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> Blockchain technology might also be used one day to produce new kinds of central-bank money. I feel like they missed the whole point.

XR0CSWV3h3kZWg 9y ago
Maybe they mean money no singular entity controls that still can enact sane monetary policy? There basically aren't any cryptocurrencies that are useful for writing long term (i.e. terms greater than 1 hour) contracts (here meaning do this action -> get this payout). The value fluctuates too much. Having a stable value is not necessary for transmitting value, or even as a store of value as long as the long term trend is not down. Determining how much someone should be paid in the future in it is awful though.
osrec 9y ago
Sort of, however it can bring full transactional traceability in a very transparent, open manner. That's better than what we have today. I mean, at a basic level even extracting your own account data from a bank is extremely tedious if you stay within their terms of use (i.e don't use yodlee etc)!
- pythonaut_16 9y ago
  Isn't most money used as purely digital anyway? When you get a mortgage, it's not like $300k of physical money changes hands. So at a basic level quite a few (most) transactions are happening on a digital, abstract level anyway, so really the question is can blockchain be used to improve this model, and is there sufficient incentive for existing players to do so, or is there enough opportunity for someone else to come in and do so. I think the former is what we're seeing banks start to explore today, while BTC and other cryptocoins have been exploring the latter.
  - osrec 9y ago
    Yes transactions are digital, but they are neither open nor transparent. The information itself is heavily guarded, as it essentially ring fences the competitive advantage of banks and stops plucky start ups coming in, adding value and thereby reducing the perceived value/utility of a traditional bank.
  - tonfa 9y ago
    There are some proposals to have the 300k be actually created by the central bank. For example the Vollgeld initiative in Switzerland: https://www.vollgeld-initiative.ch/english/ https://www.vollgeld-initiative.ch/english/ One of the logical extension is to allow anyone to have an account at the central bank, also combining those approaches with a blockchain sounds logical.
betterunix2 9y ago
Not really. In fact, permissioned blockchains are already being researched by big banks (I know someone working on this) to solve certain problems related to the integrity of financial records. It is not hard to imagine revival of ecash [1] coupled with a distributed ledger and a threshold blind signature system for issuing the currency. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecash https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecash
- aristocles 9y ago
  Oh great government can issue us currency we cant see and track everything we do.
  - zby 9y ago
    Ecash has privacy.
- okxyd 9y ago
  Yes he missed something: the context of bitcoin invention during the 2008 crisis. One of the big incentive to own something like bitcoin (or any decentralized and distributed cryptocurrency) is that it allows to emancipate yourself completely from financial institution either public (the central banks) or private (retail banks) when it comes to managing your capital, hell the "be your own bank". This is something especially important considering we live in a world where nation-states are increasingly weak, politicians are either seen as incompetent at dealing with economic issue or just straight up overpowered by transnational entities while people are more and more nomad (not hesitating to just abandon their countries for another one when they are not satisfied instead of trying to enhance it). The problem with this trend is that currently moving your capital with you is hard (e-banking is a progress but it's still not enough for most people, especially the poorest). Finally there is this economic warfare aspect, not all countries are like the USA where the currency is a tool for global hegemony and a fundamental pillar of the state, in fact with the EU we have strong countries which for the first time in history have willfully abandoned their monetary sovereignty (they still keep control but it's not one-sided). Best examples of this dynamic is Japan which has seen the yen bleed badly during the last decades and is the first big country to have a pro-cryptocurrency attitude.

XR0CSWV3h3kZWg 9y ago

Maybe they mean money no singular entity controls that still can enact sane monetary policy? There basically aren't any cryptocurrencies that are useful for writing long term (i.e. terms greater than 1 hour) contracts (here meaning do this action -> get this payout). The value fluctuates too much. Having a stable value is not necessary for transmitting value, or even as a store of value as long as the long term trend is not down. Determining how much someone should be paid in the future in it is awful though.

osrec 9y ago

Sort of, however it can bring full transactional traceability in a very transparent, open manner. That's better than what we have today. I mean, at a basic level even extracting your own account data from a bank is extremely tedious if you stay within their terms of use (i.e don't use yodlee etc)!

pythonaut_16 9y ago
Isn't most money used as purely digital anyway? When you get a mortgage, it's not like $300k of physical money changes hands. So at a basic level quite a few (most) transactions are happening on a digital, abstract level anyway, so really the question is can blockchain be used to improve this model, and is there sufficient incentive for existing players to do so, or is there enough opportunity for someone else to come in and do so. I think the former is what we're seeing banks start to explore today, while BTC and other cryptocoins have been exploring the latter.
- osrec 9y ago
  Yes transactions are digital, but they are neither open nor transparent. The information itself is heavily guarded, as it essentially ring fences the competitive advantage of banks and stops plucky start ups coming in, adding value and thereby reducing the perceived value/utility of a traditional bank.
- tonfa 9y ago
  There are some proposals to have the 300k be actually created by the central bank. For example the Vollgeld initiative in Switzerland: https://www.vollgeld-initiative.ch/english/ https://www.vollgeld-initiative.ch/english/ One of the logical extension is to allow anyone to have an account at the central bank, also combining those approaches with a blockchain sounds logical.

betterunix2 9y ago

Not really. In fact, permissioned blockchains are already being researched by big banks (I know someone working on this) to solve certain problems related to the integrity of financial records. It is not hard to imagine revival of ecash [1] coupled with a distributed ledger and a threshold blind signature system for issuing the currency. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecash https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecash

aristocles 9y ago
Oh great government can issue us currency we cant see and track everything we do.
- zby 9y ago
  Ecash has privacy.
okxyd 9y ago
Yes he missed something: the context of bitcoin invention during the 2008 crisis. One of the big incentive to own something like bitcoin (or any decentralized and distributed cryptocurrency) is that it allows to emancipate yourself completely from financial institution either public (the central banks) or private (retail banks) when it comes to managing your capital, hell the "be your own bank". This is something especially important considering we live in a world where nation-states are increasingly weak, politicians are either seen as incompetent at dealing with economic issue or just straight up overpowered by transnational entities while people are more and more nomad (not hesitating to just abandon their countries for another one when they are not satisfied instead of trying to enhance it). The problem with this trend is that currently moving your capital with you is hard (e-banking is a progress but it's still not enough for most people, especially the poorest). Finally there is this economic warfare aspect, not all countries are like the USA where the currency is a tool for global hegemony and a fundamental pillar of the state, in fact with the EU we have strong countries which for the first time in history have willfully abandoned their monetary sovereignty (they still keep control but it's not one-sided). Best examples of this dynamic is Japan which has seen the yen bleed badly during the last decades and is the first big country to have a pro-cryptocurrency attitude.