The U.S. is considering whether to adopt a digital version of its currency

[cmndr]

1 minute ago, poochyena said:

why?

There's 0 reason for there to be a quasi-permanent record of my behavior which might be used to impeach my character at a later date.

I'll admit I haven't really bothered with any obfuscation in years and I'm pretty boring. There's still NO REASON to have a record beyond several years though.

[Avocado Diaboli]

5 minutes ago, poochyena said:

It doesn't.

I'm sorry, but if you at this point can't see the actual difference it makes, then you're beyond the point of being educated.

[poochyena]

15 minutes ago, cmndr said:

There's 0 reason for there to be a quasi-permanent record of my behavior which might be used to impeach my character at a later date.

Walmart keeps the record already, and no one is going through your credit card records unless you committed murder or something. The odds of anyone looking at your purchases are less than the changes of winning the lottery.

14 minutes ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

I'm sorry, but if you at this point can't see the actual difference it makes, then you're beyond the point of being educated.

You are unable to explain simple concepts, yet you are calling me uneducated? Faux intellectualism is so pathetic. Just admit you don't know, don't go around pretending you know something when you clearly don't. Its only idiots who get offended by the prospect of their ideology being questioned.

[Avocado Diaboli]

7 minutes ago, poochyena said:

You are unable to explain simple concepts, yet you are calling me uneducated? Faux intellectualism is so pathetic. Just admit you don't know, don't go around pretending you know something when you clearly don't. Its only idiots who get offended by the prospect of their ideology being questioned.

You mean similar to you not liking any of the objections people have raised against your seemingly gleeful acceptance of a cash-free future that both doesn't stop criminals while simultaneously prohibiting legitimate customers from possibly buying something not illegal through simple manipulation of behind-the-curtain actions coupled with the notion that it simply isn't the government's business to know how I spend my money regardless of the legality of my purchases, with every one of your rebuttals boiling down to "nu-uh" and never actually delving into any explanation of your own reasoning that isn't transparently flimsy? Pot meet kettle.

 

Sorry, but smarter people than you or I have condemned every action taken to abolishing cold hard cash and only people who have something to gain from it or fetishize government surveillance because they like to invade other people's privacy could ever be in favor of abolishing cash. Or you know, gullible rubes who believe that "your data isn't that important, you're not special or noteworthy enough to be spied upon" is a valid defense of government overreach.

 

I don't usually play the credentials card because it typically shouldn't matter, arguments should stand and fall on their own merits. But I happen to actually work in a government position with a frankly irresponsible amount of private data from citizens available to me. Sure, I'm bound by a legal document I've signed to not abuse my power to look up all this type of information recreationally and only access it if my job requires it, since every request gets logged. And I admit that in my line of work, it's insanely useful to have access to that data. And I agree that most of the time, my coworkers and I don't look up private data on just anyone for the fun of it, though it does happen. But I still object to governments collecting all that data, no matter how unnecessary it seems. Because any data on you can be eventually used against you. And I reiterate: It simply isn't the governemnt's business to know how and where I spend my money. 

[poochyena]

52 minutes ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

prohibiting legitimate customers from possibly buying something not illegal through simple manipulation of behind-the-curtain actions

This has yet to be proven any more likely in a cash free future.

56 minutes ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

with every one of your rebuttals boiling down to "nu-uh" and never actually delving into any explanation of your own reasoning that isn't transparently flimsy?

I can't prove a negative. If you say "prohibiting legitimate customers from possibly buying something not illegal through simple manipulation of behind-the-curtain actions", without any evidence for that claim what so ever, then there is nothing TO rebuttal. Its a completely hollow argument.

58 minutes ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

Sorry, but smarter people than you or I have condemned every action taken to abolishing cold hard cash

I have never suggested that cash should be abolished.

1 hour ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

invade other people's privacy

I could post my full credit card statement right here and no one would have any idea what most of my purchases were. Digital payments are hardly any less private than cash deals.

[cmndr]

1 hour ago, poochyena said:

Walmart keeps the record already, and no one is going through your credit card records unless you committed murder or something. The odds of anyone looking at your purchases are less than the changes of winning the lottery.

