed, that the law can't be changed after it's created if it's understood that actions X, Y, or Z actually aren't against the universal bill of rights for living entities? Sure, freedom is about being able to do what you want with your life, but it also means being able to do it safely, without the fear of getting pwned. People who want to pwn will always have the upper hand if we just all agree we'd rather keep letting people do whatever the fuck they want so long as they can get away with it. "Perfect enforcement" sounds only as horrible as the culture behind it is, to me. Turning away from that is to embrace and make a home for the devil we know---corruption, physical and sexual domination of the weak by the powerful, environmental devastation, rampant species genocide, etc etc etc.
- noir_lord 11y ago
  As you mention "perfect enforcement" I think The culture novels are a poor example, yes the AI's had near-perfect information which made crime a thing of the past but they also had a massively broad idea of what was legal (pretty much "do no harm to anyone else"). The people running society are far less likely to benign than the culture AI's (I think I have just about all of recorded history to back that one up). It's the parable of the scorpion and the frog and we (meaning the general electorate) would be the frog.
- woah 11y ago
  I think that you are vastly overestimating the risk of crime. My guess is that your risk perception, like that of many people, has been warped by watching too many tv shows where dramatic things are always happening.
userbinator 11y ago
That is what people are fighting for, that is what freedom is all about. Perfect enforcement is not desirable. If you think about it, neither is perfect security --- since that's how perfect enforcement can be carried out. Imagine using a locked-down, unjailbreakable ("provably secure"), DRM'd device under the control of the corporations which the government obliges to design such that it behaves in a particular manner, and you can't do anything about it. That's why the whole encryption debate worries me, and not exactly in the "governments can spy on you" sort of way. "Unbreakable" perfect crypto is good only if you're the only one in control of it, and even then it's not completely awesome --- imagine accidentally locking yourself out of your car/house/etc. and having to get a locksmith to essentially hack their way in for you. That's not possible with perfect crypto. More ironically, if government systems were more secure, Snowden could not have happened... Maybe a little insecurity, a little imperfection, is a good thing after all, because it enables freedom.
- ArkyBeagle 11y ago
  Our legislators have lost - if they ever had - the wisdom to see the effects of unintended consequences. "Something must be done, this is something, this must be done."
danenania 11y ago
A solution to the tax problem is to change methods of taxation so that far less information and monitoring is needed. While we're at it, we could also make taxation less regressive, more efficient, and simpler to comply with. As much as possible, we should be taxing consumption, not income, savings, and growth. Where it is necessary to tax income and growth, we should be looking specifically at the largest, wealthiest corporations and their major beneficiaries, not average individuals.
- dnautics 11y ago
  If you're taxing consumption you're fundamentally requiring government to ingest more information about its populace than income.
  - ArkyBeagle 11y ago
    One of the advantages of taxing land rents is that most if not all the information needed is inherently part of the process of protecting property rights. Since most intellectual and "brand" property must also be registered, I am sure the same can apply to that.
  - AnthonyMouse 11y ago
    They're fundamentally the same thing. Your spending is somebody else's income. But a consumption tax which is collected by the merchants provides the government with the least information. All they learn is that Walmart reported selling $8,500,000 worth of auto parts this quarter, not who your employer is or what specific customers bought what specific products.
- CydeWeys 11y ago
  > While we're at it, we could also make taxation less regressive > As much as possible, we should be taxing consumption, not income, savings, and growth. These two desires are in complete opposition to each other, because the poor by necessity spend a much larger proportion of their income than the rich. What you are proposing is impossible.
ArkyBeagle 11y ago
Historically, when there is no cash, barter or something that plays the role of wampum in Amerind society takes its place. In a way, isn't this the drug trade in rural Massachusetts? Or in Baltimore in "The Wire"? It's a jury-rigged cash substitute. I suspect that not only is cashlessness impossible, but that some sort of scrip money will be needed to meet unfunded liability. I don't live in a high-marginal rate system, but in the US, taxes aren't high enough to be a real problem except in a very few cases. It still confuses me that any normal person believes that any sort of prohibitionism is good policy. In fact, I don't think they do - I think that prohibitionism is pernicious snake oil sold to those in search of a Utopia. One need only look and it's obvious that it can never work.
- ams6110 11y ago
  Anything that has hard value can substitute for cash. E.g. Tide detergent. http://nymag.com/news/features/tide-detergent-drugs-2013-1/ http://nymag.com/news/features/tide-detergent-drugs-2013-1/
ratsmack 11y ago
Ignorance is the largest point of failure regarding anything to do with issues of security and understanding the pitfalls of electronic commerce. I don't know what percentage of people fully understand how these system can be used against them, but I'm sure the majority don't understand. We are at the mercy of corporations which push much of the technology to their financial benefit and also the large policing agencies which want the easy route to surveillance of the general population. All of this together with the main-stream-media are an enormous barrier to to cross in order to inform people of what could become if things continue on the current path.

