Wow - thanks for that link - looks like Bitcoin might well change the world in a lot more ways than at least I could have ever imagined.


Cheers,

Ian.

That doesn't do you any good, because the most you can win for solving your own problem is slightly less than what it cost to submit the problem.

For example, let's say you burn 100,000 coins and submit a question you can easily solve the answer to thanks to your customized rig. Yes, you'd win most of that prize money. But the most you could win is say 99,000 coins (since 1% or so is lost forever as a usage fee). And that's assuming nobody else gets even some of the prize.

So it doesn't make sense to solve your own problems.

Yeah, that could work.

Essentially it would be bitcoin. Just the network would be more advanced in that it can accept and integrate new user submitted math problems, and allow you to earn coins for doing that math instead of random proof of work.

.... Hold on. I'm 1m40s in. Before I go any further, is it supposed to be self-parodying? Were the editors of the film conscious of what they were doing, and if so, was it a light joke done with a wry smile, or do they genuinely hate everyone who's watching it?

But why would they use bitcoin instead of establishing their own crypto-currency? I could see banks and companies and governments using crypto-coins someday. But it seems more likely that they would establish their own currency.

Adopting bitcoin basically makes a lot of people on the internet quite rich, those who invested in it early. But why would a powerful organization want these strangers to be wealthy, when it could by establishing its own currency instead make itself more wealthy?

how cheap 

True, but which government would? They need control over currency in order to seize it for taxes and what not.

What makes more sense is a corporation selling their own stock directly and the stock itself being crypto-currency.

For example let's say OmniCorp divides itself into 50,000,000 crypto-coins of stock and offers them online. They need USD and euros and other regular currencies to pay for factories and salaries and whatnot, so you offer them regular money in exchange for them giving crypto-coins to you.

Although OmniCorp issues the stock (no mining at all) once the coins are given out they lose control over them. Encryption keys are still used to trade the stock, and omnicorp has no way of recalling it. And they can't generate more without breaking various legal contracts.

Crypto stock would have several advantages over bitcoins. First off, it would entitle you to dividends. Owning a OmniCorp coin would allow you to claim a bit of regular money every so often. It would also give you a vote in the company's affairs. Essentially, it does everything a regular stock does but also can be tradeable.

Now, one company can fail or have swings in value. So eventually people might create a mutual fund crypto-coin that contains a tiny bit of stock in several different blue chip companies.

What would be needed is some kind of software that allows companies to issue crypto-coin stock, then allow people to use their coins to claim dividends in regular money and send in votes. And it would also need to be compatible with other corporations' crypto-coins, so users can "mint" custom coins consisting of whatever combinations of stocks in whatever amounts they want.

By raw governmental power. Or more accurately, by the fact the government will accept it as valuable, and assist people who have it or jail people who don't pay their taxes with it. True fiat currency has nothing physical backing it, but it's basically secure as long as its government remains in power and doesn't start printing money to pay off debts.

True there are downsides to that. There could be a coup, or unwise economic policies, or something else that affects the currency's valuable. And an unjust law can seize your money unfairly. But as long as the government is reasonably powerful and stable your money should retain value. It's a bit like buying stock in a company. Your Apple stock is probably secure bet, your Pets.com stock from 1999 probably not as wise.

If your hypothesis is that there are repeating patterns in the time series then you can use Pearson to test it. My point about the PPMCC being scale agnostic is that you can successfully compare samples that have different scaling.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pearson_product-moment_correlation_coefficient