Topic: Re: My letter to my U.S. Senators regarding Bitcoin (Read 1685 times)

FTFY.


You're way overestimating the influence that government will have over  virtual currency. They could not stop it if they tried. They'll likely not have much luck attempting to restrain it at all. Eventually, it will erode the power structure from beneath their feet until they are completely impotent. Somewhere along the line they may try to stop it or change its course but they will surely fail.




You just don't get fairness.

Bitcoin has leveled the playing field.



What's not fair is a monopoly game where one guy has a copy machine and can just print off as much play money as he needs.

What's fair is a monopoly game where somebody got a lucky chance at the start of the game to buy the most valuable properties, recognized that chance, took it, and won the game.

So don't whine about how somebody already bought all the best properties and say you think we should distribute them all equally, or quit the game moaning about how it's not fair, instead thank the guy, because he just kicked out the asshole with the copy machine, and there are still some good properties left, so hell, you might get second or third place.


By the way, your letter to the senator made my stomach curl and my face scrunch up in ugly expressions of distaste. I had to restrain my imagination for I surely would have vomited if I had actually visualized the senator reading it. If I had attempted to imagine that I was the senator and read it from his perspective, mentally modeling what his thoughts and reactions might be, I would surely suffer from cardiac arrest from the sheer obscene vulgarity of leading my imagination to such filthy corners of the world. I dare not even imagine what would become of me if I attempted to put myself in your shoes and imagine what a horribly twisted, incoherent world-view would lead one to write the phrases and have the ideas that you have put forth in that letter.

In conclusion I would like to say that while there is a ever-so-slight chance that your logical faculties are functioning, you are clearly operating with one or more faulty premise. Possibly a great many of them.

I had similar concerns here https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/bitcoin-distribution-vs-bitcoin-adoption-325663
Still not 100% confortable about that.

Who give a fuck about a governmental bitcoin copy. It's a good thing if they are late for the party.

OP, you'd better send this proposal to North Korean government. They love fairly and evenly distributing everything.

I'll just leave this here... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lu_VqX6J93k

I'm pretty sure you may be looking for freicoin (FRC). Each coin over a period of time is sent back  "into the soup" of the mining sector, which means that you can't just hoard freicoins without your investment eventually losing value.

Personally I have no problems at all with bitcoin, even though I personally don't currently hold any (I have 0.15 btc to my name, I had at one point 650 of them but sold them all at $10 each for a 2 dollar exchange profit.)

The people that made the protocol and put faith in bitcoin during the dark years of 2011-2013 have well deserved their fortune, I only wish I was in a better position to not have had to sell my 650 coins for tuition, but such is life.

There is nothing wrong with discovering something first and being able to make money off that fact, that's how life works. Even if you could distribute a single "happycoin" to every single person on the planet, whats the point? I don't get it? wheres the value there? If anyone actually valued these coins, the only way to make more was to make more people, do you really want to overpopulate the planet? You may want to take a doubletake at what your theorizing before you clutter your senators inbox.

OP, how is it unfair that early adopters get to keep their bitcoins? These are people who were savvy enough to research a new technology and bet on it. I prefer that a single early adopter have thousands of bitcoins than an extra few thousand people each having one bitcoin. Not only do they deserve them because they helped to boost bitcoin's prominence, but they are far more likely to put their bitcoins to good use being that they understand the market so much better.

Furthermore, it will completely destroy any incentive for new adopters to research bitcoin, especially in comparison to its competitors, and determine which currency is best.

I do not want a national currency, but I cannot think of a way to create a block chain in which there is an authority that can enforce an even distribution of the initial set of coins without a government to enforce it.  If you can think of a way to have a block chain that intrinsically distributes the coins over everyone in the world (so that everyone starts out even, you can make your fortune with your skill and luck after that), without requiring a government to enforce the distribution, by all means, please tell me, I would adopt that proposal over my own.

