*sigh* I shouldn't even address this, but I shall. The logical fallacy your trying to pull off is called a stawman argument, wherein you try to get your opponent to argue a position they never took. When done cleverly, it can derail and discredit an argument. Yours wasn't all that clever.

NEVER ONCE did I state that savings is equal to inflation. Nor did I argue that interest was inflation. Nor will I. What I stated, specifically, is that THIS mechanism, Proof of Stake is inflationary. This should be obvious, but apparently it isn't. So I shall elucidate.

In normal savings, done via a bank as opposed to simple hoarding, you deposit funds. The bank then uses those funds in investments, returning the funds and interest derived from the fees (interest) that they charged for the use of the funds. A partnership for investment with minimal effort on the part of the depositor.

Proof of Stake, by stark contrast, rewards the hoarder for doing NOTHING with their money, and does indeed create money without investment or work. Thus it is inflationary by definition.

Inflation is indeed intended to stop savings. Keynes thought (using the word loosely) that money should not ever be kept aside, that even the "tradtional" savings I listed above would slow or stop an economy. He dismissed Menger and Von Mises not on merit, but because they advised caution and prudence. Two things he was openly opposed to.

Again, there are two forms of inflation. One is inherent in any sort of commodity money, and that is the production of the asset. This form tends to be self correcting as the asset becomes rarer. This is the model that the crytpocurrency movement initially modeled, and most successful coins have followed. It is inflationary at the outset, and diminishes over time. This makes it deflationary in the long term, and because of the scarcity created,it becomes more valuable per unit. This is not true in a vacuum, of course, as the asset has to be USED.

Yes, it can be saved or hoarded (they aren't synonomous, but they are related). This is not in itself uneconomic from the point of view of an individual actor. If everyone hoards and no one spends, then the asset becomes devalued and useless. This never actually happens for very long, but it can happen when times are tough otherwise, because people want a hedge. As things improve or the stockpiles increase, people again start investing.

The second form of inflation, the pernicious one, is "printing money", or legal currency, thus diluting the asset or making it unattractive in the short term. See Gresham's Law.

Here's where interest rates come in. In a centrally managed system, they are manipulated, as you noted, to discourage saving and encourage malinvestment. This creates the boom/bust cycle. In a rational market, where risks are not absorbed by governments and central banks, interest tends to be high for risky investments. This makes the actors seeking loans think long and hard about repayment, and lowers the amount of malinvestment. There will always be idiots, but high interest rates discourage them. Artificially low interest rates, on the other hand, encourage investment in dubious prospects, and thus create bubbles. Sooner or later, bubbles pop. See 2008 as a good example. Or 1921. Or 1928. Or 1936. I could go on. Fiat currency is particularly vulnerable to this because of it's nature and because of fractional reserve banking, in which the debits are counted as assets to "create" money. Much like Proof of Stake.

As shown above, my grasp is far beyond basic. Both in economics and debate. Some references for you:

logical fallacies and the art of debate

Economics in one lesson

Human Action

There is nothing intrinsically wrong with holding, but it's a zero sum game. POS takes that dynamic away, and removes incentive to put your money to work. The only conceptual difference between POS and fractional reserve is the issuing authority is different.

Technically, they are much different, and I have heard now from about a dozen people with far more experience than I that the technical problems are many, and dangerous, even if you leave out the economic arguments.

Bank accounts are NOT holding your money, even though that's the (now) common perception. They lend it out at interest. On checking accounts, it's only for quick transactions, or they have it covered by incoming payments (in theory. In practice they've been using fractional reserves since the mid '30s). C.D.'s and similar instruments are used for parts of medium to long term loans, which always have a higher amount of interest than what the depositor is paid. Thus you are loaning the money to the bank to invest on your behalf, rather than doing it yourself. It's both risk mitigation and hiring a middleman.

That in itself is not a problem, and could easily be done in the world of Crypto. It does require a level of transparency and trust above and beyond the coin, but so does Gold, which is where such things started. Bankiing isn't evil in itself, but central banking where they issue the "money" has become an impossible nightmare. I wish to avoid repeating the mistakes of the past, which is why I'm opposed to POS.

