This thread actually highlights some of (finite) crypto currencies long-term economic flaws.
For example, in the case of Bitcoin, once all 21 million Bitcoins are in circulation the process of diminishing availability is in fact inevitable.
Most agree that this actually makes the remaining supply of Bitcoins even more valuable for a time i.e. rarity vs scarcity etc. and that you can still ofc spend 0.00001 of a Bitcoin etc.
However, this does eventually become an issue: "You cannot trade in diminishing intangibility", well you can, although not at an ever increasing level of 'value'.
When something finite isn't being produced anymore, eventually their will be nothing left. Fact.
Ironically, it is in fact the finite nature of Bitcoin that actually gives it most of its intrinsic value in the first place.
Yes we can't.
...
I'm pretty sure that someone already did something similar to this. Anyone remember the name of the coin?
You had to at least move your coins (possibly back into your own wallet) once per year to prove that the wallet wasn't lost. If not, your coins would disappear and go back into the general pool to be mined again or something.
I have also given much thought to this long-term 'problem' and looked at ways to try and avoid this situation without effecting this finite value.
We humans actually cause most of the diminishing availability issues; we loose our wallet passwords, we leave our laptops on the subway, we leave 0.00000001 transaction in wallets that we abandon because they are 'worthless' (which all add up eventually) and sadly we also die, sometimes unexpectedly and without leaving a last will and testament etc., ...
The solution ?
See:
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/04/google-death-a-tool-to-take-care-of-your-gmail-when-youre-gone/274934/"Google has now rolled out a technological solution, a euphemistically titled "Inactive Account Manager" tool ("Control what happens to your account when you stop using Google," the company says, i.e. die)."This is where the best solution is probably found. A wallet should contain a slider where its owner selects a period of time that determines if coins from the balance have not been spent within X duration and then automatically 'will' the balance to X specified address.
It would also be possible to do this against coin age i.e. something similar to a proof-of-stake mechanism - we can call this a
Proof-of-Transaction Again, if coins have not been spent from the balance within X number of years then the balance would be automatically spent (perhaps distributed as transaction fees over time) and would therefore go back to the miners and back into active circulation. The 'default' value could be set at 100 years.
This is actually very difficult to implement as it is vulnerable to something similar to a time travel attack on the blockchain, as well as numerous other factors.