Unless you're ACCUSED of committing a murder or something.

You can be factually innocent while still being subjected to a lengthy and stressful legal process that bankrupts you and leaves you in shambles.

[Guest -Senku-]

Money is already digital, how else am i gonna spend money on steam ? iDEAL / paypal / creditcard / etc duh

[poochyena]

18 minutes ago, cmndr said:

Unless you're ACCUSED of committing a murder or something.

You can be factually innocent while still being subjected to a lengthy and stressful legal process that bankrupts you and leaves you in shambles.

You'd need to be more than just accused of a crime to have such invasive search warrants signed off, and even then, your banking details aren't publicized to anyone unless it could be directly connected to the case. A jury won't be presented with your Bad Dragon purchase history unless you are accused of beating someone to death with a dildo. Either way, your purchase history is the least of your problems if there is evidence to convict you of a serious crime.

[cmndr]

6 minutes ago, poochyena said:

You'd need to be more than just accused of a crime to have such invasive search warrants signed off.

No you don't. In the US if you hand data over to a third party it can be subpeonaed. No warrant required.
Also an accusation is often grounds for probable cause for a warrant.

[poochyena]

56 minutes ago, cmndr said:

No you don't. In the US if you hand data over to a third party it can be subpeonaed. No warrant required.

uhh, they can request it, but the company has no obligation to hand it over without a warrant.

56 minutes ago, cmndr said:

Also an accusation is often grounds for probable cause for a warrant.

No its not. If I call into a crime hotline and say I saw Linus Sebastian commit the murder, that wouldn't be enough to get a search warrant unless there was additional evidence such as the murder taking place on his property or something.

[cmndr]

12 minutes ago, poochyena said:

uhh, they can request it, but the company has no obligation to hand it over without a warrant.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subpoena
 

Quote

A subpoena (/səˈpiː.nə/;^[1] also subpœna, supenna or subpena^[2]) or witness summons is a writ issued by a government agency, most often a court, to compel testimony by a witness or production of evidence under a penalty for failure. There are two common types of subpoenas:

 

12 minutes ago, poochyena said:

No its not. If I call into a crime hotline and say I saw Linus Sebastian commit the murder, that wouldn't be enough to get a search warrant unless there was additional evidence such as the murder taking place on his property or something.

You don't need a search warrant for a subpeona. The bar for a subpeona is MUCH MUCH lower than for a warrant.
The bar for a subpeona is remarkably low.

If I filed a civil lawsuit against you alleging something outlandish, I could conceivably pay my own lawyer to subpoena 10 major retailers for your purchase history, google and facebook for your message history/location history and a whole host of other things, in some cases I might need to have the target person request and then submit this data themselves. No probable cause is required, merely a compelling (potentially fabricated) reason.

I would not need a judge to sign off on that.

The general process is something like this:

• Complete the subpoena form.
• Prepare a declaration under penalty of perjury. Briefly describe the documents you need and why they are necessary to prove issues involved in the case.
• Have a subpoena issued by the court clerk.
   

As a rule of thumb, you should assume that any company with digitized records will send over a pdf or archive with TONS of information on it.

[poochyena]

4 minutes ago, cmndr said:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subpoena

You'd subpoena a witness to a crime, you don't subpoena private companies to get private records of other people.

8 minutes ago, cmndr said:

If I filed a civil lawsuit against you alleging something outlandish, I could conceivably pay my own lawyer to subpoena 10 major retailers for your purchase history

I'm not aware of any precedent that suggests you could do such a thing. Subpoenas are for people directly involved in a crime. A 3rd party who is largely unaware of your existence would not be subpoenaed.

[wamred]

Huh, I hadn't ever thought about that but that makes a lot of sense. I never realized that all the digital money I use is managed by the private sector banks.

[Avocado Diaboli]

10 hours ago, poochyena said:

This has yet to be proven any more likely in a cash free future.

Funny how you claim you can't prove your argument and use that as a defense of your view to not actually provide an explanation on the matter but are perfectly fine with accusing others to "prove" their assertion that a policy change like this would have negative impacts on citizens. After all, I can't prove to you what the future will bring unless we let it happen. I hope you see why ignoring obvious pitfalls and being dismissive of objections is a dumb stance to take in this instance.

