What are we creating?

[xeroc]

can we realize international money transfer immediately with almost no fee?
This is a really good use case, and that is why ripple rise high these days. We need one or several clear use case, and the way to realize it.

the BIG difference bitween ripple and bitshares is that ripple does ONLY have gateway IOUs while bitshares has a decentralized market to exchange IOUs into a network-wide bitUSD .. in bitshares, gatways are actually USED as gateways in that they are on/off ramps towards the bitUSD .. and not "money transmitters" (not to be taken legally) in ripple

[xiahui135]

can we realize international money transfer immediately with almost no fee?
This is a really good use case, and that is why ripple rise high these days. We need one or several clear use case, and the way to realize it.

[theoretical]

How would this work?  This would be an important and useful feature which would help us capture really big markets.

My idea for this would be basically zero lines of code.  We'd just make it a separate asset with its own feed, defined to be feed_new_asset = pow(feed_underliyng, k) for a k times leveraged bet.  Changes in the feed make wins or losses in the same direction for the new asset and the underlying, but the new asset wins or loses k times harder because it responds k times more to changes in the feed.

If there's a black swan, at the blockchain level it's a separate asset with a separate feed, so the BitUSD market would be totally unaffected by people trading Leveraged30xBitUSD (well of course there would be economic effects from traders who try to maintain some kind of portfolio of positions in both markets).  In other words, the only people who have to worry about the possibility of black swans caused by the leveraged bets are themselves making equally leveraged bets in the opposite direction.

There's no technical obstacle stopping the delegates from publishing this kind of feed today.  But I'd discourage it right now.  I want to make sure the infrastructure for handling black swans is rock-solid before we encourage creation of assets that are more likely to trigger it.

[CLains]

When you invent the internet, you do not work alongside existing alternates; you replace them.

Excellent analogy: the hypertext technology that we now call the web was in fact really invented by Ted Nelson and the Xanadu project but they failed to be the first to market because they couldn't compromise on their ideals and release something simply good enough. Tim Berners Lee picked the idea and ran with it and his stripped down version of Xanadu became what we know today as the web. Actually it's lucky that Tim Berners Lee was level headed because as it turns out Xanadu never managed to distance itself from its unrealistic ideals and are still vaporware 30 years later. Without Tim Berners Lee the web would probably be the private property of Xerox and IBM.

Powerful stuff. Ted Nelson seems like a cool guy from the Satoshi "reaveal" video, but it really is sad that some of the most passionate, idealistic people are so hard on themselves and so square on principles that they give up chances to claim the power they deserve, that will let them flourish, and will benefit the world.

[carpet ride]

From my point of view, Ripple is doing the wisest thing by pursuing progressive change instead of disruption.

No. Ripple is taking the easiest path to a quick profit. Its lazy and that is not the better route to progress.
That post looks like a bed time story for Ripple execs.. it's nonsense.

Ripple is a company. Generating value for its equity holders is the main goal of a company, but you know that already. In that perspective, homing on the steepest growth gradiant isn't lazy but effective. I'm not saying that I support that from a philosophical perspective, but I'm not here to discuss philosophical ideals but practical down-to-earth matters such as first-mover advantage and opportunities.

I agree with a lot of what have been said above about ideals, but ideals are just that: ideals. They are what the perfect world would be if it wasn't the way it really is. Unfortunately, the world is the way it is, and only things that take into account the reality of our world and come up with realistic solutions can have an actual impact on it. Had Ripple been following libertarian ideals, it wouldn't have seized the oppotunity to partner with banks, and it's about another firm we would be discussing instead.

It's not like the world has to choose a project exclusively among libertarian cryptocurrencies, and adapt itself to the project and its philosophical ideals. It doesn't work like that. The way it works is that there are opportunities that are reflecting the practical reality of the world in its current paradigm, and the project that will success to adapt to the requirements will prevail. Other projects will remain irrelevant for an undefined amount of time until the paradigm has changed enough to make them relevant.

The point of my post is down to earth: Ripple has smelt an opportunity with the banking sector, has managed to gain a strong foothold in the place and is creating some in-draft for other complementary projects. Bitshares is a good candidate to jump on the bandwagon.

The question is: will Bitshares act as the company it is and seize the profit opportunity, or will it act as a libertarian community and wait for future hypothetical opportunities that match better it's ideals?

