the social Bitcoin

[bnjmnkent]

I think you are trapped in idealism - no offense. Using money and power, a small group is able to direct events,
even in a democratic environment; it happens with conventional money, it can happen with bitcoins/cryptocurrencies.

In case of Bitcoin, it is conceivable that earlier groups are connected, thereby enhancing their influencing capabilities.
This development is natural, but only as benign as the group members.

So your question becomes more frightening:

What if the minority decides that the majority is only allowed to possess a fixed and known amount of addresses?
(There exists a thread about a dystopian future here on BT, which I still have to read)

Now back to your original question. The idea, that in the future accumulation of wealth is no longer a supreme goal, but self-improvement is, spreads through science-fiction media.
Your thoughts probably match this scenario, as people would no longer care about maximizing/increasing balance on their wallets as generations before did.
Probably it is worth to study the feasibility of a resource based economy (RBE) as it could align with this idea. I have not done this yet.

However, it could be sufficient (or more just) to spread the idea and let everything else follow in line by advancing human behavior, instead of
enforcing it technologically.

Thank you very much for a thought-provoking post.
Benjamin

[capoeira]

http://www.ahametals.com/927-people-own-bitcoins/

I think you are trapped in idealism

I will respond your whole post another day;

just responding the quote:
what do you mean? I should give up on the world and surrender to the assholes? never, I'd rather die. I can't ignore millions of people suffering starvation, dieing for a few bucks

[Rassah]

http://www.ahametals.com/927-people-own-bitcoins/

Did you know that when it started, only 1 person owned all the bitcoins? And a whole month later, maybe 3 or 4 people owned all bitcoins? When the US Dollar was started, a group of proably less than a dozen people owned 100% of all US dollars. That's how new currencies start out.

[capoeira]

http://www.ahametals.com/927-people-own-bitcoins/

Did you know that when it started, only 1 person owned all the bitcoins? And a whole month later, maybe 3 or 4 people owned all bitcoins? When the US Dollar was started, a group of proably less than a dozen people owned 100% of all US dollars. That's how new currencies start out.

so you quote the dollar to convince me that the problem will self solve itself? lol

[Rassah]

http://www.ahametals.com/927-people-own-bitcoins/

Did you know that when it started, only 1 person owned all the bitcoins? And a whole month later, maybe 3 or 4 people owned all bitcoins? When the US Dollar was started, a group of proably less than a dozen people owned 100% of all US dollars. That's how new currencies start out.

so you quote the dollar to convince me that the problem will self solve itself? lol

So, what currency, or stock, or pretty much anything invented, do you like that you would like me to quote instead? I'll still say "Did you know that ______ was 100% owned by one person, or a small group of people, when it first started out?"

[capoeira]

related: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=370034.msg3953039#msg3953039

[capoeira]

new food for thoughts:

once BTC is dominant currency, and 95% of BTCs are in the hand of 5% of world population. why would those 95% who got the rest stay with Bitcoin? they will abandon it and simply adopt another coin, wouldn't they? BTC will have only value between the richs, which would make them useless.
(just beginning to think about this, a guy on facebook gave me that "food" 10min ago; sharing this "food" with you guys)

[bitdude55]

new food for thoughts:

once BTC is dominant currency, and 95% of BTCs are in the hand of 5% of world population. why would those 95% who got the rest stay with Bitcoin? they will abandon it and simply adopt another coin, wouldn't they? BTC will have only value between the richs, which would make them useless.
(just beginning to think about this, a guy on facebook gave me that "food" 10min ago; sharing this "food" with you guys)

If everyone ditched Bitcoin and switched to another cryptocurrency the same unequal situation would emerge as early adopters of the new currency would be disproportionately wealthy. This means that there isn't much incentive to switch.

