Topic: Creating a guaranteed minimum income through crypto-coins - page 2. (Read 14970 times)

A random thought about social consequences of the Spatial Location Proof of Identity system:

Some cultures place tight restrictions on women.  That will place members of such cultures at a financial disadvantage, in that their women may not be allowed to go meet random strangers (including men), in random locations.

Maybe the system will provide a little pressure for them to change, which from my perspective would be a good thing.

So far I've described the "spatial identification for coin delivery" process as requiring a smartphone or similar mobile internet device - i.e. needing at least GPS and internet connection and camera. 

By 2020, smartphones will pretty much have displaced feature phones (though some large fraction of them may use WiFi for internet access) with around 80% of global population having one or more mobile internet devices.   And that's before considering any impact on demand from TheCoin being implemented - which might create demand for extremely cheap devices specifically for TheCoin distribution and use.

But suppose we wish to enable near global distribution of TheCoin now - as soon as the software can get written?  Phones at least capable of sending/receiving SMS are now in the hands of around 60% to 70% of global population.  SMS messaging can be gotten very cheaply, once one gets away from the absurd "Wireless Plan" SMS pricing in places like the US.

Can we leverage SMS to get going sooner, at least in areas where smartphone penetration is low and poverty is high?   

Instead of using GPS coordinates and photographs to reliably prove unique spatial identity, what if we use code exchanges between random recipients known to be in an area?    Each locale will have commonly known local places, which could be entered into TheCoin network and used to generate walking instruction messages to get random pairs of people to meet and exchange codes.  Once both parties have sent their codes, both would be sent directions to their next exchange point.    This system is slightly less reliable, in if anyone abandons their walk, they will break the chain of location proof for the person they were to meet.  A fall-back of allowing the abandoned person to try again with a location they haven't yet been to, should be sufficient to fix most of this.

The walking instructions might start with something like "Text back # of nearest location as starting point for TheCoin delivery:   1.Your Home.  2.Han's Bar.  3.Village well..."   That will set the baseline of persons who are ready to receive TheCoin, along with their location, allowing generation of pairs of persons to exchange codes at nearby locations.

A bit later each ready recipient would get a message like: "Your ID is 8253.  Go to Village well and find someone with ID 3549.  Give that person code 2967.  Message back the code they give you."  Etc.

After 3-5 locations and completed exchanges, TheCoins would be deposited to their accounts.  A total of about 8-12 (sent and received)  messages, probably costing less than 50 cents total.

So how might people attempt to cheat this system? 

They might collude to ignore directions and gather in a single spot to use multiple devices.  That won't work for large towns and cities, but could work for tiny villages with very few people, which nonetheless happen to have SMS mobile phone service, but not WiFi or mobile broadband.   Such places would tend to be poor - most people would have at most one device.  Any who have multiple devices would have to agree to pay each person they cheat with, to gain their cooperation.  So initially this would be a very tiny problem, benefiting the poorest, without having significant economic impact on TheCoin system overall. 

Still, it'd be necessary to counter it eventually.  Delays between code exchanges could be examined to look for odd variations in how long it takes recipients to get to exchange points.   When it appears that cheating has become rampant, indicating that most will have gotten enough income to purchase more than one device, it can be assumed that the villagers can now afford mobile internet devices and WiFi, and switch that region over to the standard system.  (Just knowing that this will happen will have some deterrent effect.) 

Note that this latter deterrent need only be implemented for the small fraction of the world's population living in tiny villages, so it is not a large added cost, and is a feature that can be added some time after TheCoin system has become globally established.

Then you're skrewed. Rolling this out will take beyond decades, just to marshall the resources that would be necessary to ensure that 90+% of the world's population have access to some device, power, signal, markets, goods, et cetera. Plus, the environmentalist wackos will fight you every step of the way--they don't seem to realize that 1st World countries are not going to give up their standard of living, which means significantly more resources (coal and oil 'cuz dey hate dat nuqulear stuff) will be expended to bring the entire population up to even a modicum of bare necessities.


This may be true now, but in the tens of decades it will take you to ever start setting The Plan, that won't be the case. Especially as I didn't really mean just DNA. It could just use all of the following: DNA, fingerprints, retinal scan, finger length ratios, et cetera. You'll be able to get the error/cheat rate to essentially zero.


Yep. Cost after cost after cost after cost. And you still haven't gotten to the earnings/mining issues.

