Do we have a number for the power consumption claim ? How many hashes per Joule ? 20 MH/J ? I can't find this parameter in the thread nor in the BFL docs. 20 GH/J does not sound realistic..

My point is that the "flow speed" should not be set by the monetary system but by the will of the people deciding freely whether they want to spend or save their money.

Consumerism, encouraged by demurrage, is unfair to the next generation because it goes against sustainable development.

Does anyone know about the forecast power consumption of the BitForce SC 40 GH/s ? I could not find it on the BFL web site ..

That's an interesting thread but the likelihood that such an attack would kill interest in all cryptocurrencies is quite high; So holders of litecoin would still make a very risky investment by attacking bitcoin.
In fact we are back to the Nash equilibrium: it's more profitable to mine bitcoin than to attack it unless you are sitting on an oligopoly like Visa or Mastercard.

However it's not easy for them to attack bitcoin that way because they are public companies and must disclose the attack one way or another (their management is at high risk if they engage in an attack without disclosing it).
If they disclose the attack, then the network can apply countermeasures (even after the attack) and bitcoin comes out on top because an attack by Visa would be a tremendous vindication for bitcoin.

IMHO, Bitcoin is more an evolution than a revolution: that's why it's going to have more lasting, changing effects on the economy.

With bitcoin, the money paradigm has gone full circle from commodity money (like cowry or gold) to elastic money (from the renaissance to now) to a new digital commodity money.

c'est un progrès de voir les transactions (grâce à bitcoin) mais il reste que le lancer des dés est opaque (comment je sais si c'est vraiment "random" ?). Donc je vais continuer à ne PAS jouer aux dés..

Demurrage is a naive way to create artificial velocity by twisting the arm of the unfortunate freicoin holders..

Artificial monetary velocity serves only consumerism. It's as if freicoin advocates would like to hang on forever to the suboptimal elastic money concept.

Arm twisting and arbitrary constraints (why 4.4% demurrage rate why not 10% or 5% ?) are precisely what we are trying to get rid of thanks to bitcoin.

You may be missing something but you are not alone 
Bitcoin is adding a new liberty (the liberty to conduct financial transactions without a middleman) but bitcoin is not removing any options.

The option to use a middleman for value add services like currency conversion, exchange rate hedging, dispute resolution, escrow and what not is still available to bitcoin users and merchants.
However, for most transactions, the option of using a middleman is not needed nor required.

That's right, I believe the market price reflects the market expectation that the quantity of bitcoins will reach 21 million.
Therefore the correct valuation of the bitcoin network should be even 134 M with today's exchange rate.
However I expect a rally in early december when the reward gets halved because the market is irrational 

When your salary is deposited to your bank account, the bank becomes the legal owner of your money (even though it's YOUR bank account).
You then have to beg the bank to give you a means of payment to spend it.

You can stop this non sense by asking to be paid partly in bitcoins, directly to your bitcoin address.
The amount could be roughly what you spend in cash. Think of how often you go to the ATM to withdraw cash.

The argument offered by the advocates of central elastic money goes like this:
1/ central money is the only legal tender to extinguish a fiscal debt
2/ the State has unlimited taxing power over the entire economy ( the implication being that the State has the power to nationalize the entire economy)
3/ therefore, central money is backed by the entire economy.

This is a HUGE fallacy because,unless you live in North Korea, assumption 2 is simply wrong..
Therefore, central money is backed by the limited taxing power of the State enabling lawful confiscation of a fraction of the economy: that leaves a very large chunk of the economy available for another medium of exchange..

To sum things up: let the State enforce elastic money to collect taxes and to provide useful public services and let the people use commodity money like bitcoin to create optimal economic conditions.

Payment system of the 21st century (bitcoin). Website design from the 20th century..

+1

Backing is a requirement for people who cannot think outside of the box of elastic money.
Scarcity and usefulness of the bitcoin technology are enough to give value to the bitcoin network.
The current value (120 M) of the bitcoin network is dwarfed by the valuation of networks such as Visa, MasterCard or even Western Union.
What is backing those networks ?
Bitcoin is only monetizing a fraction of the value of something called the internet.

Well the brits don't have one either (if it were not for the City, tax heaven, and the Queeen, tourist attraction, they would be bankrupt like everybody else in Europe but the Germans) but they have real weather..

Let's get rid of this Euro non sense: the Germans go back to the Deutsch Mark, the DM gets so strong the Germans can't export their cars anymore, we are one happy family..

Investor's advice at the end of the video: "buy things that are scarce"
Gold (yuck: you get taxes going in and out like there is no tomorrow, at least that is the situation in Europe) or bitcoin (yeah)..

"New" currency.....

Chessbase offers this feature: do you have an idea how they can detect cheaters ?
I am guessing they are running chess bots in parallel with the games and looking for similar move patterns but that's a feat given the very large numbers of simultaneous games.

I am starting to think that my blog domain name is too cryptic 

Jon Matonis writes brilliantly and regularly in Forbes online. He must be on the list.

C'est pas grave mais c'est embêtant car ça prouve qu'ils n'ont pas compris les enjeux.

ça les gêne que les early adopters de bitcoin aient pu gagner UNE FOIS quelques millions (potentiellement mais ça reste à prouver) alors que les gains des dirigeants de Wall Street et de la City se montent à plusieurs milliards CHAQUE ANNEE !
Bitcoin en tant que monnaie "matière première" est la seule alternative possible et crédible à la monnaie "élastique" qui permet à un petits groupes de financiers de s'enrichir indéfiniment et énormément en confisquant la monnaie.

En dénigrant voire en calomniant les bitcoiners, FDN et les autres se font les alliés objectifs de Wall Street..

Pourquoi ils ne disent pas que l'or ou la retraite par répartition  sont des "Ponzi" ?