AckSyn 11y ago

> Why do media outlets persist in tiptoeing around these issues? Because we all know who runs the place, right? It's not like you can bite the hand that feeds you. It never used to be that way, but government overreach and control is, well, out of control.

pm24601 11y ago
> It never used to be that way, but government overreach and control is, well, out of control. It always was that way. Look up William Randolph Hearst. He is sometime portrayed as a crusader. But the reality is messier, Hearst would look for dirt on people who were not doing what he wanted. Teapot Dome Scandal is just such an example.

dota_fanatic 11y ago

Devil's advocate: Imagine a world in which theft, rape, slavery, and child abuse are impossible (more than once / for any meaningful period of time). Have you read any of Iain Banks's Culture series? I think the peace of mind that you and everyone you'll ever know will never get disappeared into someone's rape dungeon doesn't seem so bad. Or that you can go into business and actually win because you're doing it better, because your competitors aren't in bed with government, corruptly and systematically destroying the possibility of competition. Just also don't do stupid shit like control the expression of two consenting persons just because what they're doing is not your cup of tea. Is this really so hard to differentiate between? And does perfect enforcement really mean minds can't changed, that the law can't be changed after it's created if it's understood that actions X, Y, or Z actually aren't against the universal bill of rights for living entities? Sure, freedom is about being able to do what you want with your life, but it also means being able to do it safely, without the fear of getting pwned. People who want to pwn will always have the upper hand if we just all agree we'd rather keep letting people do whatever the fuck they want so long as they can get away with it. "Perfect enforcement" sounds only as horrible as the culture behind it is, to me. Turning away from that is to embrace and make a home for the devil we know---corruption, physical and sexual domination of the weak by the powerful, environmental devastation, rampant species genocide, etc etc etc.

noir_lord 11y ago
As you mention "perfect enforcement" I think The culture novels are a poor example, yes the AI's had near-perfect information which made crime a thing of the past but they also had a massively broad idea of what was legal (pretty much "do no harm to anyone else"). The people running society are far less likely to benign than the culture AI's (I think I have just about all of recorded history to back that one up). It's the parable of the scorpion and the frog and we (meaning the general electorate) would be the frog.
woah 11y ago
I think that you are vastly overestimating the risk of crime. My guess is that your risk perception, like that of many people, has been warped by watching too many tv shows where dramatic things are always happening.

userbinator 11y ago

That is what people are fighting for, that is what freedom is all about. Perfect enforcement is not desirable. If you think about it, neither is perfect security --- since that's how perfect enforcement can be carried out. Imagine using a locked-down, unjailbreakable ("provably secure"), DRM'd device under the control of the corporations which the government obliges to design such that it behaves in a particular manner, and you can't do anything about it. That's why the whole encryption debate worries me, and not exactly in the "governments can spy on you" sort of way. "Unbreakable" perfect crypto is good only if you're the only one in control of it, and even then it's not completely awesome --- imagine accidentally locking yourself out of your car/house/etc. and having to get a locksmith to essentially hack their way in for you. That's not possible with perfect crypto. More ironically, if government systems were more secure, Snowden could not have happened... Maybe a little insecurity, a little imperfection, is a good thing after all, because it enables freedom.

ArkyBeagle 11y ago
Our legislators have lost - if they ever had - the wisdom to see the effects of unintended consequences. "Something must be done, this is something, this must be done."

danenania 11y ago

A solution to the tax problem is to change methods of taxation so that far less information and monitoring is needed. While we're at it, we could also make taxation less regressive, more efficient, and simpler to comply with. As much as possible, we should be taxing consumption, not income, savings, and growth. Where it is necessary to tax income and growth, we should be looking specifically at the largest, wealthiest corporations and their major beneficiaries, not average individuals.

dnautics 11y ago
If you're taxing consumption you're fundamentally requiring government to ingest more information about its populace than income.
- ArkyBeagle 11y ago
  One of the advantages of taxing land rents is that most if not all the information needed is inherently part of the process of protecting property rights. Since most intellectual and "brand" property must also be registered, I am sure the same can apply to that.
- AnthonyMouse 11y ago
  They're fundamentally the same thing. Your spending is somebody else's income. But a consumption tax which is collected by the merchants provides the government with the least information. All they learn is that Walmart reported selling $8,500,000 worth of auto parts this quarter, not who your employer is or what specific customers bought what specific products.
CydeWeys 11y ago
> While we're at it, we could also make taxation less regressive > As much as possible, we should be taxing consumption, not income, savings, and growth. These two desires are in complete opposition to each other, because the poor by necessity spend a much larger proportion of their income than the rich. What you are proposing is impossible.

ArkyBeagle 11y ago

Historically, when there is no cash, barter or something that plays the role of wampum in Amerind society takes its place. In a way, isn't this the drug trade in rural Massachusetts? Or in Baltimore in "The Wire"? It's a jury-rigged cash substitute. I suspect that not only is cashlessness impossible, but that some sort of scrip money will be needed to meet unfunded liability. I don't live in a high-marginal rate system, but in the US, taxes aren't high enough to be a real problem except in a very few cases. It still confuses me that any normal person believes that any sort of prohibitionism is good policy. In fact, I don't think they do - I think that prohibitionism is pernicious snake oil sold to those in search of a Utopia. One need only look and it's obvious that it can never work.

ams6110 11y ago
Anything that has hard value can substitute for cash. E.g. Tide detergent. http://nymag.com/news/features/tide-detergent-drugs-2013-1/ http://nymag.com/news/features/tide-detergent-drugs-2013-1/

ratsmack 11y ago

Ignorance is the largest point of failure regarding anything to do with issues of security and understanding the pitfalls of electronic commerce. I don't know what percentage of people fully understand how these system can be used against them, but I'm sure the majority don't understand. We are at the mercy of corporations which push much of the technology to their financial benefit and also the large policing agencies which want the easy route to surveillance of the general population. All of this together with the main-stream-media are an enormous barrier to to cross in order to inform people of what could become if things continue on the current path.