I've been writing about a similar hypothetical cryptocurrency, which would overcome some the the technological barriers to redistributing the money.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=367080.0

Instead of the majority trying to force a redistribution of Bitcoin, a new cryptocurrency would be created which gives a universal allotment of coins to each new user. DNA would be used to identify a new user, once they have been identified their DNA signature is recorded on the Blockchain and they can't claim again. Trying to redistribute all the Bitcoins is impossible because many people have multiple wallets, would they receive multiple shares? This DNA system ensures that there is one unique payment for each person. My ultimate vision for this currency is for it to be used as a kind of corporation tax, people in rich countries go out and spend all their cash buying products from large corporations. The next day they switch to the DNA based cryptocurrency. The people have a pile of new stuff and an allotment of cash worth about $600 (all the cash in the world divided by 7 billion) and the corporations have a big pile of obsolete currency.

[Hideyoshi]

Instead of the majority trying to force a redistribution of Bitcoin, a new cryptocurrency would be created which gives a universal allotment of coins to each new user. DNA would be used to identify a new user, once they have been identified their DNA signature is recorded on the Blockchain and they can't claim again. This DNA system ensures that there is one unique payment for each person.

Cancer people can use their cancer DNA, which is different from their own DNA, to claim more money. Viruses can also be used to change DNA, since that is how viruses reproduce - they change the DNA of cells to make those cells make more viruses. If you test for DNA by taking blood samples, people who had bone marrow transplant will have same DNA as people who donated the bone. Also, I can print custom DNA that is not like any other person's DNA. It takes long time, and can not be put into people yet, but soon technology will change that. DNA is not a scarce or unique resource, like time, energy, and work.

If people end up with lots of money, and corporations get obsolete currency, as you say, that will be very bad. People with little money will not know what to do with lots of money besides spend and waste it, and corporations will not have money to buy supples to make products, and money to pay their employees. Poor people with lots of money will not have jobs, and will not have products to spend money on, so their lots of money will become worthless too. Money is not measure of one's wealth. It is measure of one's production capability and ability to think. So corporations will still be rich, because they still have their buildings, factories, people, and knowledge of how to run their business.
There is reason that wealthy people and corporations have much money - they know how to use it and how to take care of it.

[Hawker]

Instead of the majority trying to force a redistribution of Bitcoin, a new cryptocurrency would be created which gives a universal allotment of coins to each new user. DNA would be used to identify a new user, once they have been identified their DNA signature is recorded on the Blockchain and they can't claim again. This DNA system ensures that there is one unique payment for each person.

Cancer people can use their cancer DNA, which is different from their own DNA, to claim more money. Viruses can also be used to change DNA, since that is how viruses reproduce - they change the DNA of cells to make those cells make more viruses. If you test for DNA by taking blood samples, people who had bone marrow transplant will have same DNA as people who donated the bone. Also, I can print custom DNA that is not like any other person's DNA. It takes long time, and can not be put into people yet, but soon technology will change that. DNA is not a scarce or unique resource, like time, energy, and work.

If people end up with lots of money, and corporations get obsolete currency, as you say, that will be very bad. People with little money will not know what to do with lots of money besides spend and waste it, and corporations will not have money to buy supples to make products, and money to pay their employees. Poor people with lots of money will not have jobs, and will not have products to spend money on, so their lots of money will become worthless too. Money is not measure of one's wealth. It is measure of one's production capability and ability to think. So corporations will still be rich, because they still have their buildings, factories, people, and knowledge of how to run their business.
There is reason that wealthy people and corporations have much money - they know how to use it and how to take care of it.

Thanks.  Its nice to get some respect on these forums. 

[bitdude55]

Instead of the majority trying to force a redistribution of Bitcoin, a new cryptocurrency would be created which gives a universal allotment of coins to each new user. DNA would be used to identify a new user, once they have been identified their DNA signature is recorded on the Blockchain and they can't claim again. This DNA system ensures that there is one unique payment for each person.

Cancer people can use their cancer DNA, which is different from their own DNA, to claim more money. Viruses can also be used to change DNA, since that is how viruses reproduce - they change the DNA of cells to make those cells make more viruses. If you test for DNA by taking blood samples, people who had bone marrow transplant will have same DNA as people who donated the bone. Also, I can print custom DNA that is not like any other person's DNA. It takes long time, and can not be put into people yet, but soon technology will change that. DNA is not a scarce or unique resource, like time, energy, and work.

