To: freechina who wrote (1466 ) 10/24/2005 3:45:55 AM From: Maurice Winn Respond to of 218178 Who best to trust to ensure maintenance of a fiat currency store of value? Answer = the current holders of that currency. NOT somebody else, such as Uncle Al KBE, or King George II, or the electorate, or some combination of banks. Those who hold the currency do NOT want it going down the gurgle. They will therefore act to maintain its value. Which means they will not dilute it and give the dilution to other parties as happens at present. They will NOT allow it to fizzle out. They will compete with other forms of currency to maintain a competitive position in store of value and means of exchange. The Quid will be a new, all-singing and dancing cybercurrency, owned and controlled and adjusted by the holders of said currency. A fully abstract unit of measure, unattached to any "real" entity such as a lump of gold, block of land, or chunk of coal. The value will be purely, as with gold and other things of value, a function of scarcity. People will hold a certain amount so they can go shopping when and where they feel like it. Interest rates will be low, as there won't be any inflation to allow for. Really, it will be much the same as normal fiat currencies, with the crucial difference being the holders own and control the currency, not the central bankers, Uncle Al, Uncle Sam and the rabid, thieving, self-dealing, ignorant electorate appointing them. Such a currency has never existed, because it never could. There was no enabling technology. Now there is. Well, it is starting to exist, though it's not extensive enough or cheap enough yet for everyone to join in. I'm in the process of building the technological framework, aka CDMA/OFDM phragmented photon cyberspace, powered by QUALCOMM-enabled cyberphones. After the hardware is extensive enough, then the software can be loaded and trading can begin. Gold, as you say, is a material world anachronism. Hayes and Ai Li will carry cyberphones, not gold, other than as ornamentation [perhaps]. I expect to use the Quid too. It's not that far away. Mqurice