 

10 hours ago, poochyena said:

I have never suggested that cash should be abolished.

From your original post:

On 2/7/2022 at 6:04 PM, poochyena said:

There will be little reason to even use cash once this is implemented

[mr moose]

2 minutes ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

Funny how you claim you can't prove your argument and use that as a defense of your view to not actually provide an explanation on the matter but are perfectly fine with accusing others to "prove" their assertion that a policy change like this would have negative impacts on citizens. After all, I can't prove to you what the future will bring unless we let it happen. I hope you see why ignoring obvious pitfalls and being dismissive of objections is a dumb stance to take in this instance.

 

From your original post:

Hey, I'm still waiting for someone to give me a legitimate benefit of crypto/digital currency that conventional currency cannot do.  So far the only thing it has managed to do that conventional currency can't is make ransomware payments a whole lot easier.

[Sauron]

11 minutes ago, mr moose said:

I'm still waiting for someone to give me a legitimate benefit of crypto/digital currency that conventional currency cannot do.

DUH, conventional currency can't be exponentially less efficient the more people use it.

 

[05032-Mendicant-Bias]

1 hour ago, mr moose said:

Hey, I'm still waiting for someone to give me a legitimate benefit of crypto/digital currency that conventional currency cannot do.  So far the only thing it has managed to do that conventional currency can't is make ransomware payments a whole lot easier.

You'll be waiting a long time, nocoiner.

Thanks to lack of regulation, cryptos like ETH and BTC allow wealth transfer from poor->rich, and have extreme inequality. 
Gini coefficient measures inequality. 0.0 means everyone is the same. 1.0 means one player has everything.
Germany: 0.31 (somewhat fair with strong support for working class)
USA: 0.48 (deeply unequal)
North Korea: between 0.6 and 0.8 (indentured servitude)
BTC and ETH have about 0.8
https://www.wsj.com/articles/bitcoins-one-percent-controls-lions-share-of-the-cryptocurrencys-wealth-11639996204?redirect=amp

If the world transitioned to crypto, inequality would be increased such that our civilization might regress to slavery. If you are rich, and want to get richer at a faster rate than the current economy allows, then, crypto IS an optimal tool. Crypto is designed from the ground up to favour early adopters and market manipulation.

[IPD]

1 hour ago, mr moose said:

Hey, I'm still waiting for someone to give me a legitimate benefit of crypto/digital currency that conventional currency cannot do.  So far the only thing it has managed to do that conventional currency can't is make ransomware payments a whole lot easier.

Crypto has the additional benefit of apparently being a bit more immune to draconian shutdown measures of conventional funding sites like "kickstarter" and "gofundme".  Not that canadian truckers have anything to say about that...

[Sauron]

2 minutes ago, IPD said:

Crypto has the additional benefit of apparently being a bit more immune to draconian shutdown measures of conventional funding sites like "kickstarter" and "gofundme". 

Literally not true, exchanges can and have shut down with no prior notice. The only difference is they do it when it's financially convenient to them rather than when users break the law.

4 minutes ago, IPD said:

Not that canadian truckers have anything to say about that...

Indeed I don't think they do since related kickstarters seem to have been scams for the organizers to pocket money that never made its way to actual protesters.

 

Oh right, I forgot that crypto bros like it when scams are allowed to happen completely unhindered by "laws" and "morals".

[poochyena]

6 hours ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

Funny how you claim you can't prove your argument and use that as a defense of your view to not actually provide an explanation on the matter but are perfectly fine with accusing others to "prove" their assertion that a policy change like this would have negative impacts on citizens.

My evidence that this won't have negative impacts is the lack of evidence that it would. Its saying asking me to prove tomatoes won't kill you. The fact that there is no evidence they do is evidence they are safe.

6 hours ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

From your original post:

Yes? No where in that quote do I say cash should be abolished.

[Avocado Diaboli]

5 minutes ago, poochyena said:

My evidence that this won't have negative impacts is the lack of evidence that it would. Its saying asking me to prove tomatoes won't kill you. The fact that there is no evidence they do is evidence they are safe.