Once a week would be enough, assuming weekly distribution of TheCoin.  Is a 3-5 minute walk once a week really that much to ask?   If someone thinks it is, maybe they don't need TheCoin distributions.   (Daily position checking was just an attempt to make life harder for those who will hire poorer people to collect TheCoin for them.  But on reflection, they'll mostly hire people who don't yet have their own wireless internet device, and it's better that those poor coin farmers get some income, than none.)


Honestly - I've previously considered and rejected a number of the most obvious options, including a real world verification organization. 

So far the unique spatial position test, backed by random real-time interactions with others who are also verifying their positional identity, is so far the simplest and quickest and best.  Yes, it still has flaws.  Not everyone has mobile internet (yet).  Until everyone can afford that, crooks can hire others to walk for them.  Not everyone could physically perform the "walk".  (Perhaps have randomly selected people verify the physical location of the disabled person as part of their own walks.)   

Hmmm - new names for TheCoin:  "Walkers".  Or  "Walkies".   
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TheCoin success depends on rapid roll-out.   Building up real world ID verification organizations would take too long - likely a decade to even get coverage of most major cities on Earth, decades to get close to universal coverage, even assuming no political interference.   In areas with thin or corrupt law enforcement, crooks would take over the local organizations.  Desire to maintain a good reputation is simply not a strong enough motivator - as evidenced by the many known instances of corrupt behavior in organizations, plus the larger number that go undetected.
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Biometrics sound good - but unique personal attributes are subject to high measurement error/variation.  A person could count on a slightly different digital representation from every capture.  Hash that, and you'll get a different hash every time - allowing multiple identity creation.   Attempts to eliminate those errors reduce the uniqueness of the measurements - creating higher likelihood of more than one person with the same ID code.

Consider DNA sequencing (though it will be too expensive, for several more decades, to be a practical global solution):   Even the best (expensive) sequencing has error rates of 1 in a million bases.  ("Cheap" methods, ~1 in 1000.)  For the ~3 billion bases in the human genome that's at least ~3000 errors per sequencing.   No two sequencings of a person's DNA are likely to ever give the same digital representation. 

One might imagine cleverly "averaging out" DNA sequencing errors somehow. But human DNA is 99.9% the same for everyone.  Blood relatives will be even more similar - perhaps only 1 in a million bases differing.  That's on the same order of magnitude of the best sequencing error.  Trying to eliminate the errors to get a repeatable digital representation, will map more than one person to the same digital representation, and hence to the same hash code "identity".   

CheapID is interesting for the privacy protection it aims to grant - but still subject to easy acquisition of fake IDs, as well as corruption of accreditation agencies.

I tried to come up with a solution based on Webs of Trust.  But a WoT is not as good at preventing a person from having multiple keys by getting different groups to verify trust in them.  Casual cheaters could probably be blocked by requiring them to inform their trust networks of their name, address, etc.  But a small group of cheaters could build their own sub-web of trust with a number of fake identities per real person.  The best counter I came up with for that was bounties for catching cheaters.  But that adds a lot of complexity for verification of cheater reports.   

Great discussion, but as brush242 says it would be far too messy to require proof-of-human work every single day.  A non-profit verification foundation makes more sense, and to avoid double-dipping/double-claiming it would need to base verification on a derivative of some unique identifying feature that cannot be changed.  I think there are three broad categories of such identifiers, all of them imperfect:

• Commercial identifiers (phone numbers, accounts on social networks)
• Government identifiers (passport metadata, tax/identity number etc)
• Biometrics (see CheapID for a proposal on this front)

The fourth way is to build a web of trust with crypto, check out OpenUDC project who have gone down that road.

Not clear to you, maybe.


No. UL is voluntary in the only sense of the word that matters: No one is forced to deal with them. Ever. You voluntarily choose to deal with them, or you choose not to deal with them.

Yes, their brand and reputation is a powerful motivator.


Your choice, of course, but no, it won’t limit anything really. If people want the coin, they will come to you willingly. Creating just such organizations is part of your process. That, or putting out specs and accepting bids.

 
You have no idea what it would cost to operate, but once again, yes there are costs involved in EVERYTHING. In this case, a one-time validation vs. doing a little dance or whatever you suggested every day. Who would pay for it? The people that come to get validated, because the cost (the fee) is greatly outweighed by the benefits (TheCoin).

As far as corruption, that is somewhat of an issue for anything humans create. But, as far as I understand crypto, OMIVA would take a cheek swab, blood, hair root, whatever for DNA. That DNA gets hashed, and along with the OMIVA key generated for each person, the result gets entered into whatever computer distributes the coin. The DNA insures each person can get only one code.


