Crypto currency relies on a base truth about money — it is a construct. Money is a stand-in for agreement on value. Money operates on trust. Money speeds and obfuscates negotiation. Money keeps us from having to carry around sheep or chickens.
Crypto currency replaces sheep for bytes.
@patrickrhone We long ago stopped carrying sheep, replacing it with legal tender. The marginal gain between paper and bytes is too small for my taste since all kinds of riff-raff can create a crypto-currency. Just look at World Liberty Financial.
@ReaderJohn And hence my argument, one can point at anything and call it currency. And as long as you can get someone else to agree it is.
At least shiny rocks, dinosaur goo, sheep are good for something.
Crypto takes that pleasant fiction one step further by pointing at — essentially — thin air and calling it currency and getting others to believe it.
@patrickrhone Yuval cites ‘currency’ as one of the most significant stories in the history of humanity.
@JohnPhilpin Because the only way it works is by telling and selling a story — both to others and ourselves.