If people end up with lots of money, and corporations get obsolete currency, as you say, that will be very bad. People with little money will not know what to do with lots of money besides spend and waste it, and corporations will not have money to buy supples to make products, and money to pay their employees. Poor people with lots of money will not have jobs, and will not have products to spend money on, so their lots of money will become worthless too. Money is not measure of one's wealth. It is measure of one's production capability and ability to think. So corporations will still be rich, because they still have their buildings, factories, people, and knowledge of how to run their business.
There is reason that wealthy people and corporations have much money - they know how to use it and how to take care of it.

So if I had cancer and I did a heredity test with my kid that would screw up the results? Just because DNA is altered by something doesn't mean a computer definitely couldn't identify what person it was, a sophisticated enough machine could check for cancer, etc. You are saying you could make a vial of my blood in a lab? I don't think so.

What are you talking about when you say 'spend and waste it'? Spending isn't wasting money it's enjoying it at least. Spending is investing in the products you buy, it doesn't cause the money to disappear from the economy. This is just a transfer of wealth from the global rich to the global poor via corporations. How much cash does a corporation have at any one time? What proportion of their wealth is in physical money? Taking it would be unlikely to bankrupt a profitable company. Employees would have their allotment of coins, (less than their usual salary admittedly). If they want to make money they just have to sell more of their stock or services, in the developing world demand would be big. It's just a hit to large corporations, a tax that they'll pay to the poor. The richest country in the world by GDP per person is Qatar; they don't work or do anything productive with their labor, they get Pakistani servants to do everything for them. So why are they the richest? Because they a have valuable natural resource. People are poor because they are cut off from the wealth of natural resources, usually either land or energy. Being efficient and productive is valuable for ensuring that your military seizes the best resources but you're kidding yourself if you think wealth distribution is a result of these attributes alone. People behave in the way that's most appropriate for the environment they inhabit, that's a natural human law and if we can change that environment people can have any positive qualities you want. This is a tax that corporations will pay to the poor for monopolizing natural resources for decades; that is all.

[Hideyoshi]

So if I had cancer and I did a heredity test with my kid that would screw up the results? Just because DNA is altered by something doesn't mean a computer definitely couldn't identify what person it was, a sophisticated enough machine could check for cancer, etc. You are saying you could make a vial of my blood in a lab? I don't think so.

If you test your normal cell, it will be ok, but if you take your cancer cell and test it, it will have DNA that will not be like yours. It may pass heredity test, but it will not pass test as your DNA. You did not mean that anyone who is related will not get DNA money, and only one person in family will get money, did you?
I can not make vial of your blood in lab, but I can make your DNA in lab. I can then inject that DNA in blood cell. It takes very long time to make DNA, and I would need to inject it into blood cell one by one, because blood does not divide. To make vial of your blood in lab, I would need to make your DNA in lab and use it to clone and grow bone marrow, which can then grow your blood. It is still very new and very difficult to pull off technology, which will take years with technology we have now, but it will become much easier and faster to do, even to create blood cells themselves in vials, very soon.

What are you talking about when you say 'spend and waste it'? Spending isn't wasting money it's enjoying it at least. Spending is investing in the products you buy, it doesn't cause the money to disappear from the economy.

This is what I mean by people who are not rich do not know how to use and take care of money. When you buy something, you are not investing. You are using up money on something that itself will get used up. There is difference between earning or spending money, and between making money. Wealthy people and corporations actually make money, by putting cheap things together to make more expensive things. As saying goes, sum is greater than its parts. When people earn money, they just trade one thing they do not need, like their time and labor, for another thing they do need, like money. When people spend money on products, they also trade something they do not need, like money, on things they do need, like products. And those products wear out, which means that they need to trade more labor for more money, and more money for more products. Wealthy people invest by spending money on things that will make them more money, like property, stocks, building businesses and companies, or even buying labor that they can combine with other things to make products that are worth more than labor and those other things.