Meh. You’re arguing about human-created systems. If it was created by humans, it can likely be subverted by other humans. Billions has been spent on this problem. “What keeps field agents honest?” What keeps cops honest? What keeps bank auditors and accountants honest? What happens if a locksmith company or a bank is subverted from inside by a short-sighted crook - not necessarily the whole company, just someone with the right access controls - who doesn't care about Citibank’s or Huge Locksmith’s reputation, but just wants to grab a quick personal fortune and disappear?

What happens? You pick up the pieces, improve the system, and go from there.


I think it would be foolish to have a monopoly. Let different comers compete against each other for who can do it the best. Much like the costs for a phone are driven down by Motorola and HTC trying to crush each other.


By DNA, as I said above. The person who wants TheCoin will come supply it. A DNA hash and a unique code from the authority, hashed together to enter into the whatever system is distributing TheCoin.



Here it is. Here is the fundamental flaw that you don’t understand. This is the sticky wicket: Effort IS cost. Let me repeat that because it is a fundamental concept. Effort is cost because it costs you that effort to earn a benefit.

The only thing you have in this world to trade for what you want is effort (read labor). You trade your labor for what you want (most often, money). Every single aspect of everything everyone involved with your project does to set it up has a cost: their labor or effort and the opportunity costs of their choices.

This is why you make the claims you do. Somebody, through their labor, has to create all of the value that you wish to be distributed to others that did not earn it. Whether they earn dollars or BTC or rupees or Litecoin or whatever, it all has to be earned, first.

The connection of OMIVA to the proposal you sketched previously was not at all clear.  

I'll go into a lot of detail below to explain why what you have proposed is not simple, and far more expensive and susceptible to corruption than what I just proposed.  

But in essence, it sounds like you propose a "traditional" non-profit business version of the network organization I previously proposed trying to implement via network-distributed tasks.  I set that aside as possible but more complex than I would like.  

OMIVA would find the identification task just as complex, but would also be slower to get started, more expensive to operate, and less likely to provide sufficient internal cross-checking to prevent corruption, than the network organization I previously suggested.

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So your proposed OMIVA model is analogous to Underwriters Laboratory.  

UL is voluntary only in the sense that their customers voluntarily seek their inspection and stamp of approval - it does not provide free services.   It is a trusted brand/mark only because consumers understand that UL's future income rests on maintaining their reputation as a trusted inspector.  

UL has relatively few customers compared to the potential global 'market' for TheCoin distributions - so the size of organization you are proposing is necessarily much larger.   Creating such a global organization from scratch would not be quick or easy, which would be a major limiting factor on spread of TheCoin distributions.  

It would also cost a lot to create and operate.   Who would pay for OMIVA?  That is - what future business might they lose if they became corrupt and started validating false identities in return for a 50% cut?  

If it is the identity-verified coin recipient, and OMIVA is corrupted anyhow, what happens to all the people who had honestly gotten verified by them?  Do we discard their identities and make them to pay for new ID verification?   Even if TheCoin recipients somehow don't have to pay for the service, they might be cut out of the distribution until a replacement validation organization gets around to re-validate them.

What happens if OMIVA is subverted from inside by a short-sighted crook - not necessarily the whole company, just someone with the right access controls - who doesn't care about OMIVA's reputation, but just wants to grab a quick personal fortune and disappear?  What keeps its field agents honest?   High pay perhaps?

Does OMIVA have a monopoly, or would there be multiple ID agencies?  If it is only OMIVA, the disruption of any corruption would be universal and massive.  If there are multiple competitors, the likelihood/frequency of corruption increases even if they are all somehow qualified.  If anyone can start a validation company with no qualification process, you are pretty much guaranteed that crooks will jump into the business.  And if there are multiple agencies, what prevents someone from creating a different fake ID with each?

Which brings us to the question of how OMIVA agents verify personal and unique identity.  

- By residence?  What if someone moves and doesn't tell OMIVA, but goes to a new OMIVA agent in their new town to create a second identity for a double distribution?  What if a group of 4 friends share two addresses under 8 different names to get double identities through two different OMIVA agents? (Lying to landlords and other potential witnesses and spending time in both places to create a convincing facade)?   Does OMIVA check up on people at frequent random intervals (increasing its expenses)?  How can it tell if those 4 friends have other names and another address, if they spend time at both addresses?

- By Government issued ID?  What about places that have none?  There are also those who will produce good fake IDs for a fee.  Also, a big part of TheCoin system is an attempt to end-run around dependence on and limitations of governments.