Let's not put the cart before the horses: the finance industry and the state are not dying yet and they show interest in blockchain technology out of curiosity rather than actual need; they will laugh at technologies that pretend to replace them and pick the projects that make the effort to fit their requirements. There are opportunities now to be seized and they will be seized no matter what. I would prefer to see projects from the current crypto community seizing opportunities in the real economy and entering the current power stucture even if they have to tone down a bit on their ideals until the time is ripe. If no one steps up and seize the opportunities, the old guard will react and close the opportunity window and you'll see the same old Paypal, Visa, Master, Amex, Bloomberg, Reuters, Swift, Tibco, NYSE technologies and the like stepping in the cryptospace. What do you prefer? Wouldn't Bitshares have a stronger impact on the world and more influence to shift the paradigm if it's an established brand on the Street rather than some obscure group of libertarian philosphers on the Internet waiting for the perfect opportunity to come?

When you invent the internet, you do not work alongside existing alternates; you replace them.

Excellent analogy: the hypertext technology that we now call the web was in fact really invented by Ted Nelson and the Xanadu project but they failed to be the first to market because they couldn't compromise on their ideals and release something simply good enough. Tim Berners Lee picked the idea and ran with it and his stripped down version of Xanadu became what we know today as the web. Actually it's lucky that Tim Berners Lee was level headed because as it turns out Xanadu never managed to distance itself from its unrealistic ideals and are still vaporware 30 years later. Without Tim Berners Lee the web would probably be the private property of Xerox and IBM.

When you invent blockchain technology, you do not work alongside existing alternate trust mechanisms; you replace them.

Well maybe that's what you do when you are called David P Brown, but when you are a developer at Swift and your boss asks you to create some crypto-based middleware for the banks, you just clone the latest crypto and you crank up some closed source thing that will be good enough to handle realtime transfers and settlements among banks while keeoing your firm as a necessary middleman. For all its defaults Ripple is open-source, freeish and it's public infrastructure. So really at this stage it's a question of whether you prefer opensource initiatives like Ripple and Bitshares to become the new financial standard or some proprietary stuff from the old guard. Maybe 10 years down the line if the financial system collapses you'll get better opportunities at your own terms but by then the market will be saturated by competing solutions that may not embarass themselves with too much ideals either.

I would say this is the most significant from Klosure which to be honest I agree with everything you say but I like this the most

"Excellent analogy: the hypertext technology that we now call the web was in fact really invented by Ted Nelson and the Xanadu project but they failed to be the first to market because they couldn't compromise on their ideals and release something simply good enough. Tim Berners Lee picked the idea and ran with it and his stripped down version of Xanadu became what we know today as the web. Actually it's lucky that Tim Berners Lee was level headed because as it turns out Xanadu never managed to distance itself from its unrealistic ideals and are still vaporware 30 years later. Without Tim Berners Lee the web would probably be the private property of Xerox and IBM."

And if bytemaster doesnt become more than 8 bits and doesnt become mega bytemaster then we are screwed.  We cant align ourselves being Libertarians we have to be like Stellar and be looked at as Utilitarians. (mostly the second definition)

u·til·i·tar·i·an·ism
yo͞oˌtiləˈterēəˌnizəm/
noun
the doctrine that actions are right if they are useful or for the benefit of a majority.
the doctrine that an action is right insofar as it promotes happiness, and that the greatest happiness of the greatest number should be the guiding principle of conduct.


We cant just have our ins as college profs, we need to be business people who are pragmatic.  Mega bytemaster has proven hes pragmatic, he must not solidify his views.  He may outcast more people, but more people will come.  If you build it, they will come,

The real question is who would want to hold bitUSD at this point, you cant have leverage that is more than 30x like a futures contract, people wont trade for pennies, and you cant spend it yet at walmart.

We need to make the apps as easy as possible, Apple style.  The key to the iPod was only becomes it did not need drivers to sync into your computer, your computer automatically recognized it, it was also useful and easy friendly, but I want through 4 Apple iPod like devices (not iPods, other companies) because I hated Apple at the time for making the gay colored macs we had in highschool.  But once I came across the iPod, I was in heaven, it was just that easy, no driver needed.  This was back in 2004 I believe.