So if poor people get money, who only know how to convert it to products that will wear out, then all they will have is less and less money as their products wear out. If they did know how to take care of and use money, they would use it to invest in things that would make them money, and if they knew how to do that, they would not have been poor to begin with. Does this make sense?

How much cash does a corporation have at any one time? What proportion of their wealth is in physical money?

Millions of dollars, and billions for some corporations. It is cash that is transitioning through their corporation, which they just received for selling their products, and they will be using in a few days to pay their employees and suppliers. If you take most of their cash, they will not be able to pay their employees, who will go hungry and quit, and they will not be able to pay their suppliers, who will not sell them more supplies to make products out of. So company will go out of business. Many businesses had to close when Cyprus took money from banks, because many businesses kept their money there for reasons I mentioned.

It's just a hit to large corporations, a tax that they'll pay to the poor.

Corporations made lots of money because they made things that people wanted to buy. They are rich because people traded money that they did not want for corporation products. So corporations already served poor people by giving them what they want. Why must corporations give even more?

The richest country in the world by GDP per person is Qatar; they don't work or do anything productive with their labor, they get Pakistani servants to do everything for them. So why are they the richest? Because they a have valuable natural resource.

People in Saudi Arabia are like this too. They have much natural resource, so people get paid $1,000 for doing nothing. Everyone is rich, and does not need to work. Because of that, everyone does what they want, not what is needed. Because religion is very respected, most people there go to school to learn and get degrees in religion.  So natural resource of Saudi Arabia is poisoning everyone's minds. What is worse is that natural resources are not unlimited. When it runs out in Qatar and Saudi Arabia, you will have entire country full of people who do not know how to do anything, and do not know anything other than religion. They will be very poor, very desperate, and very religious and very angry. It is going to be big problem. Much worse than terrorism is today.

People are poor because they are cut off from the wealth of natural resources, usually either land or energy.

If that is true, explain Israel, Dubai, and Japan? They have no resources at all, but are riches countries in middle east and Asia. Not wanting to use your mind and not wanting to be productive is what makes people poor. In fact, if you look around at different countries, you will see that those with many natural resources are most poor and corrupt, and those without are much more wealthy. Reason is because those without resources must rely on their own intelligence to make money.

Being efficient and productive is valuable for ensuring that your military seizes the best resources... This is a tax that corporations will pay to the poor for monopolizing natural resources for decades; that is all.

It is very not efficient to seize resources with military. It is much cheaper to ask for and trade for those resources with people who have them. This is because people who have those resources know best how to get them, and if you take resources, you will have to deal with angry people trying to kill you. Only reason corporations monopolize natural resources is because no one else knows better than they do how to extract them. If you and your family and friends were given oil rigs over Norway, what would you do with them?
Also, if you take resources from corporations, or tax corporations, then you will just become the new monopoly that is controlling those resources. You will either be extracting resources yourself, or having corporation work for you. So who will later tax you for being new monopoly in charge of resources?

[qiwoman]

There are two types of people..The Oppressors and the Oppressed..When the Oppressed wake up and say they have had enough then many different types of economic systems will come to the Fore so then nothing will really matter. Foe now let's enJoy the ride and the revolution BTC is bringing and the Hope to the Average Joe and then later down the line we can address if the BITCOIN PROTCOL Experiment needs a good tweak.

[Rassah]

There are two types of people..The Oppressors and the Oppressed..When the Oppressed wake up and say they have had enough then many different types of economic systems will come to the Fore so then nothing will really matter.

The question is who is who? Are the workers the oppressed, and the businesses and corporations the oppressors, in which case the workers will rise up, take control, and relieve the wealthy business owners of their wealth, as happened in communist revolutions during the last century?
Or are the business people and entrepreneurs the oppressed, and the workers the oppressors, feeling that it is unfair that some people have much and they have little, and using the power of government to regulate and take from those business people and entrepreneurs, in which case it's the wealthy business types that will rise up, take their wealth, and move elsewhere? This wasn't really possible with wealth being stored in banks, since that wealth could just be frozen and confiscated by governments, but it's possible now...

