It's not self evident to any "us" that includes MPEx. Peer-to-peer markets are, as far as we can see, pure nonsense.
LOL. I didn't expect anything different from MPOE-
PR, and it is probably a good thing that you're commenting on p2p markets (it's a sign that you're afraid of them, which means...)
But I think you do not understand how it is supposed to work.
We can decouple asset ownership tracking from exchanges from listings/ratings.
Which means you can create more centralized solutions
on top of low level p2p market infrastructure. Say, you can create MPOE-P2P which would be
exactly like MPEx except that it would accept ECDSA signatures instead of PGP signatures.
So p2p markets are simply more flexible: they can mimic and interoperate with centralized solutions, but they also offer a number of interesting options.
Much in the same way wikipedia does not work as a textbook
If you want a shitty analogy, p2p market is more like WWW: you can get both textbook and wikipedia content over HTTP. It can handle both. Choice is up to you. Students often use wikipedia
in addition to their textbooks.
Peer to peer markets will work exactly for what and exactly how
Of all people, you're the most informed about how they will work. LOL.
GLBSE has shown them to work (a centralized market run by undistinguished members of the general public being indistinguishable from a peer to peer market in any practical sense): a collection of the useless, the dysfunctional and the pointless taking turns to become fashionable, thus copied, thus reinforced by "social proof", presided upon by many idiots of which some are useful and a handful are outright con artists, generating an ever increasing quantity of drama per BTC.
How much does Mircea pay you for your writing, Hannah? Reminds me of Matt Taibbi a bit. But try even more vitriol next time.
going to be need for a place where the above average can be listed, and that's the end of the p2p market as a serious venue.
Right, if somebody makes such listing p2p market will just collapse. Because if you add one bit of information per ticker (shoddy/non-shoddy) it would somehow ruin everything.
A market of one billion dollars obtained through adding together one million different "securities" with markets averaging one thousand each is neither large nor liquid. It is painfully fragmented and utterly illiquid. Because, again, fungibility matters.
You forget that technology, in theory, would allow you to invest in
each of these million of securities. Perhaps some 3rd party rating agency will provide trustworthiness score for each issuer. Just use trustworthiness as weight when you buy them.
When you liquidate, you'll get good deals on some of these bonds and shitty deals on other ones. This, likely, averages to something sensible.
So it is statistically liquid. Not in the same way as one big security, but quite likely it would be acceptable.
It makes no difference if you're investing a lot or a little money. This is a completely imagined distinction, a bad buy is a bad buy at any size.
Only if you assume linear utility function. Don't forget that people send a lot of money to Satoshi Dice, this means that for real people utility function is very different from what you think it is.