[spudwaffle]

> Digital cash, Mr. Zimmermann explained, is "a combination of cryptographic protocols that behave the way real dollars behave but are untraceable."

> In other words, they are packets of worth that have value in cyberspace, the same way dollars have value in the real world, except that they have the properties of anonymity, privacy and untraceability. Many details remain to be worked out, Mr. Zimmermann said.

Very cool how people were predicting cryptocurrencies from the beginning!

[nly]

They weren't predicting cryptocurrencies in 1994... viable digital cash enabled by cryptography had already been developed, and had a level of "anonymity, privacy and untraceability" that make Bitcoin look like a joke. Even the likes of Microsoft bought-in.

The reason none of them succeeded is that they were generally all built around a central banking model, where an existing financial institution had to act as gatekeeper and point of exchange. Government then, and especially corporations today, really don't want you to have anonymity, privacy or untraceable transactions. Until they can tax it, you're not getting it.

Bitcoin solved this, and only this, problem. Like the electric car, really ubiquitous digital currency, with nice properties, is probably going to take the kind of societal change that could another 100 years.

[mirimir]

Cool, yes. But "predicting" isn't how I see it.

We wanted anonymous, private and untraceable digital cash. Many people worked on it. There were several ~centralized electronic currencies, and they all got taken down, sooner or later. Because of FinCEN "know your customer" requirements. E-gold lasted until 2009. Liberty Reserve lasted until 2013, and the founder went to jail. Pecunix still sort of exists in a weird stunted way.

So anyway, Bitcoin was developed as a non-centralized electronic currency. Which would be far harder to take down.

[Nursie]

E-Gold and Liberty Reserve were, like BTC is now, rife with scams, Ponzis and other fraud.

It's not really a surprise that the Quadriga CX founders have history in those arenas.

[mirimir]

Last I checked, dollars are "rife with scams, Ponzis and other fraud". Bernie Madoff, for example.

[Nursie]

Not in the same way, not as their primary use or as such a large proportion of their use.

This is a really disingenuous argument.

[mirimir]

Mostly, for me, it's "so what?".

It's entirely predictable that any system that's truly private, anonymous and untraceable will be abused. That's simply because some people are wont to abuse others.

But that doesn't require that we eliminate privacy and anonymity, and make everything traceable. Personally, that would be intolerable. And unless people became hugely more tolerant, it would tend to enforce conformity, and inhibit dissent.

Also, perhaps ironically, "scams, Ponzis and other fraud" are reliable indicators that systems are truly private, anonymous and untraceable. Canaries, one might say.

[Nursie]

>But that doesn't require that we eliminate privacy and anonymity

But it seriously limits any sort of appeal it may have to regular folk who don't really care about that anonymity.

In the case of Liberty Reserve and e-gold, just their mention becomes a huge red flag for any legitimate activity. Cryptocurrency is basically there too, particularly as it's a worse system in pretty much every other way.

[nineteen999]

> Many details remain to be worked out, Mr. Zimmermann said.

And surprising how little some things have changed in 25 years as well.