[capoeira]

There are two types of people..The Oppressors and the Oppressed..When the Oppressed wake up and say they have had enough then many different types of economic systems will come to the Fore so then nothing will really matter.

The question is who is who? Are the workers the oppressed, and the businesses and corporations the oppressors, in which case the workers will rise up, take control, and relieve the wealthy business owners of their wealth, as happened in communist revolutions during the last century?
Or are the business people and entrepreneurs the oppressed, and the workers the oppressors, feeling that it is unfair that some people have much and they have little, and using the power of government to regulate and take from those business people and entrepreneurs, in which case it's the wealthy business types that will rise up, take their wealth, and move elsewhere? This wasn't really possible with wealth being stored in banks, since that wealth could just be frozen and confiscated by governments, but it's possible now...

yea, and the enslavors where the victoms in slavory. SInce i know Bitcoin and got to know the libertarian sect (for me it is a sect because of confirmation bias, profetizing satoshi, citing half a frase of him as a commandment, etc.) my forehead allready got flat like a board. never facepalmed so much.

n which case it's the wealthy business types that will rise up, take their wealth, and move elsewhere?

would be nice, let them take all their wealth and go to Mars. would give the humanity another chance. and this time we install an antivirus

[Rassah]

Slavors where the victoms in slavory.

Slaves had no choice in what they worked on, whom they worked for, and what they got in return. Workers can change careers, change employers, and negotiate pay. The two are incomparable. The only thing workers can complain about is not being paid fairly, but fairness is subjective, while pay is a function of supply and demand. If they want to get paid more, they need to supply something that's in higher demand.

n which case it's the wealthy business types that will rise up, take their wealth, and move elsewhere?

would be nice, let them take all their wealth and go to Mars. would give the humanity another chance. and this time we install an antivirus

So, what will you do if your employer left, the store you by things from closed and left, and all the things your government provides you with had to be paid with your own taxes? Would you be able to run your company, manage the supply chain that your store uses to stock it's shelves, and make millions to pay for those tax provided services? I would guess no, because otherwise you would have already been running your company or your own store, and would have already been making millions.

What is it that you actually contribute to the world, that you believe will be enough to keep your world going without those running the businesses you deal with?

[bitdude55]

My point about the heredity test is that we already use DNA testing to identify a person to a great degree of certainty. We also have tests to detect when blood has been tampered with. Custom making unique DNA and physically inserting it into blood cells or cloning and growing unique bone marrow sound like expensive ways to gain a fairly small amount of money (maximum $600). As long as a computer can say that a vial of blood came from a certain person and that it hasn't been tampered with, blood could be used as a form of identification for this system.

Up to now I have been writing about this idea as something that could be pushed on people, a run on cash, a form of striking, a revolution; but now I think it would have to be something that people in the developed world choose to do voluntarily. As they are the ones who will be giving up most of the wealth it could not be forced upon them and they need some incentive to participate. One incentive would be to give relief to the world's poor; but there is another more practical reason to adopt a global egalitarian cryptocurrency.

I suppose that natural resources are best handled by those that know best how to manage them, that way the most valuable possible objects will be produced per unit of natural resource. As such natural resources and wealth are only wasted on people who have not reached a certain level of organization, cooperation, efficiency and rational thinking. It is better for energy to be concentrated on a wealthy minority that know how to reproduce it efficiently. There is a major flaw in this line of thinking. Yes developed countries have figured out how to yield the greatest value from natural resources such as land and energy but they have neglected to invest in the greatest natural resource of all: the human race.