Etc.  


Effort is not cost.  As for whether TheCoin is worth the opportunity cost - that would be for each potential TheCoin recipient to decide.  For someone unemployed with zero income, I think I know the answer.

No. (Well, yes, I made it up as an example). Look here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=430364.msg5389223;topicseen#msg5389223 But very briefly: You set up a non-profit association whose only purpose is to validate that people are who they say they are. 100% voluntary.


No, you either did not read it, or you forgot that you read it. The specifics are simple. I wasn't vague, and I gave you a real-world example.


It increases costs because people a) have to do something, and b) that something seems like a pain. Plus opportunity costs.

I'm sorry, I don't see where you have said any such thing.  Those terms don't show up except in your latest post when I search all Bitcoin Forum, nor in the obvious Google searches.   

Are you just making up this "OMIVA" term to describe your previous unsupported claim that this is actually an easy problem to solve?  Or is this something real that I just can't seem to find?

Describe a real proposal, or provide a link to it, so we can evaluate it.   I'll be happy if it does turn out to have a simple solution, but so far you've only made a vague claim that it is possible, not any specifics of how it would be done.

In the meantime, it appears that you agree that my proposal could work adequately.  I don't see how it increases cost at all (and relative to what?), though it does mean that the effort required is more than zero - maybe half an hour a week to collect TheCoin, plus some other light activity (TBD) to earn the coins.   

Keep in mind that all you're doing with all these schemes is driving up the cost of using this system.

Like I said, the easiest and more accurate would be the Oddballcoin Minimum Income Verification Association. The OMIVA would just verify people and issue them some part of a crypto system.

"You can't be in two places at the same time."

Suppose TheCoin was distributed at a specific time of day (say local solar noon for every degree of longitude).  Each potential recipient would need to undertake a few actions that take a few minutes, that they could not in general physically do with two or more devices.

For example, they might have one minute in which to log in, after which they would receive a series of instructions directing them to a random series of positions reachable by walking for a few minutes total (by which time the password entry and start walking window would be long over).  Sometimes they would be directed to take a picture in a specified direction.  Sometimes they would meet someone else and exchange random codes to be entered into their devices.  Etc.

Some would attempt to get around this by hiring poorer people to do it for them (similar to gold farming).  One way to reduce the value of this, would be to only pay out TheCoin randomly, averaging once a week.  Anyone who wants to hire others to do this would have to hire them for every day of the week, even though they only get TheCoin once a week on average.  (Longer term, the problem is mostly solved as networked mobile devices get common and cheap enough for all - why do it for someone else? )

In addition to the above control on distribution, TheCoin system might require some small amount of work to earn the distribution, such as running a light weight server, or doing mechanical turk things such as examining photos to verify they were taken where claimed, or show a person matching a photo of the person who claimed to be there at a specific time.

Oh come on now, it's a fun discussion. And it's really hard to come to terms with an idea as specific as "minimum income" fitting into a decentralized cryptocurrency system. However...


If you can broaden your definition of minimum income, you might be interested in discussing the Decrits proposal: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.1960697. It does not describe anything exactly like a minimum income, but it does have properties that are similar, and it is in development.

If you invest enough, you can 

We are discussing precisely that. My position is that it cannot be done via an altcoin system, hence we discuss.

No, I understand quite well, and yes, I did read your paper.

"Any human being instinctively uses this sort algorithm on a daily basis, as well as the path of least resistance algorithm but for computers we must take the actions human beings do in ordinary life, turn them into algorithms and then translate those algorithms into computer code."

This is just cost/benefit analysis, which is what humans do with every single decision they make, no matter how small.

Your paper sounds nice, just like Social Security sounds nice: "we're just asking everyone to pay their fair share to help those less-fortunate." Except, well, in practice it has been almost the dead worst investment ever; it takes an enormous amount of personal income, thus acts as a disincentive to productive work; and it has given the government a further tool to mislead the populace and devalue money.

Beyond that? Well, I'll just mention one here. If you actually create some sort of non-owned autonomous entity, someone else is going to take it away from you.

This thread takes it as a given that a basic or minimum income would be desirable and effective, and asks if it can be done via an altcoin system, and if so, how best to do that.
I understand that some of you don't agree, but that is no reason to effectively DOS attack this thread with an off-topic discussion.

There are other discussion threads covering the topic of whether technological unemployment is possible or not,  and whether a basic/guaranteed income is desirable. 
Why not take that discussion there?   