We need to find honest uses for bitshares and the bitassets.

As a note I would consider my ideology utilitarian not anything else.

I agree.  Once the additional wallets come out we need to go utilititarian full bore


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Ander]

30x leverage is coming provided someone is willing to loan with collateral of just 103% and carry the risk of default.   

The network will not bear the 30x leverage risk, but will allow individuals within the network to take opposite sides of a 30x leverage bet.

How would this work?  This would be an important and useful feature which would help us capture really big markets.

Would it work like this, using OKCoin and 20x BTC leverage as an example:

OKCoin has a Bitshares account with $X worth of Bitshares in it. 
OKCoin uses this as collateral to short (create) $X/3 worth of bitBTC.

OKCoin allows its pool of bitBTC to allow you to open short or long futures contracts on bitBTC at 20x leverage, just as they do now with bitcoin. 

When any individual trader makes a profit, OKCoin pays them.
When the internal trader goes bust, OKCoin is on the hook to the bitshares blockchain for the loss, and uses a system of socialized losses to cover this, just as they do now.

OKCoin cannot go completely bust, because its bitBTC are backed by 300% collateral in BTS.  (Or at least, them going bust would require the ame level of black swan event that destroys all bitAssets).



Is something like that correct?

[bytemaster]

30x leverage is coming provided someone is willing to loan with collateral of just 103% and carry the risk of default.   

The network will not bear the 30x leverage risk, but will allow individuals within the network to take opposite sides of a 30x leverage bet. 

[eagleeye]

From my point of view, Ripple is doing the wisest thing by pursuing progressive change instead of disruption.

No. Ripple is taking the easiest path to a quick profit. Its lazy and that is not the better route to progress.
That post looks like a bed time story for Ripple execs.. it's nonsense.

Ripple is a company. Generating value for its equity holders is the main goal of a company, but you know that already. In that perspective, homing on the steepest growth gradiant isn't lazy but effective. I'm not saying that I support that from a philosophical perspective, but I'm not here to discuss philosophical ideals but practical down-to-earth matters such as first-mover advantage and opportunities.

I agree with a lot of what have been said above about ideals, but ideals are just that: ideals. They are what the perfect world would be if it wasn't the way it really is. Unfortunately, the world is the way it is, and only things that take into account the reality of our world and come up with realistic solutions can have an actual impact on it. Had Ripple been following libertarian ideals, it wouldn't have seized the oppotunity to partner with banks, and it's about another firm we would be discussing instead.

It's not like the world has to choose a project exclusively among libertarian cryptocurrencies, and adapt itself to the project and its philosophical ideals. It doesn't work like that. The way it works is that there are opportunities that are reflecting the practical reality of the world in its current paradigm, and the project that will success to adapt to the requirements will prevail. Other projects will remain irrelevant for an undefined amount of time until the paradigm has changed enough to make them relevant.

The point of my post is down to earth: Ripple has smelt an opportunity with the banking sector, has managed to gain a strong foothold in the place and is creating some in-draft for other complementary projects. Bitshares is a good candidate to jump on the bandwagon.

The question is: will Bitshares act as the company it is and seize the profit opportunity, or will it act as a libertarian community and wait for future hypothetical opportunities that match better it's ideals?

Let's not put the cart before the horses: the finance industry and the state are not dying yet and they show interest in blockchain technology out of curiosity rather than actual need; they will laugh at technologies that pretend to replace them and pick the projects that make the effort to fit their requirements. There are opportunities now to be seized and they will be seized no matter what. I would prefer to see projects from the current crypto community seizing opportunities in the real economy and entering the current power stucture even if they have to tone down a bit on their ideals until the time is ripe. If no one steps up and seize the opportunities, the old guard will react and close the opportunity window and you'll see the same old Paypal, Visa, Master, Amex, Bloomberg, Reuters, Swift, Tibco, NYSE technologies and the like stepping in the cryptospace. What do you prefer? Wouldn't Bitshares have a stronger impact on the world and more influence to shift the paradigm if it's an established brand on the Street rather than some obscure group of libertarian philosphers on the Internet waiting for the perfect opportunity to come?

When you invent the internet, you do not work alongside existing alternates; you replace them.

