Bitcoin Forum

A few disputes broke out over the last several weeks in area such as bankruptcy and suspected scamming. We don't have definite laws or procedure on how to deal with trespassers or processing evidence yet.

But I think a couple of details is emerging as far as law goes:

1. Bankrupted person will defer all payments to creditors and wronged parties for the amount that was owned.

2. Those who are suspected of scamming but protest their innocence could pay a 'fine' in case of damning evidence.

Those these laws are not definite as it need some more iteration and more testing to make it work.

I would give it a couple of 'court cases' before something good emerge.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I put forth this link, which I believe is relevant:
The Common economic protocols (http://cep.metropipe.net/)

The main thing I'd like to point out here is: Any arbitration must take place with the prior consent of  all parties involved. Anything else is tyranny.

Uhm, why the hell would I pay a fine if I’m innocent, just because someone is accusing me? If I’m found to be guilty, I should pay back everything plus a fine though.

The evidence was pretty damning but people offer to forget it. Nothing really happens so we don't know if that's a good law, not to mention we need several court cases to determine if it is a good law in the first place.

And about the first rule there, who will be giving the money if the person who owns money doesn't have any anymore?

No-one. The bankrupt party suffers a loss of trust.

Bad phrasing:

Bankrupted person will defer all payments to creditors and wronged parties.

Do you refer to the case of the Russian scammer? Yeah, I think he should pay at least back everything (30 BTC left), as he’s either guilty or deeply involved with the guy who is. But I don’t know how you would want to determine guiltiness. By votes maybe?

I approve of the rephrased rule 1 by the way.

Who is allowed to vote?

Everyone? On what basis would you exclude anyone from voting?

I personally think the guilty party should be required to give up their favourite goat to the victims.

In my opinion, only the arbitrator in this case is allowed to make a decision after explaining his reasoning in a case essay.

Of course, you guys are welcome to try different systems such as democratic decision making, letting outsiders choose, and so on.

What if some people ganged up and accused an innocent on an obscure matter? The way the first post is written sounds like guilty till paid otherwise....

Who's gonna be enforcing these kangaroo courts? And how would you propose that enforcement to be achieved with a money system that is designed for anonymity and no control of already performed transactions?

You mean a convoluted super-tricky plot against an innocent user where we have to craft credible evidence? Do you think Kiba is a socialpath and decide to be evil and accuse a more vulnerable member of the community for defrauding another user? What's up with that?

Anyway, nobody is going to be enforcing anything other than seeing people voluntary following the laws.

There's no way to enforce said laws, given the nature of Bitcoin. How do you prevent the person from using other addresses? Other email accounts? Other IPs? Without a face-to-face system, or extensive tracking resources, I can't see a way that the rules will do anything but create friction in the system that would slow down any resolutions that would have happened anyway.

Look, we have the benefit of hindsight and the ability to use the English common law system as we see fit! We have access to all the other law system in the world such as Icelandic law system. Not to mention we have access to scientific field such as game theory!

Secondly, we're a bunch of geeks who have not even specialized in much of anything yet. We don't even have a chance of constructing much of our laws yet! There are some geeks who really have an aptitude and the mindset necessary to construct a law system.

Thirdly, we can't use violence and coercion on the internet.

Lastly, we live in a global society. It's not just the anglo-saxon sphere, but also the Germanic, Italian, and Russian sphere! Don't forget the Asians too! How do we construct a law system that encompass the globe?

These laws are meaningless if you can not enforce them. You'd be hard pressed to bring a court case against an anonymous internet person. (Yes, anonymity is difficult, but that's a different discussion.) This is why the idea of web-of-trust etc. has been put to use in the Bitcoin community. If you can not rely on conventional legal means to enforce fair play, you come up with something else. Here, reputation is king. What is being discussed now is a way to make that reputation contingent on fair behaviour without descending into mob rule. I think it's a matter that has to be resolved. The solution doesn't have to be a full-blown legal system in the sense anyone living in a western society thinks of it. In fact, it shouldn't be that complex, it needs to be readily understandable by anyone. We just need to find common ground for dispute resolution so everyone can have an expectation of being treated fairly by the Bitcoin community at large.

You are free to use or not use any of the law system or even none at all. Nobody is forcing it upon you to use any of these system. Perhaps, it may be rather unnecessary 99% of the time.

