On Friday, March 29, 2002, at 08:33 PM, someone wrote: (I'd finished the reply below before noticing that the message was a personal one, not sent to the list. So I've changed the name to "someone.")
> On 29 Mar 2002 at 8:03, Tim May wrote: >> This episode, and the likely fizzling of the silly "E-Gold" >> scheme, is a useful object lesson. > > e-gold is working fine, though there seem to be a huge number of > ponzi schemes seeking e-gold. > > The fundamental pseudonymization mechanism of e-gold is that you > can melt down gold. Let them trace that! > If the gold is shipped, traceability is trivial (pace the usual issues with physical deliveries). If the gold is _not_ shipped, and is stored in some repository, then the E-gold is noting more than a warehouse receipt. The interesting things about true digital cash (i.e., something coming close to Chaum's early ideas) are about the untraceability for both sides in a transaction, not whether the "underlying" thing of value is a Federal Reserve Note, a Bank of England Note, a gram of gold, or whatever. --Tim May "He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." -- Nietzsche