Excellent analogy: the hypertext technology that we now call the web was in fact really invented by Ted Nelson and the Xanadu project but they failed to be the first to market because they couldn't compromise on their ideals and release something simply good enough. Tim Berners Lee picked the idea and ran with it and his stripped down version of Xanadu became what we know today as the web. Actually it's lucky that Tim Berners Lee was level headed because as it turns out Xanadu never managed to distance itself from its unrealistic ideals and are still vaporware 30 years later. Without Tim Berners Lee the web would probably be the private property of Xerox and IBM.

When you invent blockchain technology, you do not work alongside existing alternate trust mechanisms; you replace them.

Well maybe that's what you do when you are called David P Brown, but when you are a developer at Swift and your boss asks you to create some crypto-based middleware for the banks, you just clone the latest crypto and you crank up some closed source thing that will be good enough to handle realtime transfers and settlements among banks while keeoing your firm as a necessary middleman. For all its defaults Ripple is open-source, freeish and it's public infrastructure. So really at this stage it's a question of whether you prefer opensource initiatives like Ripple and Bitshares to become the new financial standard or some proprietary stuff from the old guard. Maybe 10 years down the line if the financial system collapses you'll get better opportunities at your own terms but by then the market will be saturated by competing solutions that may not embarass themselves with too much ideals either.

I would say this is the most significant from Klosure which to be honest I agree with everything you say but I like this the most

"Excellent analogy: the hypertext technology that we now call the web was in fact really invented by Ted Nelson and the Xanadu project but they failed to be the first to market because they couldn't compromise on their ideals and release something simply good enough. Tim Berners Lee picked the idea and ran with it and his stripped down version of Xanadu became what we know today as the web. Actually it's lucky that Tim Berners Lee was level headed because as it turns out Xanadu never managed to distance itself from its unrealistic ideals and are still vaporware 30 years later. Without Tim Berners Lee the web would probably be the private property of Xerox and IBM."

And if bytemaster doesnt become more than 8 bits and doesnt become mega bytemaster then we are screwed.  We cant align ourselves being Libertarians we have to be like Stellar and be looked at as Utilitarians. (mostly the second definition)

u·til·i·tar·i·an·ism
yo͞oˌtiləˈterēəˌnizəm/
noun
the doctrine that actions are right if they are useful or for the benefit of a majority.
the doctrine that an action is right insofar as it promotes happiness, and that the greatest happiness of the greatest number should be the guiding principle of conduct.


We cant just have our ins as college profs, we need to be business people who are pragmatic.  Mega bytemaster has proven hes pragmatic, he must not solidify his views.  He may outcast more people, but more people will come.  If you build it, they will come,

The real question is who would want to hold bitUSD at this point, you cant have leverage that is more than 30x like a futures contract, people wont trade for pennies, and you cant spend it yet at walmart.

We need to make the apps as easy as possible, Apple style.  The key to the iPod was only becomes it did not need drivers to sync into your computer, your computer automatically recognized it, it was also useful and easy friendly, but I want through 4 Apple iPod like devices (not iPods, other companies) because I hated Apple at the time for making the gay colored macs we had in highschool.  But once I came across the iPod, I was in heaven, it was just that easy, no driver needed.  This was back in 2004 I believe.

We need to find honest uses for bitshares and the bitassets.

As a note I would consider my ideology utilitarian not anything else.

[klosure]

Generating value for its equity holders is the principal goal of a company, but you know that already. In that perspective, homing on the steepest growth gradiant isn't lazy but effective.

Something is wrong with the economy; ever stop to wonder why? Greed is not Good.

Greed is human and will be there no matter what paradigm you shift to.
Look at the Bitcoin community. Is that the blueprint of the ideal society?

Unfortunately, the world is the way it is, and only things that take into account the reality of our world and come up with realistic solutions can have an actual impact on it. Had Ripple been following libertarian ideals, it wouldn't have seized the oppotunity to partner with banks, and it's about another firm we would be discussing instead.

That is lazy. "the world is the way it is", so we just have to play along, rather than ever consider it could be bettered!

It's not lazy but realistic. It doesn't mean you have to give up trying to make it better. But you can't turn it on its head overnight and pretend that going forward the world is just going to be that fantasy place you would like it to be. Making the world a better place starts by looking at it with objective eyes, the beautiful things and the ugly things, be able to tell what is in human nature and what can get better, and think realistically about what you can try to change, where you can get the most impact for the least cost, and how you can avoid hurting people in the process.

