Quote from: Atom on August 04, 2011, 06:53:10 PM

This implies there is a finite amount of value in BTC, and that any fork will neccesarily draw that value away from BTC into the fork.

A successful fork will draw value away from Bitcoin, yes, but it won't diminish the value of a bitcoin at all! It will increase it!

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any fork will get value the same way BTC did - People buying into it with an existing currency. That will most likely be USD.

Don't you think that the adopters of a new crypto-currency would be disproportionately Bitcoin users? Do you think they might feel like they now have to choose how to split their crypto-currency holdings between BTC and the new one?

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As far as relative valuations go, whats the point of having a fork if they trade for exactly the same value? If you want something to be priced exactly the same as BTC I recommend.... BTC.....

lol

Unless the point here is to create a new "early adopter" gold rush while also guaranteeing against non-adoption (the peg), this is a non-starter

There's a hell of a lot more to a crypto-currency than it's exchange rate to another one. The protocol could be changed in all sorts of noticeable ways, that would distinguish it from the other. For example, say you had one that could be used for extreme micro transactions, small enough to pay for each of the individual packets going over the Internet? Do you think that would be enough to cause an exodus from Bitcoin, despite exchange rates remaining at parity? Here's the idea of how this might be possible: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=25786.msg325839#msg325839.

Then suppose Bitcoin eventually got around to implementing this, finally got its users to upgrade their software so that it worked, and eventually wrestled most of its original users back. Well in the meantime these users got to move seamlessly to a kickass new crypto-currency that did so much more for them than the old one, and at the same time their movements led to a ton of innovation. And notice that the new currency issuers are incentivised to innovate by being able to turn a profit! This allows for fierce competition and stability at the same time!

Besides, people stampeding from crypto-currency to crypto-currency fucks over those who don't want to have struggle all the time to stay on top of "the game". It's not a fucking game to most people. They can't reasonably be blamed for "not being sensitive enough to the winds of change". It doesn't help confidence in the stability of crypto-currencies in general to introduce such uncertainty - unnecessarily - as I believe I've shown here.

I hope these fears aren't knee jerk reactions to my use of the words, "peg" and "central bank". First of all, they're temporary (if you want). Secondly, the trust in the central bank can be distributed over an arbitrary number of independent people and organizations. And third, if you analyze this carefully, you'll see that there is never any redistribution of purchasing power until the peg is gradually lifted.