I get where you're coming from. You want bitcoin, but you also want a regional currency, you want to be able to freely exchange one for the other (maybe pay property tax, buy corporate certifications, etc), I get it.

Right now however, is not the right time to do this. The senator you'll be sending this along to barely can understand what a bitcoin is let alone "hey lets make a US coin wooh!" This could be disasterous for bitcoin adoption.

I personally would like to see a one currency world with only bitcoin as it suits the needs of everyone sans the government itself, however realistically I see multiple cryptocurrencies, some run by governments, and this could certainly happen in the long run.

Nationalism aside, do you have any other reasons for wanting a regional currency rather than a borderless, non-descriminate, inflationless (nearly) single currency?

No, my thick headed friend, if I had thought that people born after a certain date should get a share of the virtual currency, I would have said that.  If you're born after the cutoff date, you are, just as for every other aspect of your young life, dependent upon your parents to provide the resources that you need.  You will inherit your 'share' of the virtual currency that was awarded back in 2013 from them.  If they leave you nothing, well, you should have picked better parents ...

If the U.S. government accepts bitcoin as legal tender, then they are in essence awarding a very large amount of money to the bitcoin early adopters.  On the other hand, it seems inevitable that the government will have to eventually accept some form of virtual currency.  I am simply proposing a way for the government to create a form of virtual currency for the use by U.S. citizens which does not START OUT biased towards early adopters.

I do realize that most people on this forum will be hostile to this idea because they'd rather be rich than fair; but I am hoping that there are other like minded people who will contribute meaningfully to the discussion.

And there is something you may never heard of before called "letting the perfect be the enemy of the good."  My proposal is not perfect so arguing against the places where it is not perfect and could not be made perfect is pointless; but my proposal is better than bitcoin, at least from the average person's perspective.  There are alot of people who have never heard of bitcoin and I really think it would be lame to start out a new virtual currency already putting them at a disadvantage when we have the capability to do things fairly instead.  Alot of things that happened in the past and could be considered analogues of bitcoin (gold etc) didn't really have a planning period or a technical basis that could have allowed it to start out fairly.  But virtual currency does.  There is no reason whatsoever that the U.S. Government couldn't start their own block chain and only accept transactions from that block chain as valid legal tender.  NONE AT ALL.

+100

@bji, may I suggest you read Currency Wars book by James Rickards. It will open your eyes. Be warned, though, you will never think of government the same way again.

good one

translation

the major problem with the U.S dollar is that you were born in the late 20th century and you did not personally get rich during the gold era, now you see alot of rich people hoarding billions of dollars and you are stuck in a minimum wage job...

this is the same argument you see a child have, that his older brother learned to walk and talk before he did. im sorry that you didnt get there first, but for atleast 100 years you still have a chance to make your life successful, dont blame your elders for getting there first

ya, i don't think anyone is taking you seriously since you obviously haven't thought everything through from every aspect except that every US citizen should have the same amount.
right, what about newborns do they get this virtual currency too? or it's a one off thing that benefits people who are alive in 2015 at the expense of those born afterwards. or does everyone get a coin in perpetuity. if not in perpetuity your whole argument is moot.
you haven't thought your arguments through well.

the distribution of bitcoins people may not agree with but your proposal is in no way better

i feel bad if a senator really does get that letter. they are confused enough as it is!

Well dude, with a tinfoil hat that thick, I am not sure any reason could get through.  But thanks for your contribution!

I do realize that this is a pretty bad forum for reasonable discussion, being roughly half full of get-rich-quick schemers just hoping that their post will influence the bitcoin market in a way to make them money, and the other half being tinfoil hat wearers ... but I am hoping for just a little signal in the noise.

You don't seem to understand the current monetairy system and why exactly it has been put in place and by whom.

The current US monetairy system is set up in such a way, as to enslave it's citizens in debt. They won't implement anything other than that.

Thank you for a reply that actually has some worthwhile content!