Ok, you've given a cogent, if heated, argument. You have yet to make one reason why ADDING A SECOND AND INCREASING level of inflation (yes, it is. Yes, I understand economics better than most. Yes, Keynes was an idiot at everything but gathering unwarranted power.) will increase adoption, but targeting merchants, attempting to get real world exchanges and stores, selling silver, and advertising WON'T.

First, let me dispense with YOUR fallacy. Proof of Stake is INHERENTLY inflationary. It adds coins as a secondary means to mining, which is in fact adding to the increase in the supply. Unlike mining, it expends no energy, no effort, and has no return OTHER than increasing a wallet.

Let me break it down a bit more. Inflation is not simply price increase, as idiots like Bernanke would have you believe. Inflation has ONE cause: Increase of the money supply. Bitcoin, and it's successors such as this one, are modeled on the real world paradigm of gold mining. Initially the supply is high, and decreases with time to a definite limit. There will come a time when there is no profitable way to mine gold on earth. It ain't there yet, but it will be. There will come a time when there are no more earthcoins to be mined. It's early in the game, and there is an oversupply currently. That can and should be addressed. We are discussing it. The idea has been bandied about several times on this thread and in other places of cutting the block reward sooner than the scheduled halving. I am in favor of this, as it chokes the supply and immediately causes the coins to become more scarce. Makes them less attractive to multipools as well, probably. Not sure on that, because their model is a bit odd to begin with.

Proof of Stake does not do this. Proof of Stake does encourage parking the coins, which does not put them in circulation but STILL increases the supply. Not only that, it does it indefinitely, which breaks the scarcity beyond repair. I want earthcoin to still be a viable currency down the line, not simply right this second. I cannot see how adding an inflationary component will do anything in the long term other than harm the coin. In the short term, yes, it gives it a shot in the arm. And much like the heroin addict, it will take more and more until it's ineffective and the addict is burnt out or dead.

Now, do you think you can tell me where and why I might be wrong without cussing my lineage, intellect, or understanding of economics? You can lambast my coding skills all you want. They are essentially nonexistent, and not my function on the team. But when it comes to economics, I was studying the Austrian school before Bitcoin was a concept, let alone earthcoin.

I can tell you that at this moment, all but two of the team are adamantly opposed to POS, but not to several other innovations, including cutting the block reward earlier or in a more graduated way. But all of us see mercantile adoption as crucial, regardless of technical tweaks.  

I have, from an earlier exchange. I doubt that clennell is editing much, based on past performance.

Not a cryptographic expert, but to the best of my knowledge that isn't true. In fact, I know it's not because the last block that I was paid from on Eligius had literally hundreds of transactions.

Again, to the best of my knowledge (I will ask the more technical team members) EAC has no transaction limit, it just depends on when a transaction gets (a)broadcast and (b) picked up in a block.

What we do have is fast transaction TIMES, which makes it so that you could buy a cup of joe and not have to wait an hour to have it confirmed.

Yeah, that about sums it up. I saw essentially the same thing for stocks years ago Some things never change.

If I may humbly request that you hold just a bit longer... We're getting things sorted and rolling. We'll have a full report in a few days on what we're doing, what we want to do, and how we gonna do it

25 words, eh?

Ah, Wot de Hell. I like ridiculous.

-begin-
Chinga con la horquilla de bitcoin. ¿Estás loco, o simplemente una locura? Yo, que estoy loco. Déjame entrar.

-end-

Nah. He's not a troll. Just venting.

It's wrong. The stats show what it believes to be true right this minute. I've been here for about three months now, and aside from this recent run of luck with the front end, it's been paid within an hour of my threshold almost every time. When it does get fubar, Wizkid always does a manual payout as soon as the system is caught up. Like within minutes sometimes. The longest I ever saw it go was two days past my payout threshold. For the guys with big hashpower, that may have equated to 3-4 DAYS delay. Not months.