Here's one:  https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=318001.460

How do you define labor though? Playing WoW is labor if the coins in WoW can be spent to buy real world items.

The difference is people will be able to do what they want to do because the basic necessities are free. Very few people will choose to do nothing at all except maybe drug addicts, depressed persons, etc.

The people who are depressed or with drug problems is not the vast majority. So as the vast majority has more free time then we will have more art and people playing sports, games, and other kinds of jobs. Work will be between 10-20 hours a week because no one really needs to work more than that and productivity doesn't improve working more than that unless you're trying to start a business and there is literally no one else to do it.

Getting a job doesn't make you rich. This isn't about rich and poor really. Every human being costs x amount of resources and has to be accounted for one way or the other. Basic income allows the human being to develop their skills, educate themselves and live up to their potential while prison, poverty and some of the other options only suppress human potential.

The idea I have is to use a dividend based around shares in DACs. DACs don't become profitable without any work. If you are going to use 3d printers or develop cool new products you have to be very creative. Artists have to design and render the product. Marketing campaigns have to be developed. It's not as simple as just giving people money and expecting value to generate itself, instead tools have to be built to facilitate value creation.

And value isn't created by a useless 9-5 but by innovation and production.
It's not entirely a choice if we aren't giving people a better option. If it's impossible to get rich, and easier to go to jail, then people will take welfare. If there is basic income instead of welfare then if people want more than just the minimum then they'll have to create value by making something new or doing something important.

Most jobs people have today are not important, don't make anything new, and will soon be automated. What happens next?
Machines will do that, so what happens next? You're not thinking of the big picture are you?
How do you make a job without investors? How do you have investors without people who have enough saved?
Crowd funding allows anyone to become an investor in anyone else. If everyone in the community is a shareholder and anyone can crowd fund anything then there is plenty of money for people who want to start a business to make jobs.

But in order for people to have money to invest they need basic income because you can't invest if you can't eat or pay rent. People who you think should mow your lawn are people I think should be investors and shareholders.


Long term poverty is a choice? So you know the secret to getting rich and if everyone follows those steps then everyone can do it? I don't think the situation is that simple. You ignore technological unemployment and the effects of automation. People just aren't all that useful for labor anymore.

So if the machines will be doing the labor what should the people who don't want to live poor do? They should own shares in the machines which do the labor. Bitcoin shows the way, let the computer mine for you.

If we are talking about virtual communities then most of these categories of division do not have to exist. If they do exist because it's a separatist community then the separatists have the right to exclusively associate and assist only other separatists. I don't see how it's my business to interfere with these matters whether or not I agree with it.

I don't think you can force a community to support a group of people financially who they don't want to support without initiating force against them. If you're asking about security issues and the use of force that is an area I cannot cover or be involved with but if you're asking about technology to give people the choice to form their own communities in any fashion they like then I can discuss it from a technological and politically agnostic perspective.


Shares are capital assets. It's not a ponzi scheme to distribute capital assets which appreciate over time. It's not a ponzi scheme to use a dividend to give out basic income. As businesses in the community generate a profit by providing products and services of value they'll have money to give back to shareholders in the form of a dividend. That is not a ponzi scheme, a pyramid scheme, or anything else. No one has to be coerced, it's entirely voluntary and government force does not have to be used so there is no class warfare agenda in my plan.


You don't understand because you did not read my white paper. Dividends are not free money. Dividends are given to shareholders only if the business is profitable. Businesses which fail don't produce any dividends.

Distributing shares isn't the same as "free money" because shares alone aren't worth anything until people make the businesses profitable.

It is like any other incentive system with money, just more direct and obvious. The government can and does do this all the time. Production gets geared towards where the money is. And basic necessities production generally does not require much skilled labor, so it would be easier to employ those who are currently relying on government hand-outs anyway, and thus create a self-sustaining system that lowers unemployment and poverty.

Certainly it will take value away at least initially from some other sectors--but when the financial sector really adds very little net value to the economy yet possesses such a large percentage of it, you have to wonder if the current incentive system is flawed. I mean, isn't that why we're on bitcointalk.org?


I said Star Trekkian utopia because it isn't a perfect utopia and there probably never will be. But at some point we've got to realize that doing what we can to raise the opportunity level for all humans to contribute to society will bring far greater returns than the temporary control of keeping the status quo. Actually, you don't, it's going to happen whether you want it to or not because cryptocurrency does give us the tools to try other things and see what works without waiting for the approval of those in control.