The whole point of blockchain technology is to distribute power and wealth. That's a fundamental concept that Ripple seems to want to bypass. Such attitude is at the root of why there is an economic crisis. It's irresponsible.

No, the whole point of blockchain technology is to allow trustless resolution of concurrent access to a distributed databased structured as a chained list of records. Practically speaking, the main effect is to desintermediate the trustees in all sorts of automated transactions that require such concurrent use of a database. But that's pretty much it. Anything more you will slap on top is just your interpretation of the implication of the technology mixed up together with your political leaning and subjective view of the world.
By the way, be careful with how you wield the "redistribution of wealth" rethoric as it just makes Bitshares look like communism, as evidenced by the long trollish thread on Bitcointalk where Bitshares is painted as USSR.

It's not like the world has to choose a project exclusively among libertarian cryptocurrencies, and adapt itself to the project and its philosophical ideals. It doesn't work like that.

"The way it works is that" .. "the practical reality of the world in its current paradigm"

Give over.. that's just fallacy, chatter as faux academic authority, doesn't make truth and is not persuasive.

Oh ok, so you mean the world actually has to chose exclusively among libertarian cryptocurrencies and adapt itself to the project and its philosophical ideals? Glad to hear that, it will make things so much easier indeed.

The point of my post is down to earth: Ripple has smelt an opportunity with the banking sector, has managed to gain a strong foothold in the place and is creating some in-draft for other complementary projects. Bitshares is a good candidate to jump on the bandwagon.

You sound like you're trying to exploit BitShares because it has what Ripple lacks. I can understand Ripple would want a partner like BitShares but understand that BitShares is the stronger partner.

I just see a strong synergy potential between the two projects. Both have got top talents and distinctive advantages that are almost entirely complementary. It's also saden me that such a potent technology as Bitshares is having so little visibility. If you want to give a negative twist to it and antagonize the Ripple community for showing interest in BitShares it's your choice. I hope other BitShares people are a bit more open minded.

Ripple has a corrupted sense of what blockchain technology can do; it opted for the trivial near old banking remittance use of XRP as water but it needs to do what BitShares already can in order to survive; the reality of others like BitShares doing remittances without the wasted wealth value in XRP, will be too much to bare.

I don't get what you mean by "corrupted sense of blochain technology" or "XRP as water" or "wasted wealth value".
As far as I can tell, Ripple seem to be doing just fine these days. Not sure what you think is threatening its survival.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not unrealistic; others have noted that solving today's problems is often better than perpetually chasing perfection - Counterparty dev suggested that a while back too.
If Ripple could offer BitShares access to real markets, then I'd be all for that. You need to understand though that what makes BitShares and others effective, is what has Ripple compromised.

At the pace Ripple is expanding, it's only a matter of time before some real world exchange starts using Ripple as backend.

Open Source works for a reason and you cannot just "clone the latest crypto" if you do not have the skills to do that. There are too many examples of closed source vulnerabilities; so, don't mistake closed source as an option to hide incompetence.

I'm not trying to start a debate about closed source vs open source. I'm just stating that given the fact I don't see the state and finance industry dying of a stroke any time soon, I much rather have opensource and public networks like Ripple and Bitshares seize the opportunities and put a foot in the place than let the old gard catchup and position themselves in the cryptospace with their own closed source and private networks. It won't be an instant utopia, but it's a first step in the right direction that will open the gates for further change and help clearing the massive communication fsck up that has led to the demonization of cryptocurrencies.

Ripple may have strengths and partnering with BitShares could be useful but be realistic about why; and do not see everything as an opportunity to exploit others!

That's petty accusations. I'll pass on it.

Gifting ye old banksters another monopoly, is not going to solve any problem but their own. The world is progressing and Ripple cannot just sit by and do what old banking has done.