But isn't the point of a law system to enforce the rules upon those who don't want to follow them? To prevent behaviors that the majority (or at least those in power) deem unacceptable? To have an opt-in law system is, frankly, silly as the only people that will pay attention to it are the ones who will follow it. Without the ability to extend the reach of the law system to those who don't want to be a part of it, the law system just creates busywork, friction, and annoyances.

The law system that create busywork, fiction, and annoyance are unnecessary and will be phrased out of the market.

We are talking about a system that form organically on how to arbitrate dispute and reduce the amount of dispute that could happens. That's all it is. We are not prescribing laws but trying to explain laws as people agree on.

Not necessarily. If you want to take advantage of voluntary arbitration, you will state that you will only do business under the condition that other parties will accept some set of rules and a method of arbitration. If they refuse, you take that as a sign they're not trustworthy and refuse to do business with them. Someone else may do business without any prior agreement regarding arbitration, but in doing so they accept they have no real recourse against being scammed, except to try to pit their word against that of the scammer.

Overall I'm starting to think arbitration is not the big issue here. It's proving you've been wronged that needs to be figured out. For physical goods, registered shipping is a good start. What about other types of trade? If someone was to claim an exchange operator was acting dishonestly, what kind of proof could they provide for their claims? What kind of transparency could an exchange provide to make it possible for users to make their case if dispute arises?

Ah, you're talking arbitration. That's very different from a set of laws. You're talking guidelines that two (or more) parties could use to settle disputes they have regarding Bitcoin transaction. Just a semantic problem then, sorry.

I'd be interested in hearing any concrete objections you could voice. I get the feeling we're not exactly on the same page here. I'm envisioning something very simple and limited in scope. Maybe the terminology used makes it sound more complex than it is?

I'd also like to see what you say the nonsense is. I know I was confused. I don't pretend to have any background in legal systems. My only experience with the legal system (outside of traffic tickets) was being in the middle of a bankruptcy, and having a friend who is a paralegal.

I was just thinking about private law the other day. Bob Murphy has some good articles on it, this being one http://mises.org/daily/1874 (http://mises.org/daily/1874). Also, For A New Liberty and The Ethics of Liberty are two good books by Murray Rothbard that discuss state-less law.

The key to success is cooperation, not coercion.

Naive? Is saying "we don't know until the laws are worked out" over time naive?

Well, what do you even mean by "law"? Laws, outside of scientific usage, are rules set down by a higher authority that you are to follow. Fundamental in law is that it is enforced.

While it is true that "we don't know the until the laws are worked out", it is also true that there are no laws until some group of us decides on what they are, and threatens anyone breaking them with punishment, which we will deliver. A law is simply not a law unless there is some thug ready to hand out punishment and the community at large agrees that they are not going to stop him.

I paint it in bleak, simplistic terms but, thats what a law is in the end. Certainly it sounds as if I dislike the very concept of law (and I do bear it some contempt) but, there are certainly a number of shall we say "evil deeds" which the law proihibits and for which, I am more than happy to turn a blind eye too (or even to cheer now and again.... ) also, being a city dweller, I must admit, there probably is some usefulness to some amount of the regulations that are used to keep things running smoothly and neighbors from each others throats.

In any case, I don't see any of us forming a band of thugs, ready to track people down and hand out justice. So.... certainly we can discuss codes of conduct and ethical behaviour, where those things intersect and diverge from the laws of various lands that we may or may not be in, but.... to actually think we are going to make any sort of law.... well... you have to have an organization to have law within it.

It would also be quite legitimate to question how one would institute social systems which encourage ethical behavior and protect its members (and/or others) from the bad actors that will crop up from time to time. Things like.... I don't know.... credit rating agencies? Bonding? ;) not law, but, in a way can serve similar ends, and are much more productive to discuss.

Wikipedia said:


Obviously, we cannot enforce the law through violence and coercion. However, it doesn't mean that enforcement is impossible. For example, reputation destruction means the loss of economic power in the global bitcoin economy. So one must follow procedures and judgement to be considered "trustworthy".

Anybody who starts with a low reputation will be accorded with low economic power.

Think of it this way: anarcho-capitalists condemn coercion, but it doesn't mean that we think rules and guidelines shouldn't exists.

