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"ICOs (tokens) are to IPOs (stocks) what cryptocurrency is to fiat currency." No - absolutely not. An IPO is the sale of shares in a company. It comes with a

"ICOs (tokens) are to IPOs (stocks) what cryptocurrency is to fiat currency." No - absolutely not. An IPO is the sale of shares in a company. It comes with a whole set of legal rights - most importantly, legal rights to the assets of the company. Crypto-currencies are just another form of arbitrary currency that have different parameters - and by the way - crypto currencies are definitely 'fiat' currencies (i.e. they have value because they are declared to have value and that's it) - a non-fiat currency would be backed by an asset like Gold or property. Crypto-currencies imply zero rights to assets of the company, which is a pretty big deal. Most currencies in the world are in fact 'backed' by something. USD are backed by TBills and crap property. The Euro is backed by 'good assets' generally. "In other words, crypto currency and ICOs 'cut out the middlemen'" No - definitely not. ICOs are way to sell NOTHING to people for actual money. 'Cutting out the middle man' in an IPO would be akin to skipping brokerages or something of the like - i.e. direct sales to consumers. With ICO's - coin owners get nothing in return, i.e. no rights to assets or future profits. "there are some ICOs or users of cryptocurrency engaged in scams or questionable activity" Can anyone name any ICO's wherein the coins have gone on to support a healthy economy for which that currency was supposed to support? Because the Kin (i.e. Kik) coins are down to 1/5th their original valuation - they are not being used for anything in the economy - and Kik owns enough Kin to devalue the current economy by over 90%, meaning the current Kins are worth about 1/10th of their value. "You fail to understand the big picture so let me help you (and perhaps @jedberg) out a bit." No - I'm sorry but you fail to understand. So many people on here who support BTC have no financial or economic understanding of what it is - they are blinded by the admittedly very cool technological aspects and the 'utopian promises'. The notion of a 'decentralized currency' is really cool, but it's not likely to happen for a variety of reasons. Basically all ICOs are scams. Most coins will die soon - BTC will be around for a while yet.

mrschwabe 9y ago
> "set of legal rights to assets" ... "zero rights to assets" Who cares who gives you rights to the assets? If I invest in a company, I've already decided to bet on them. If they choose to screw me over - fine, I will no longer invest in them - and neither should anyone else. Why do you want to involve the government to enforce 'your right' over someone else - why don't you take responsbility for your own failed investment? Let the company set the terms, including for insolvency scenarios, and take the risk knowing that they may or may not be able to fulfil them but it's up to you to give them that chance. When I make an investment, I am willing to trust the business issuing the share/token 100% to do the right thing. If the business is run by left-nut SJWs drinking soy latte's all day then I'm gunna run away or pull my funds out ASAP cause these are the types who will most likely fail or compromise when big brother comes along and demands to undermine the business by installing a backdoor for which to expose all of said business' customer data. > "would be akin to skipping brokerages or something of the like - i.e. direct sales to consumers." Exactly. > "blinded by the admittedly very cool technological aspects and the 'utopian promises'." It's not a utopia - it's a vision for the future unfolding, 'happening right now' , for a variety of reasons. And yeah, at $7.5k per coin today I agree it's going to be around for a while yet. > "With ICO's - coin owners get nothing in return, i.e. no rights to assets or future profits." That is, for the scams - yes. But same line of thinking as I described above - stop assuming the government can enforce anything and instead trust the company to follow through on what it has promised you in the initial offering. If they say they will issue you a dividend in proportion to your total number of tokens - you and every other token holder should hold them accountable to do that (the blockchain and open bookkeeping btw can make it even easier to audit them in this regard) > "Basically all ICOs are scams" Let's agree to disagree on that one - but full disclosure, other than ETH (later sold for ETC after the fork), I have never invested in a hyped up ICO myself. But when and if I do, I certainly don't want big brother 'enforcing' anything with regards to the transaction or the business issuing the token.
- alexasmyths 9y ago
  You need 'legal rights' because it's (almost) the only way to enforce agreements. Suppose you use BTC to buy something, and someone ripped you off. Do you get a gun, and 'take care of your own business'? Do you grasp that 'the law' and 'the government' is there to manage the social contract that we have in place? Commercial law is there to help us sort out agreements we make with one another. Crypto-currencies have very limited ability to do that. Also - owning a 'coin' is owning an abstract number that someone made up, which does not give it a whole lot of value. Owning a 'share' implies ownership in the company ---> The company's money in their bank account, their real-estate etc. - it belongs to you. That's a really big deal - someone giving you their cash, and their future earnings, the IP, in return for 'money now'. "It's not a utopia - it's a vision for the future unfolding, 'happening right now'" No it's not. Nobody is using coins for any kind of commerce, and ICOs are turning out to be scams so they will disappear fast. BTC is just a pyramid scheme. It will be 'around for a while' because more people will find out about the scheme and 'want in'. Eventually it will lose steam. My bet is that BTC crashes when the first economic crash happens in the West - people will need to liquidate their BTC and prices will fall - as soon as their is legit downward price pressure on BTC it could go to zero pretty quickly.

