What are Beertokens: http://exchange.beertokens.info/docs/images/beer_logo75.pngBeertokens are trust shares in a crypto-currency trust that is traded with it's own crypto-currency chain where each Beertoken is one of the 100,000,000 total initial outstanding shares in the trust. The trust is setup with rules and a prospectus similar to what a standard corporation or trust would use. Beertokens was created to communicate a concept and to be an example of a proof of concept of the infrastructure needed to support such a method. I should also note that BeerTokens chain has not been created yet as we continue to develop software needed to make it a reality. For an updated status of the BeerA crypto currency spec overview see
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=9493.msg423706#msg423706. Also see MultiCoin where a majority of these dreams of new crypto currencies are becoming a reality :
http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=24209.msg300830#msg300830What are the Beertokens Trust rules:The Beertoken rules are controlled by the present holders of the Trust. The votes of the holders of the trust are controlled by the number of beertokens a voter is holding at the time of each of the quarterly meetings or anytime a new issue is brought forth onto The Trust. The simple rule from the start of distribution of Beertokens is that “The central beertoken exchange will buy and sell from it's internally owned pool of Beertokens ( that at start total 100,000,000 initial beertokens, but if the market demands more than 100mil and if/when we sell out we just create a new chain with more that are trade-able 1 to 1 to the new chain over the central exchange to make the supply unlimited yet with controlled distribution) and it's accumulated other currencies and assets, at the price of one 330mL can of Leo Beer as seen priced in all 7-11 stores in Thailand with a spread of +-3%” . The price of Leo Beer will be updated quarterly or when a transition in the price is detected, at todays price one 330mL can of Leo Beer at a 7-11 store is 30 Baht or $0.9907 USD (updated 7/28/11 price 1 Beer = 1.010010 USD). For transaction of BTC to BEER since the price is so unstable at present the spread will be the mtgox low of the day -3% and the mtgox high of the day +3%. For other currencies including USD, PPUSD, THB, it will be the the currencies value with added spread -3% and +3% minus all transaction fee's as compared to the value of BEER. Remind you that private traders can trade between the central exchange spread to make it even more stable and can use BEER as the base currency in speculation trading of BTC or any other currency. The Trust rules would also contain what assets the trust would hold as backing with possibly 50% in BTC and 50% in a diverse set of other currencies that would be used at the exchange to move from one currency to another. These percent holding overtime may change depending on market conditions and what was decided by The Trust.
Why do we need a Beertokens trust:The purpose of the Beertokens trust is a concept to attempt to create a more stable currency that will not change in value more than between +-3% over time so that merchants can start using crypto currencies for what they were meant to be used for instead of just speculating. Since it will also base a majority of it's asset holdings in Bitcoin it could also act as a stabilizing capital entity to help stabilize the price of Bitcoin as well, if the asset base got big enuf to be influential.
The new http://exchange.beertokens.info currency exchange: http://exchange.beertokens.info/docs/images/beertokens_exchange150.pngI have already setup a new exchange to move between several currencies including BTC, TNBTC, WEEDS, BEER, USD, PPUSD, THB at:
http://exchange.beertokens.info . At present the exchange site is only setup for testing and will only trade between TNBTC (testnet BTC) and WEEDS (another test currency) and now also open for trades between BTC and BEER with limited max deposit accounts of max .1 BTC per account. We will soon also activate the site to accept international currencies into the exchange through banking, PayPal and other transactions. I have the FAKE testnet TNBTC exchange continuing to run so people can learn how to use it without even having any real money in it. At this time there are no transaction fee's on any transactions in the beertokens exchange.
What is WEEDS currency: http://exchange.surething.biz/docs/images/weedlogo64.pngWeeds is another test crypto-currency, created for testing and as a proof of concept to using the new multi crypto-currency client now called MultiCoin. Weeds also uses some of the new rules changes possible with MultiCoin that include controlled inflation. In the case of Weeds all the coins were minted within the first 10 blocks in the chain for a total of 10,000,000 Weeds. Weeds also has a set minimum of .01 transaction fee for every transaction. This is all that is received by the miners that mine for weeds. This is very much like what we had planed for the rules of BeerTokens with a few other modifications added. For more details on the specs. of WEEDS see MultiCoin:
http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=24209.msg300830#msg300830 . The creator and supporter of the WEEDS test currency and other Alternate crypto chains. WEEDS is used in the BeerTokens Exchange for testing of exchange infrastructure and is setup as a simulation of how BeerTokens are traded.
What is the MultiCoin client: http://exchange.beertokens.info/docs/images/multcoin150x50.pngThe MultiCoin client is a new slightly modified Bitcoin client that allows transactions with an unlimited number of crypto currencies block chains. Each different crypto currency has a different set of rules and a different root block that is controlled by settings in the MultiCoin config file. The code for MultiCoin and also MultiCoin-qt (the gui version) are open source . The MultiCoin client will also be able to transact the new beertokens chain when the beertokens config file is released in the near future. MultiCoin now also provides P2P escrow features that have been tested as working on testnet and weedsnet. We are not sure if the escrow features will work on Bitcoin Mainnet yet. for more details about Multicoin see
http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=24209.0