I agree that the U.S. government does not perfectly represent the interests of all citizens equally, but it's the best thing we've got now, and like it or not, it decides what is legal tender for transactions with itself, and to a large degree, between private individuals.  Therefore it must establish some policy with regards to virtual currency, which is why there are Senate hearings now.  The only remaining question is, what policy will it establish?

It can choose to accept Bitcoin as legal tender.  Then it will have essentially pre-assigned a large amount of the currency to those people who created bitcoin or heard about it early, which is a very, very small fraction of the U.S. population.  That just seems inherently unfair to me.   I think it's much better to act on behalf of all citizens - which is the point of the government, isn't it - and ensure the fairest possible scheme from the outset.  Hence my proposal.

The early adopters of Bitcoin are already rich, or at least well rewarded, according to the timeliness and veracity of their participation.  I don't feel too badly about cutting off their cash cow now, leaving them with the profits they have, and moving on to a better system that is fairer for everyone.

Also your comments equating these U.S. virtual currency coins with Bitcoins and saying that I should just give away my Bitcoins because they are the same as the coins I propose and thus I would end up with only 0.3 of these new coins instead of the 1.5 bitcoins I have unfortunately indicate that you are either deliberately or inadvertently being obtuse.

Finally, you don't know me.  I don't care that much about being rich, I value certain things alot more than money, the future of my country and fairness to all citizens being more important to me.  I am not writing to my Senator because I am angry that I didn't get to be a Bitcoin millionaire.  I am writing because I want the best for everyone, not just myself.

* Because we all know that the US government doesn't squander money...
* Some would argue (including myself) that fairly and evenly are not the same thing, and furthermore what is "fair?"
* Because we all know that the US government does not effectively legislate monopoly privileges...

It sounds like you are mad that you came late to the party and that you wish you would have bought more a year or more ago, who doesn't?

Assuming a 21 mililon coin cap (which would never happen because the government has an incentive to inflate). With your scheme, assuming there are 350 million people in the US, each person would receive 0.03 coins, which is significantly less than the current amount you now hold. So unless your argument is that you should have less coins than your current holdings, I don't understand your argument. And, if you are arguing that you want less coins than your current holdings, please give everything except 0.03 bitcoins to me.

Absolutely everything that you said can be said about Bitcoin also.  So I don't know why you are even here if you don't accept the fundamental tenents of what makes a virtual currency like Bitcoin viable.

No one else in the world has to use this currency.  But by making it the only virtual legal tender acceptable by the U.S. Government, it will have an immediate legitimacy.  Once people start paying for government services with it, it will have value and an infrastructure.

I am not sure that everyone understands my proposal.  My proposal is that the exact same protocol (ok well maybe with some very minor tweaks to the block schedule) as Bitcoin be used for this.  The only difference is in the initially seeded block chain.  Instead of Satoshi getting it all, and then the early adopters of Bitcoin getting a huge chunk of the rest ... it starts out fairly distributed to all U.S. citizens.

Also as to an earlier poster's point, I am not calling this Bitcoin.  I don't think I have ever called it Bitcoin, although it uses the exact same protocol.  I call it the U.S. government legal virtual tender, of course they'd have to come up with a better name.

Anyway, I'm done replying to naysayers without any actual technical input to give.  I'll be back when someone has something interesting, relevent, and informed to say.  Thanks.

who is paying you and how much for this nonsense?

It's the same software man.  It's just a new initially seeded block chain.  YES, you have to trust to government to follow its own laws and give out the coins according to the schedule that it proposes when it creates the chain.  But you already have to trust them for just about everything already, don't you?  And even then, you don't actually have to USE your U.S. virtual coin if you don't want to.  Anyone who doesn't want to participate doesn't have to use the coins at all.  But you won't have any other way to conduct virtual coin transactions with the government since it would be the only virtual currency they would accept.  But that's OK, once all of the non-paranoid people have actually started using the currency for years, you'll eventually accept it too.