This makes no sense at all - in order to peg NxtUSD to say NxtAUD *inside* the Asset Exchange would mean that the actual USD/AUD exchange rate has to be ignored (as that by definition is *outside* the AE).

So by definition you can't peg those currencies to each other in any meaningful way - you might decide you are going to always exchange 1 NxtUSD for 1 NxtAUD and the opposite but even that won't work unless you have exactly the same amount of either.

I agree (and had always thought that was the intention).

The mistake that Ripple made was to make all the statements about Ripples just being "postage stamps" and having no real value and then suddenly hyping their value after launching and giving away "coins" (a small percentage). If they had been more honest about it in the first place people would not have been so turned off by it and so far I think Nxt has been far more honest (so no need to go and do the "reverse" of Ripple).

Best of luck with it - but my guess is you end up with something like "Bitshares" who think that just because you call something bitUSD then it will magically be "worth" 1 USD because of it being a "prediction market".

I don't think that holds water at all nor any kind of other "pegging" unless you are talking about the kind of "pegging" that governments do (like Hong Kong's pegging of the HKD to the USD) which is not at all what I think people interested in "decentralised" solutions are looking for.

But if we aren't supposed to "trade NXT" then that wouldn't have any value then would it?

Ouch - so we should instead exchange things that are just IOU's in place of something that actually at least has scarcity.

Although maybe Ripple screwed up by trying to make too much out of Ripples I think that unless you have atomic cross-chain transaction support so you can trade something of *real* value (such as BTC or LTC) then this would be a disaster.

You are - but let's look at what you say "next" (pun intended).


This is the problem - *how* is it *pegged*?

It can only be so if some individual or group is "guaranteeing" to accept it for 1 USD (or whatever) but if that person/group decides that they are not worth it (for whatever reason - maybe they don't have any USD left) then your *pegging* has just failed and in fact the coins are worth ZERO.

This is why they are not *actual* USDs (or whatever) - they are actually IOUs - this is EXACTLY how Ripple works.

It won't be fixed at all if the issuer suddenly stops redeeming their IOU's and in if fact such IOU's will quickly become worth *nothing* - as you said the Asset can be anything including "Pirate Ponzi Coins".

Understand that just calling something NXTUSD does not at all make it worth 1 USD - it's no different to Mt. Gox USD amounts (they have clearly been valued at less than *real* USD amounts for a long time).

I don't see how any AE is going to really ever be properly "backed" by anything - you just end up with "centralised" Gateways a la Ripple or you end up with disasters like GLBSE.

Why do people think AE is so important when the only "decentralised" part is the "trading between IOU's and NXT" (anything else becomes reduced to having to "trust" whoever to actually respect the IOU)?

Oh - I thought the purpose of the Asset Exchange was always going to be for such things. At the end of the day I think that the AE just brings the Nxt functionality closer to Ripple (which may or may not be a good thing).

Sure - of course there are probably quite a few running nodes whose motivation is not forging - hard to know whether or not that is the majority (perhaps being able to work this out might help with the decision).

I am guessing that a reduction from 1 to 0.1 should at least provide a good way to "get an idea" how much a "further tenfold reduction" would affect the network.

I think that the idea of reducing the fees by a factor of 10 or 100 is likely to pretty much completely get rid of the "mining mentality" (and will increase the # of transactions made) although one does need to be careful perhaps not to do this too soon as currently the "forging reward" is one of the main factors motivating people to run nodes.

Changing the total supply from 1B to something else would be a lot more controversial than reducing the fees - effectively that amount was a "promise" made at the outset so if that promise were to be broken I would expect some investors (especially the 73 initial ones) would be unhappy about that (actually it would probably upset those who have invested at recent "market prices" much more than the 73 as they have already probably each taken large profits from their initial investment).

Yes - it's just too hard to keep focus on ideas in this topic so efforts to do so often end up in frustration (or are just lost in the noise).

I don't think that anyone here has a problem with his ideas - the frustration that myself and some others have had has been in communicating with James about just "how" to do things (rather than "why" do them).

I agree with this and hope you haven't taken my criticisms too heavily James. Understand that from a "software engineering" perspective the way you think is a bit like if you approached a "structural engineer" with the following:

1) I need a foundation for a house to be built made out of steel.
Engineer says no worries - let me work out how much steel we will need - how big is the house?

2) I think that the building will need a helipad - can we have a helipad that handles up to 4 helicopters at once?
Engineer says - "building" hang on a minute I thought you said "house" - we are going to need a *lot* of steel - you don't want to use concrete also?

3) I think that the building needs to be a floating structure that will be placed into international waters - no problem with making it float?
Engineer says - I am going for a beer.

Am getting tired of this.

The film "Despicable Me 2" is *now showing* in Beijing and in most other cities in China - where do you get your (mis-)information from?

Perhaps you could find something more useful to do than just to try and spread FUD about what can and can't be done in China (and perhaps actually *talk to people who live here* rather than quote bullshit western articles)?

So - does it make much difference that I can't see some political video without using a VPN when you can't watch some movie without the same?

To me it's the same thing - "censorship" exists in both cases - it is just focused on different things ("copyright" rather than "political ideology" and btw - I could watch a western movie here that is actually quite "political" also - so it isn't as simple as you might think).

Aha - so your "internet freedom" has some restrictions then?

You should be able to find basically every big movie from 2013 and also every major TV series episode as well (in English with Chinese subtitles).

For sure it isn't nice to not be able to find websites - but would be pretty sure that some of the websites that I can access here without a VPN you could *not* access due to them having "pirate video content" (something the Chinese authorities don't care much about).

Interestingly enough they don't actually block bitcointalk.org here (although sometimes btcchina.com is blocked).

Please don't try and twist it this way - I am not some "oracle of truth" and you are not some "oracle of lies".

My point is not really to "win an argument" about "who is right or wrong" but simply to ask you to "question information" (as I do myself - I hope you don't think that I believe *anything* much that is reported on CCTV which is the "portal" of propaganda in China).