This is not going to happen thankfully.  There will be no Bitcoin law. 

Who would pay to run and enforce it?  Then we would have Bitcoin tax. 

At most we could have an opt-in (and I would not need to for my purposes) credit reporting system, but even that is blown easily with people just making new addresses. 

We already have an informal form of bitcoin law enforcment at the moment. There were vigilanties in that russian scam backup program case, they wen't after him and got most of the BTC back.

There is the case currently being dealt with by MTGOX, the accused has had their funds frozen.

Tools, protocols, and frameworks are being developed and worked on now to help solve these problems and keep scammers out.

We don't exactly need (or have) police, but if a scammer finds that no one will do any business with them and they can't use any bitcoin related services well that is enforcement enough for me, and for most people I think too.

People are still thinking of laws in term of nation-states and violent enforcement.

Exactly, and that's just not possible here. We enfource our "laws" by boycotting a person. If someone can't do business with bitcoins, they have effectively been thrown out of the bitcoin community.

In effect, that is a lifetime ban from the bitcoin economy. The result of that would be to concentrate the economic power of those with a reputation at the expense of everyone else.

It's all fun and game until somebody get hurt.

With all the anonymity stuff, how can you ban someone?

We can't.

I theorize that trust/reputation = economic power. An anonymous person with no history have very little power. He will have to work hard.

Suppose, if there's a bunch of people deciding not to cooperate, the bitcoin economy would shift the balance of power to the very well trusted. This is a security problem.

When somebody decide to sue someone in a "real" court of law. That's going to be damaging to the international bitcoin economy just like paypal suspending mtgox's account and making it clear that paypal is not trusted.

The worst case scenario is that people will no longer deal with someone unless that someone is a friend of a friend.

Like I said, it's all fun and game until somebody get hurt.

Working on that.

The way "laws" work is by every honest member agreeing to not associate with or do business with anyone who has earned a bad reputation.  Doing business with those who have a bad reputation is a way to earn a bad reputation.  No one needs to "enforce" at gun point anything for this to work. 

All that is needed is a P2P web of trust and the ability to "earn trust".  An ID can be anonymous, yet trusted if it has a known history of honest dealings.

Giving anyone or any group the "power" to enforce (point a gun) rules they came up with upon threat of force is simple tyranny.   The only way to keep a good reputation is to settle things quickly with everyone, or voluntarily submit to arbitration and then obey the decision.  Failure to submit to arbitration is like filing bankruptcy and no one will give you "credit". 

In reality, all systems of "trust" are just systems of "credit" and if you cannot get "credit" it is hard to do business.

Then you let peoples "profit" motive keep them in line.

Finally once everyone has been refunded their losses, a person should be re-enstated.  This is to motivate people to "make things right".

Rule #1) No one shall use the threat of force against anyone else in any case (except immediate self defense).

Then the "good laws" will develop organically, and the "bad laws" will simply be ignored. 

I think the use of coercive enforcement apparatus will be allowed to be used against would-be murderers.

I also presume that that terrestrial lawsuit can be met with terrestrial lawsuit as retaliation.

Which is to basically say, the upper limit of force is established by the aggressor. Even so, the use of force will still be a rare event.

Which is to say, even if somebody scammed or stole some money from me, I won't do a terrestrial lawsuit. Such lawsuit could only occurs in the circumstance of somebody suing me in a terrestrial jurisdiction.

Prior to law, moreover here the Civil Code, we must settle the Principle - on Earthling meanings, the "constitution". Under which principle we create a rule, under which principle it may be applicable, to which reasonably and extent.

Putting this to words on a first initial draft:

#1 Principle of Decentralization

No one can claim to "own the Bitcoin" or the "Bitcoin word", nor require any fee under such behalf, it belongs to everyone who uses them as a payment method for trade.

#2 Principle of Free Market

No Bitcoin market can be accepted as part of any country's financial and economical regulations. It's a currency to the World not to a specific country.

#3 Principle of Distribution

Bitcoins are naturally distributed by the miners according to the processing power they add to the mesh and by the randomness thereby generated.

...

BTW, the "enforcing system" used so far is "e-Thug like"; we've to think this over, maybe a way to "taint coins", eg. by mark stolen transaction hashes on some site.