False equivalence. You claim that your evidence is the absence of evidence to the contrary for a situation that hasn't happened yet and where no data exists. Therefore any of your objections are as easily dismissed as you dismiss my concerns. Especially given the flippant nature you've been displaying and your refusal to actually acknowledge any of the points brought forth to argue that abolishing cash is a phenomenally bad idea except for the reasons I outlined previously.

 

6 minutes ago, poochyena said:

Yes? No where in that quote do I say cash should be abolished.

Then what is the driving motivator behind saying "There will be little reason to even use cash once this is implemented" and being so dismissive of any concerns about the abolition of cash?

[Taf the Ghost]

Saw BTC blowing up on socials this morning. Took a look at what is going on.

 

So, anyway, any argument you had for a digital form of a Central Bank controlled currency kind of goes out the window. What little efficiency is gained comes at the complete cost of your financial freedoms. 

Also, everyone, be safe out there. It's about to get really ugly across a lot of countries.

[IPD]

7 hours ago, Sauron said:

Literally not true, exchanges can and have shut down with no prior notice. The only difference is they do it when it's financially convenient to them rather than when users break the law.

Indeed I don't think they do since related kickstarters seem to have been scams for the organizers to pocket money that never made its way to actual protesters.

 

Oh right, I forgot that crypto bros like it when scams are allowed to happen completely unhindered by "laws" and "morals".

Not disagreeing with either point.  Just noting that there is now a narrative portraying crypto as "evil" and a means to perpetuate bigotry and crime--and that this has come about because crypto has been turned to as an alternative after other, more legitimate means have been struck down by the powers that be.

 

In a perfect world, we would have crowd-source funding sites that will not internally, injunctively intervene in something...and are not beholden to any outside outside pressure to remove specific funding drives except in the case of a court order to do so.  Of course, even such a noble goal would likely fall flat when you have payment companies refusing to play ball (eg. VISA decides that it will not honor payments to this company or a particular crowd-source fund).

[poochyena]

2 hours ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

False equivalence. You claim that your evidence is the absence of evidence to the contrary for a situation that hasn't happened yet and where no data exists. Therefore any of your objections are as easily dismissed as you dismiss my concerns.

yes

2 hours ago, Avocado Diaboli said:

Then what is the driving motivator behind saying "There will be little reason to even use cash once this is implemented" and being so dismissive of any concerns about the abolition of cash?

I, currently, have little reason to use cash. I already explained earlier that the primary reason I use cash now is to avoid card processing fees. Without fees, there would be near zero reason to use cash. I have never said there 0 reason to use cash, never said cash should be abolished, and my dismissiveness of your concerns are due to lack of evidence to support what you are saying would be worse without cash. The only reasonable use case for cash in a future with government backed digital currency is in situations of no internet connection or processing servers going offline. Card processing requires internet and servers, if either one becomes unavailable (such as during a massive gathering of people overloading local internet infrastructure, or payment processing servers temporarily going offline, both things that I have experienced), then cash (or checks I guess) is the only way to pay for something. Sure, you could save the card info and have it charge the card for the product later when you get internet back again, but that has the same issues as checks.

[Sauron]

1 hour ago, IPD said:

Just noting that there is now a narrative portraying crypto as "evil" and a means to perpetuate bigotry and crime--and that this has come about because crypto has been turned to as an alternative after other, more legitimate means have been struck down by the powers that be.

The design of crypto has no real advantages over conventional methods except its grey area status and the lower levels of control that entails. Inevitably its only real uses turned out to be crime and speculation. That's all it's valued for... for any other use, conventional currency is as good or better.

1 hour ago, IPD said:

In a perfect world, we would have crowd-source funding sites that will not internally, injunctively intervene in something...

You can literally go out and make your own today. Just don't complain if you get charged with money laundering because you didn't check on what your platform was being used to "fund".

1 hour ago, IPD said:

Of course, even such a noble goal would likely fall flat when you have payment companies refusing to play ball (eg. VISA decides that it will not honor payments to this company or a particular crowd-source fund).

Yeah, laws exist and companies need to abide by them. Go figure.