By neglecting to invest in the world's poor the developed world has allowed a huge gulf to grow in terms of relative standards of living and most importantly education. There are about 1.2 trillion american dollars in cash, America's wealth is thought to be around 120 trillion dollars. Adopting this cryptocurrency would make only a small dent on American wealth but for 40% of the world's population earning less than $2.50 a day it would be unimaginable wealth ($600). Nothing could do more to boost the world's productivity than investing in education and tools for the world's poor. Adopting a global egalitarian currency would be different to any other form of wealth redistribution in that it would be totally decentralized. Instead of giving aid to corrupt governments that don't understand the needs of their people, for the first time they would receive the money directly. I'm a big believer in the work of philosopher Nassim Taleb; he frequently writes about the disastrous consequences of centralized planning and organization that simply fails to respond to dynamic and organic processes. If people can decide for themselves or in small groups what they need they are more likely to become productive. Yes some will simply consume their share of coins. There are geniuses in every part of the world but most live and die without ever achieving a fraction of what they could have because the group they belong to has been designated 'unproductive'. This cryptocurrency would give the poor an opportunity to get the things they need to be productive, it will allow the entrepreneurs among them a chance to emerge.

To accompany this redistribution of the world's cash I would also suggest an exodus of people to the developing world in order to assist in the transition. All across Europe and America young, college educated people are sitting at home consuming welfare because there is no demand for their skills. In the developing world they could share their knowledge and make a real economic and social impact. This cryptocurrency would give people a real motivation to go to the poorest parts of the world and offer their valuable services because there would be 'gold' to earn. As long as the rich world agreed to use this currency the lives of the rich and the poor would be deeply intertwined in a way they are not now because the 'gold' would be distributed equally to begin with. I believe that this would be a form of long-term investment that would eventually pay off enormously.     

[Hideyoshi]

There are two types of people..The Oppressors and the Oppressed..When the Oppressed wake up and say they have had enough then many different types of economic systems will come to the Fore so then nothing will really matter.

The question is who is who? Are the workers the oppressed, and the businesses and corporations the oppressors, in which case the workers will rise up, take control, and relieve the wealthy business owners of their wealth, as happened in communist revolutions during the last century?
Or are the business people and entrepreneurs the oppressed, and the workers the oppressors, feeling that it is unfair that some people have much and they have little, and using the power of government to regulate and take from those business people and entrepreneurs, in which case it's the wealthy business types that will rise up, take their wealth, and move elsewhere?

That is good point. There is now much oppression of not only wealthy people, but small business owners and entrepreneurs, who must now pay for expensive licenses and fees to do their jobs. There are news that almost 10 wealthy people leave America every month to avoid paying these high fees and taxes. We even have examples of this here in bitcoin community, such as Erik Voorhees leaving and moving to Panama because it is much easier to establish business there, and China becoming more dominant in Bitcoin because it is difficult to do anything with bitcoin in America. Business and entrepreneur people will keep leaving, poor people will have fewer job opportunities and become poorer, and they will get more angry and demand more money and more things from business people and entrepreneurs, and cycle will continue until everyone is poor and with no work. It is already much easier to get job in China and India than in Japan and America.

[Hideyoshi]

Up to now I have been writing about this idea as something that could be pushed on people, a run on cash, a form of striking, a revolution; but now I think it would have to be something that people in the developed world choose to do voluntarily. As they are the ones who will be giving up most of the wealth it could not be forced upon them and they need some incentive to participate. One incentive would be to give relief to the world's poor; but there is another more practical reason to adopt a global egalitarian cryptocurrency.

There is already working solution to this, and people are doing it voluntarily. Until just decade or so ago, it was much better to hire well educated people in developed world to do skilled labor, because the people in developed world already had needed skills. But then people in developed world voluntarily chose to raise minimum wage, and increase regulation, so now it is cheaper to hire and train people in places with a lot of poor people. This past decade has seen unbelievably large amount of poorest people in all of world get pulled out of poverty through economic expansion in India and China. Indians are much grateful to developed world for voluntarily doing those choices. Namaste!

[capoeira]

I was thinking a lot about how to respond the "Holocaust denial" - like arguments of some here, but i just suggest you guys continue in this "this world is perfect, why change?"-thread and leave this here ontopic: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=370034.0




just leaving you a text from Bessie A. Stanley:



"What is Success?

To laugh often and love much; to win the respect of intelligent persons and the affection of children; to earn the approbation of honest citizens and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to give of one’s self; to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to have ?played and laughed with enthusiasm and sung with exultation; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived—this is to have succeeded"