A Common Economic Protocol?

ReleaseCandidate-Alpha-0.0.1

Principle are not made: they are discovered.

From the Diamond Age, eh?

Whoa, wait a moment.

I thought this community is about the currency itself. Since when are we lawyers ? Since when can we be judge and prosecutor of anyone ?
Shouldn't warning about scammers be the maximum we do ?

Also, there is a lot of anarchists/minarchists/libertarians here - do you think they will approve any kind of such procedure ?

This might help.

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Smart_contracts

Caveat emptor, as they say...

I think perhaps a trust Database should be established... Sure, you can just start back from scratch if you screw someone over, but you're starting back from scratch, and everyone is going to be a little bit wary of people with 0 trust.

I can't get behind a guilty before proven innocent system, sorry.

I set up a wiki for people to come up with a legal system to agree on.
I'm not an expert on anything (government, legal, coding...) and the information started is only a seed, that can grow and change as anyone sees fit.

Some people need a legal system to fall back on, others do not.  Those who do not need it, still follow some type of rule wether it is written or not.  

The goal is global, i think I've set it too high, it can be used as something to fall back on after an overthrown government.  Something to assist in the take down of a tyrannical government.  Something everyone on earth can agree on, that can be adjusted quickly, and its activities are open to anyone.

http://opticbit.com/phpwiki

Yeah, shouldn't PGP web of trust or something similiar be everything we need?
I am generally against of the community creating some kind of "bitcoin law" & legal system. Isn't warning against spammers/scammers/thiefs/griefers etc. enough ?

Anyway, how to punish somebody over the internet for doing something bad ? How to force him to pay ? "Bitcoin law" seems weird idea to me.

I don't think anything more is being proposed. But how do you make sure someone is a scammer? In a community where reputation is king, false accusations are a very serious matter. This is why we need arbitration services. Using them must be voluntary, but it would probably help to have a basic contract of sorts written up that people can refer to. Common ground that you can deviate from if all parties agree.

I feel like I'm just repeating what I said on the first page now.

Government is ok when you opt in voluntarily. The trouble is they never let you opt out and you are forced to pay whether you use the 'service' or not.

Who's talking about government?

We are (including yourself), kind of. If you haven't noticed.

Yes, but there's a need for guidelines, a set of laws or rules can't go erratically or done-as-we-go.

No, I haven't noticed, unless you're using a very broad definition of government. I'm talking about drafting a contract base for people to use in their trades and letting them decide for themselves how/if they want to make sure both parties conform. There is no top-down element. In fact, I'd argue this would be less of a government than what we currently have here as it would hopefully reduce the mob rule aspects of dispute resolution in favour of whatever means the people actually involved can agree on.

Well, if government = "some number of people elected by someone to impose laws & punishments on the rest of the population", then we are talking about government.

From original kiba's post i concluded that this is what we are discussing here.

I can't speak for kiba, but I would never support such a system. I said before all parties must consent to being bound by arbitration.

As I see the major vote tendency is for anarchy, so anarchy it is then. It's neither a good or a bad thing anyway.
Prior to deal with a market we must simply know where we are stepping into.

A regulated, with state or somehow enforced rules is one thing, an anarchist market is another. In one you lose one thing, on the other other but you can't have the best of both worlds. We can trim a bit using the community, but there again is at parts will.

So, basic and only rule become: Look up for your assets or nobody will.

Another matter is that there are serious limits on what we can do in terms of enforcement, anyway. If you want to use force to enforce compliance of any rules, you'll probably have to do it via the courts in nation states. Some here have denounced such practices, but that doesn't change the fact that recourse to enforced law is available to all of us. If you want to avoid that, you have to maintain strong anonymity at all times. Nothing else can protect you.

"Won't" is nice, but "can't" is better.
That's why, while I think arbitration and clear communication regarding how we expect others to conduct their business with us are important, it is more important to improve the ways we do trade in order to limit risk caused by dishonesty, incompetence, oversights and miscommunication.

Well, you need a government. You.. you just do. ;)

vladimir;

Fair enough, but if it is to run without rule or regulation, then don't expect also things which just exists under rule and regulation.
They're two worlds, different Worlds, different rules, different tools.
If it's intended to not use "mob" or "street" justice around, then some rules are needed to get to know "who's right" and "who's wrong".