mrschwabe 9y ago

> "set of legal rights to assets" ... "zero rights to assets" Who cares who gives you rights to the assets? If I invest in a company, I've already decided to bet on them. If they choose to screw me over - fine, I will no longer invest in them - and neither should anyone else. Why do you want to involve the government to enforce 'your right' over someone else - why don't you take responsbility for your own failed investment? Let the company set the terms, including for insolvency scenarios, and take the risk knowing that they may or may not be able to fulfil them but it's up to you to give them that chance. When I make an investment, I am willing to trust the business issuing the share/token 100% to do the right thing. If the business is run by left-nut SJWs drinking soy latte's all day then I'm gunna run away or pull my funds out ASAP cause these are the types who will most likely fail or compromise when big brother comes along and demands to undermine the business by installing a backdoor for which to expose all of said business' customer data. > "would be akin to skipping brokerages or something of the like - i.e. direct sales to consumers." Exactly. > "blinded by the admittedly very cool technological aspects and the 'utopian promises'." It's not a utopia - it's a vision for the future unfolding, 'happening right now' , for a variety of reasons. And yeah, at $7.5k per coin today I agree it's going to be around for a while yet. > "With ICO's - coin owners get nothing in return, i.e. no rights to assets or future profits." That is, for the scams - yes. But same line of thinking as I described above - stop assuming the government can enforce anything and instead trust the company to follow through on what it has promised you in the initial offering. If they say they will issue you a dividend in proportion to your total number of tokens - you and every other token holder should hold them accountable to do that (the blockchain and open bookkeeping btw can make it even easier to audit them in this regard) > "Basically all ICOs are scams" Let's agree to disagree on that one - but full disclosure, other than ETH (later sold for ETC after the fork), I have never invested in a hyped up ICO myself. But when and if I do, I certainly don't want big brother 'enforcing' anything with regards to the transaction or the business issuing the token.

alexasmyths 9y ago
You need 'legal rights' because it's (almost) the only way to enforce agreements. Suppose you use BTC to buy something, and someone ripped you off. Do you get a gun, and 'take care of your own business'? Do you grasp that 'the law' and 'the government' is there to manage the social contract that we have in place? Commercial law is there to help us sort out agreements we make with one another. Crypto-currencies have very limited ability to do that. Also - owning a 'coin' is owning an abstract number that someone made up, which does not give it a whole lot of value. Owning a 'share' implies ownership in the company ---> The company's money in their bank account, their real-estate etc. - it belongs to you. That's a really big deal - someone giving you their cash, and their future earnings, the IP, in return for 'money now'. "It's not a utopia - it's a vision for the future unfolding, 'happening right now'" No it's not. Nobody is using coins for any kind of commerce, and ICOs are turning out to be scams so they will disappear fast. BTC is just a pyramid scheme. It will be 'around for a while' because more people will find out about the scheme and 'want in'. Eventually it will lose steam. My bet is that BTC crashes when the first economic crash happens in the West - people will need to liquidate their BTC and prices will fall - as soon as their is legit downward price pressure on BTC it could go to zero pretty quickly.