In my time here there have been zero problems with the server regardless of what the stats page was doing. This recent one where the namecoins got jacked has been the worst I've seen, and that's minor. (though still unfixed on my setup )

@ ATXsilver.

You, sir, are truly Da Bomb!

Now where can we get ten more of ya?

I have a bit of a challenge for all the earthcoin family: Get New Blood. Everybody that thinks earthcoin needs a boost, send your friends and colleagues to Earthcointalk or getearthcoin, or this thread. Hold their hand if they are new to crypto, and get 'em to Earthazaar while you're at it.

Also, and I don't recall who said this so somebody tell me, if all of us put up something that we no longer need/want on Earthazaar either for auction or sale, we'd peak the charts in no time.

...and with that I'm off to bed. See y'all in the coming days!

You're a bit bored today, eh? Same question on my (earthcoin) thread. I won't answer you here, cuz I like these guys.

I don't know what to say about this one. I've been following it for a while, and it's value seems to be in two things: Uniqueness, and a very engaged developer. I'd look on it as a possibly valuable novelty, like that Elvis jacket in 1970

I figure they'll work on it's future when the major kinks are worked out.

0rganic. I'm posting this under my own nic, because what I have to say is not the official word of the team. We are, in fact, somewhat divided in our opinions of you.

Wes is a hothead. He's also a guy with a great many ideas and a lot of ambition. There has been NO deliberate deception as far as I know, and they have been VERY open with me. Which is why I accepted the position. We are still transitioning. You do not right a capsizing ship overnight, nor win a war without planning.

I probably understand Wes better than you do, because I'm a hothead myself.

But I also understand you. No, not your points, they have been addressed or are in the process, which you have been informed of. I meant you, personally. You like pushing buttons. Not an uncommon avocation, but it's not productive either.

There's no smoking gun nor festering boil to be lanced here. One of the original team left. He and the others were not happy with each other. I wasn't there for that, but it appears from both sides that the issue was unresolvable while they remained a team. He kept his part of the pre-mine, and has provided you with sufficient detail in his post to run with it. Make of it what you will. We are taking it at face value, with a pinch of salt. You might try the same. The rest has been accounted for. Not as precisely as we all would like, there were mistakes made in the accounting. They amount to very little. The vast majority of the premine has been accounted for, and most of what remains, as you have yourself documented, remains under the control of Norb and Wes. For the moment, they control the purse strings. The rest of us have a lot of input on that, and one of the projects we are currently all focused on is setting up a detailed bounty structure, with public accountability. Aside from the article that Cryptozark and I are working on that puts more solid numbers to it, this is the last time I will address the premine issue. We have real things to do. For all practical purposes, regardless of what John may or may not do you can assume that his part of the money is no longer part of the team's assets. How you feel about that is up to you. I don't like it, but there is nothing productive that I or any other team member can do about it. We're moving forward. You're welcome to come along for the ride. But we are DONE living in the past. It can't be changed. The future can, and will be. With or without you. Your choice.

Kevin Biomech

As of 12:46 pm Mountain Time, my miner is still hashing away. Stats page is 504.

l already pay 1%. Got no issue with it being mandatory.

Not at my current hashrate. Give me time

Seriously would if I could.

Will do! And I agree. Have fun at work.

PM sent.

Yeah, I'll give it a day or two. If it's not back the way it was, I'll re-enter it. I did decide to take Raskul's advice for a minute, but it's not lack of trust. He just found an interesting coin. I figure I'll give it a day for the lulz if nothing else, and then come back here.

WK always gets the bumps smoothed out. Just seems to be a lot of them this month. He's gotta have balls of steel to keep up with this shit

To the best of my knowledge the only people who've been burned by Bitmain are the vaporware manufacturers, since Bitmain delivers in 2-3 days. I haven't got one myself, yet, but I've heard NO real problems with 'em. Either the machines or the company.

What I have heard is a lot of rumours that they're about to have a better machine/chip