Agreed, you do need groundrules. Rules, however, do not require Rulers. Voluntary self-regulation is sufficient, and you're free to not deal with anyone who refuses to hold to the rules. No need to pay thugs to beat anyone up.

Who say there must be a new government?

The Common Economic Protocol doesn't exactly aspire to sovereignty or to install itself as the authority. So it will be the case with the Bitcoin Common Laws.

Too often, people misunderstand the purpose of this thread is to create coercive enforcement apparatus as the higher authority on the bitcoin economy. That's not what I am trying to do. I am trying to understand the "laws" as human beings voluntary agreed on in the little dispute cases that arise.

(Do I have to explain myself again and again? Please read the fricking thread!)

Quote: "Anyone could explain me why would we need a new government now that we have a new, parasitefree, currency?"

I no longer have the quotes collections I used to use for .sigs, so I cannot recall the exact wording, but the Emperor Paul Muad'dib had a nice one about control the currency and the courts and the rabble can have the rest.

(Might also have been same place where he also enquired but who is to say who are the rabble and who the, uh, non-rabble I guess. Rulers, maybe?)

So basically, even the Emperor could see that currency and courts go together...

-MarkM- (Actually maybe Paul quoted Shaddam about currency and courts then added his enquiry?)

EDIT: google to the rescue:

--
"Control the coinage and the courts—let the rabble have the rest." Thus the Padishah Emperor advises you. And he tells you: "If you want profits, you must rule." There is truth in these words, but I ask myself: "Who are the rabble and who are the ruled?"
-Muad'Dib's Secret Message to the Landsraad from "Arrakis Awakening" by the Princess Irulan

A court system can exist independently from a government, in fact that is preferred.

Quote: "A court system can exist independently from a government, in fact that is preferred."

Apparently not by the Padishah Emperor. ;) :D

-MarkM- (Though all other governments including Paul Muad'Dib doubtless agree with with you? Heh. Maybe Paul might? Arguable...)

Edit: "is preferred", ha ha, nice, reminds me of supreme commander... :)

What kind of tyranny is this? Making rules after making a deal?


You make a contract and specify conditions and penalties if either party violates those conditions. The courts may merely decided if a party violated a contract condition or not. Everything else is coercion and tyranny and if we want a principled and virtuous society we should all strongly reject it!

LOL! No you don't!

I mean FFS you have this new commodity BitCoins that you're willing to use as currency that emerged without a government in a complete open non-coercive way and now all of the sudden we can't find agreement in other topics without coercion?! Please stop using your brainwashed mind and learn from what your participating in right now!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jvKN64ZT9Q

I'm assuming you knew I was making a joke, and that's why you laughed... I have elsewhere (in this thread, I think) revealed that I'm 100% AnCap/Agorist. And outside this thread, linked to UPB, so... yeah. Preaching to the choir. :)

Ahhhh.. well no, I didn't realize :P

I'm glad that's the case though :D

As far as I can tell no-one here is proposing any kind of non-voluntary punitive system. I don't know why so many insisting on seeing it that way.

Anyway, this thread is probably done. A better use of time would be to work on a common contract base, ways to trade securely and, if possible, arbitration. By trading securely, I mean doing business in such a way that all parties can prove whether or not the contract has been fulfilled.That's probably the biggest nut to crack.

Of course this still leaves open how to handle "unsolicited" mistreatment - theft of assets by, say, cracking passwords etc. I can't think of much more except trying to secure your coins as well as possible, keeping good logs of everything  (what, exactly?) and working towards being able to actually prove that a specific person has stolen something. Likely that will not always be possible, some losses will simply have to be accepted. I know if I have to choose between arbitrary denouncements of possibly guilty parties or letting some thieves get away scot free, I'll tend to follow the old adage:

"Better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer."

Exchange operators would do well to have TOS stating whether or not they will interfere where foul play is suspected. That way no-one can complain if they get their funds frozen or what have you - that becomes a risk one explicitly, knowingly takes when using services that will interfere. To go one better, operators could provide a more detailed outline of the kinds of actions they will undertake and what recourse, if any an accused party has against such action. Keeping to these guidelines would then become another element the operator's trust hinges on.

