Reality check: Functions of money
Store of Value for rich people
Medium of exchange for traders/producers
measure of value etc.
No one monetary design is optimal for all functions.
A typology of money
Very little consensus on this. Important for the integrity and long term stability of the project.
For all currencies note that the issuer has a tremendous benefit by being able to thrust the money into circulation and usually to control the quantity. Recession means not enough money circulating in the economy.
Commodity money / Barter
Fully backed. What is backing? Why Gold? What if...
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Adventures in mutual credit
Last time I described several solidarity economy networks and a bit about their software situation and needs. Today I want to look at some solutions which could help them work in a more integrated way.
This article starts from the specific problem of accounting, and widens out to whole-platform approaches.
For full interoperability the accounting needs to be abstracted out of the community portal into its own service, and made accessible with an API.
For me the most interesting accounting system is Ripple because it is open and has a web API allowing anyone to plugin and log...
The failure of state-level economic policy is driving the emergence of many independent 'solidarity economy' networks accross the world. While the old story says that resources are short and the fittest will survive, these movements are forging a new story about creating local abundance together. As well as creating a new culture, a new spirituality , they are learning how to
feed themselves from their gardens better than supermarkets
maximise exchange between themselves (and each other) to keep the value local
finance sustainable enterprises,
pool risk
use underemployed people to...
Most ecovillages are progressive outposts on the frontiers of a necessary transition. Damanhur however is the centre of a nascent civilisation. With over 500 adult residents and tens of thousands of connected souls it is the largest ecovillage in Europe; it has created its own culture and its own ways of living in community and understanding and practising spirituality. The heart of the community is a massive and magnificent work, the Temple of Humanity, secretly carved into the mountain over fifteen years before being betrayed to the public.
Forty years ago the original founders held...
Reponse to What Permacredits will look like in our daily lives
Dollars won't be the currency of reference for much longer. Yuan perhaps, or a new gold-backed unit, or Special Drawing Rights, will be the next Reserve currency and and standards of value for the credulous world.
I think the chances of Litecoin becoming a major currency are very slim. We both agree with BL that monetary diversity is desirable for stability, but Litecoin isn't what I would mean by diversity. Litecoin has no marketplace outside of Bitcoin, and no story.
Bitcoin is a global general purpose asset. Backed by...
Yesterday I wrote about how using a currency strengthens the story and gives value to the acts for which that currency was issued. I suggested that anyone can informally certify socially beneficial behaviour and accept those certificates as recognition of their own contributions. Today I will discuss how that principle might pan out in the macroeconomy.
I read somewhere (anybody know?) about a money made from elaborately worked wood and leather disks, which anyone could make with a little practice. If ever anyone couldn't earn the money needed, they could just make it. In this system no-...
When we are compelled to use a currency using such violent means as legal tender laws, latterly money transmission laws, taxes, bailiffs, and the throttling of alternatives, it hardly matters where the money gets its value, or if it has value at all. The 'value' of the dollar tends to mean its price expressed in other commercial credit currencies, but the real value is what the paper represents, what justified its issue.
The emission of money is always complemented by an equivalent value exchange somewhere in time.
When fiat money is created, the issuer is effectively taking spending...
In this talk to the Global Exchange Gathering last week, I show how the competition between timebanking platforms is a result of the software structures, and how even if different platforms can't share code, the can still service their users by becoming more interoperable.
The talk was very well received perhaps because I spent the previous five days in reconnaissance, and thus was able to say what this audience needed to hear.
There is much misunderstanding about the proper basis for issuing currency, especially with regard to somehow limiting the issuance to ensure that the issuers are not over-empowered and the currency tending to worthlessness. With Bitcoin we have a new expression in our vocabulary, 'proof of work'. This too is often misunderstood to mean that work provably done merits a currency reward, but if that were the case the amount of Bitcoin couldn't be fixed. in fact 'proof-of-work' cryptocurrencies entitle the worker to vote on which version of the blockchain is definitive, and enters them into a...
Swiss nonprofit Community Forge was founded in the aftermath of the 2008 banking implosion. The first mission statement was about giving communities the tools they needed, most especially the monetary tools, to become more independent and resilient. Tim Anderson, from the LETS in Geneva, had teamed up with Matthew Slater, a software developer to build a community web portal and accounting tool suitable for LETS. Having deployed in Geneva they decided to go further and publish a free software package, and offer to manage the hosting for as many groups as possible, sharing costs. They found a...
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