Quote from: MatTheCat on October 12, 2014, 04:06:02 PM

Quote from: nuff on October 12, 2014, 03:59:51 PM

Wrong. Bitcoin is or can be money (it's fungible, transactable, and has a value). But to me Bitcoin is more an asset, a store of value, rather than a currency. Bitcoin is entire independent, if bitcoin were to be affected by external markets that's only because the people thought it to be. But by its very nature, Bitcoin is absolutely independent and decentralized.

It could be money. But it isn't and it never will be.

If it is to succeed, it will be as a means of making money transfers or payments, but with the units of account that everyone is primarily concerned with being, Dollars, Euros, Pounds, Shekels, Yen, etc.

The most important ingredient behind any monetary standard is the authority that stands behind it and enforces it's use as money and that is because the #1 property of 'money', is that people have confidence in it. This even applies to the use of precious metals as money throughout history. Gold and silver coin also required some sovereign power somewhere, who was willing to recognise the metal tokens as being of value, or at least for a small fee, who was willing to the melt the metal coins and remint them into a form which was recognised as having value. This will never apply to Bitcoin.

What we might get is some kind of asset backed digital currency based around crypto technology, with all the pernicious aspect's of the Bitcoin block chain built into it. One wallet per global citizen. All economic transactions fully traceable.

Interesting approach.

But what if just one country accepts taxes in its own currency and also in Bitcoin? What would the other countries do?