I'd just like to point out something that seems obvious to me.  Any central exchange/business selling for bitcoins/private party that reneges on debt, is an actual person, who already lives in a meatspace jurisdiction.  Bitcoin transactions are simply viewed as barter under normal state laws, and there are already bankruptcy systems and court systems.  If we set up a system for the bitcoin community, it is not enforceable without coercion, since we do not have a monopoly on force in any meatspace jurisdiction, attempting to enforce community rules will likely involve things that are technically illegal, and limit acceptance of bitcoin as a whole.  This is all very nice to try to make a working anarchocapitalist platform, but if you want mainstream acceptance we can't set up our own system of laws and courts, real world businesses will simply not participate in such a thing.  It is better to just view this as a parallel market where, while normal laws apply, they are very difficult to enforce, and exercise due caution because of this. 

I agree that it would be foolish to ignore "meatspace" laws. Those enforcing them will not ignore you. However, as you say, they can be very difficult to enforce, so perhaps we can do something more relevant to the nature of pseudonymous or anonymous trading, instead. Such safeguards will offer no protection from litigation in meatspace, but may offer increased protection to traders who are unable or unwilling to take matters into courts.

Each true leader should start his own calendar and religion (like Jesus)

++

We have to abide to our respective national laws.  Believing that we can make a Bitcoin law and somehow enforce it is nonsense.  I.e. an exchange operated in one country would have to follow different laws and regulations than an exchange operated in another country.

Why should bitcoiners care about if you follow national laws or not? Will you provide the goods and services, or will you not?

This is pretty much my point, if you are a mainstream business person, that is identifiable in real life, you need to observe local laws.  You (the customer) don't have to care about that at all, but you can't set up some sort of bitcoin community law in order to do business using the currency.  In fact, this is sort of a nonsensical discussion anyway, since you have no authority and no ability to enforce such a system, and a system of voluntary contracts would only be enforceable through local courts.  Mainstream businesses will need to do business according to their local laws, that includes bankruptcy protection and all the risk that comes with it, private individuals can rely on bitcoin to be more or less like cash, and simply rely on being under the radar if they choose.  The idea of having a separate system of economic regulations for the bitcoin community is not feasible, however, and if widely supported would just alienate mainstream businesses, because they cannot comply with such a system while still obeying their own laws.  For arguments sake Amazon could accept bitcoin at some point in the future, and it would be fantastic for the currency, but they have business licenses, tax IDs in almost ever US state and lots of other countries, if you think you can somehow make them comply with some sort of bitcoin community law before their other obligations, which are enforced with monopoly of violence in real geographic jurisdictions, you are delusional.  If bitcoin works well, such a parallel legal system will be unenforceable for private transactions as well.  So while I understand the ideals behind this whole discussion, I think it's misguided.  I should add that if you simply mean to set up some sort of community standards system in which reputation counts and violation of the "laws" cause a lowering of "credit rating" that's fine... that's totally doable, and in fact is already being done at bitcoin-otc.

It isn't unfeasible because some of us are not "mainstream business". We rely solely on our reputation.

The bitcoin community can enforce compliance with anything we decide in a very simple way:

We don't like what you do with our bitcoins, you don't get any more of our bitcoins.

The best part: Each of us gets to make this decision each time we make a transaction.

And how will you know who someone is if they don't tell you?

They have no reputation. Nobody trust them.

That will be an issue for newcomers, even worse if someone got lots of money they want to convert into BTC 'cause they've just learned about it.


I don't think we should be thinking in terms of punishment for the guilty, we should instead focus on educating the innocent.

You don't.

You also don't have to deal with complete strangers. I don't know if anyone has set this up yet or not, But we should have a database of payment addresses associated with merchants. Since the address is unique, anyone who wants to build up positive rep just keeps using the same acceptor address, anyone with 0 rep is a possible scam artist who just switched addresses.

You might be interested on my draft idea here:
http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=3920.0

Yes, I am interested. Posting on that thread now...

You misunderstand my meaning, of course you are free to apply market pressures by spending or not spending with various merchants.  The thread proposed a system of laws and arbitration.  That goes far beyond market pressures, and people who are identifiable in real life will not be able to follow community laws before following local laws that are enforced with physical force.  If allegiance to a parallel court system is the price for using bitcoin, it will always remain a rand minority that uses it.  If that's what some people want fine, it's not what I want for the future of bitcoin. 

/me sigh.

Read the god damn thread.

It's fucking completely voluntary!

I am about to fall out of my chair.

That's exactly what I'm talking about. I just want to try to find a way to protect people from false accusations to some extent. Clear contracts would help with that. Arbitration might be useful too. I grow tired of reiterating this in so many ways. Here's a test, let's see who fails English comprehension:

I'm talking about trying to improve the trust model we now use. I'm thinking of doing it in three parts:

1: simple contract base people can use if they feel like it, or modify at will. This is just convenience mostly, generally just a simple "I promise not to steal your shit" would suffice.

2. Ways to actually prove whether either party has fulfilled their word or not. This is the biggest one, as if you can prove foul play, you can point to the proof and be justified in denouncing a person publicly.

3. For gray areas, arbitration. Both parties need to agree to it of course. Probably this would not be used very often, but some kind of basic procedure might be nice to have for reference at least.

My motivation here is that reputation is so important in anonymous trading, it feels very risky to have no real protection against simple character assassination. I'd feel better if I could take any serious disputes to a trusted third party and provide them with whatever proof I have that I have, indeed done what I said I would. If my hypothetical accuser refused to do this, it would be telling of their claims.

I suggested a pretty good way to do this over on this thread: http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=3920.0

I'll tl;dr it here, for those of you who'd rather not go to the other thread: Paypal buyer/seller ratings linked to payment addresses, and rated by escrow service. You are welcome to change payment addresses, but you'll lose all your rep.

Arbitration would be the best way to settle disputes.

OK, criticism withdrawn, I'll wait and see how it turns out and then decide whether to participate.

Because if I am e.g. an exchange, and I don't follow my national law, YOU risk loosing everything you've trusted me with if I get caught.  I may have the best intentions, but it doesn't help at all if what I do is illegal in my jurisdiction.  "Bitcoin common law" isn't worth anything when real life police knocks on the door.

How are we suppose to settle disputes when you're in one country and I am in another? You want me to use the court to sue your ass out of existence? What if some other guy can do but you can't without getting caught?

One can follow local laws and still settle disputes by Arbitration. The two are not mutually exclusive.

Not to harp on The Icelandic Commonwealth, but they frequently used all available means to come to settlements, legal and extralegal.

Man anarchy at work so beautiful to watch. This thread is a prime example of individuals throwing out ideas how to do commerce between one another and none of them having the ability to force their idea upon the rest instead it's all on a voluntary bases and people vote for ideas they like with their BitCoins.


I love it.

Ain't it?

Is quite unfortunate that we do not have laws or regulations governing bitcoin and cryptocurrency as a whole as far as investment and transactions are concern. But the suggested laws will not help at all. We need to reflect and come out with a more refined one.

Like seriously. I think we must think outside the box and bring something meaningful that will secure crypto investors and lovers and also catapult bitcoin to a next level. We really need laws governing bitcoin to prevent its abuse.

Hi,
I'd like to create a Common Law Token, can any programmers help me?
TIA

Anyone who wants to build an active rep will only continue to use the same accepted address. You misunderstand my meaning, of course you are free to apply market pressure by spending or not spending with different merchants. That goes beyond the pressure of the market, and those who can identify in real life will not be able to follow community law before complying with local law enforced with physical force. If that's what some people want, that's not what I want for the future of bitcoin.

To enforce any action against a fraudulent act (scamming etc) you would need to establish the real identity of the scammer and the jurisdiction in which they live-both of which will be incredibly difficult with Bitcoin or any crypto as they are intended to be anonymous. As for bankruptcy people go bankrupt for many reasons, not all of which are down to fraud.

Unless we accept regulation and a central controlling body for Bitcoin etc then there is no realistic chance of redress or retribution.

We all need to be extremely vigilant in our dealings.     

We all know that bitcoin is a decentralised crypto currency so there is no proper authentic regulating body over the bitcoin and all other so this little defect or I should say the improper regulation is misused by some social defaulters and they use bitcoin for many illegal activities like in selling drugs, explosives, money laundering and many more and now the government of those countries are keeping eye over bitcoin those who has legalised it in their nation and for the proper and beneficial use, bitcoin needs to get centralised all over the world.