You don't get it: banksters have already the monopoly of money and the power to outlaw crypto. Crypto hasn't always been legal, its liberalization is fairly recent and David Cameron's latest blunder is proof that the idea of a general ban of crypto is floating in the air and that we can't consider it for granted in the current climate. We are litterally walking on eggs and it would take as little as allegations that terrorist are using blockchain technology (false flag or not) to tip the balance. Show proactively that crypto and blockchain technology are positive inventions that can propel our economies into a new era of growth and progress and we will prevail but it will take some time. On the other hand if we act like a fanatical and uncompromising bunch of revolutionaries and rock the boat too much, we'll just give a good excuse to the state to defend itself and make sure that these "subversive" technologies can't endanger the global economy. Look at what we got out of the reckless way filesharing was started... the DMCA. I really don't think that it was a wining move.

Again, I'm not saying that I approve the state. I do perceive it as a violent, corrupt and self-serving aberration, and want its demise as strongly as you do, but I also understand that it's extremely powerful and basically holding the world together, and that trying to replace it altogether in one go is just not realistic or even desirable given the price to pay for that. If we are right in our analysis that we have reached the technological level to spawn a new fairer world order, we need to understand that this has to be done with the utmost mindfulness and wisdom and that a long term strategy is more likely than not needed to perfom what essentially amounts to a cerebral spine transplant. We also should not forget that the state is still composed of very normal people like you and me who are caught in the system, don't approve it but have to follow the rules, and would equally want to change it to something better, and that whatever we do with the law and the way it's being intepreted, we will still need these people to run the economy. So no need to needlessly antogonize everybody. That doesn't serve our objectives.

One element of your posts that I agree with is that I expect there may come a point where there is a split between those who are unrealistic and those who want to get something done. However, that is a balance that works both ways. You can do too little too!

I agree with that but if your last sentence is referring to Ripple, I don't think it's a really fair to decide arbitrarily that they are doing too little. They have a strategy that is sound, clear and consistant, and so far they have executed it greatly. That may not send us directly where we really want to go but that gets us closer and still counts as a point scored by our camp. At least Ripple is doing something, and not trolling all day long and partaking in vain internal rivalry like the Bitcoin community has been doing most of last year.

[bytemaster]

Can we combine experience of ripple and our innovation?
We can solve the international money transfer as one step. Once we solve this, we will achieve massive number of users, and of course it is easier for people to accept bit-assets. This may be a possible way to promote. 
People may deposit bitCNY to an account via exchanges or ATM using fiat. And in minutes people in America can withdraw USD via another exchange or ATM.

My question is this:

If BitShares were to partner in some way with Ripple or Stellar.  And those chains worked to form a layer that is more loved by the "elite" psychopaths and their Agenda 21 brethren, could bitshares-based exchanges serve as counterpoints that sufficiently neutralize the toxic collaboration that XRP has with the current system? 

I think it would be more likely that Ripple would side with "regulation" and BitShares-based DACs would be forced to either go along to get along or face strict regulation and media campaigns/false flags that make liberty-loving BitShares promoters out to be "Terrorist-Sympathizers".  But I am up for dissenting opinions.

BitShares is supporting everything to comply with all regulation with User Issued Assets and thus could be adopted by the banks just like Ripple. 

[xiahui135]

Yeah i am also thinking what bitshares want to provide to the world.
Stellar is founded by who founded Ripple. Though it is not that decentralized, it is good solution to the real world.  it is easy for average people to understand what they are doing. They just want to do things like "send USD and receive JPY in any place of the world in seconds" .  It is so easy to understand and attract millions of people join to establish that organization.
Stellar announce they have 3 million users and the number are fast natural growing.   
The goal is described in words that average people can understand, so easy to spread. And the tool is usable. It cost nothing to realize dream for ordinary people.
What is the bitshares goal in one sentence?

To find free market solutions to secure life, liberty, and property.   

Good long term goal.
We want to encourage people hold bit-assets. We firstly have to make bit-assets useful.  So i suggest we may solve some real problems firstly to make people use it.
International money transfer is a good one. If we can solve this problem, we will achieve massive number of users.
Imagine if it is very easy to send CNY in china and receive USD in america, we will win these kind of user. And if there is another good gateway in japan. We will win users of CNY/JPY, CNY/USD,  USD/JPY. When the number of gateway grow, we win massive number of users.

[fuzzy]

Can we combine experience of ripple and our innovation?
We can solve the international money transfer as one step. Once we solve this, we will achieve massive number of users, and of course it is easier for people to accept bit-assets. This may be a possible way to promote. 
People may deposit bitCNY to an account via exchanges or ATM using fiat. And in minutes people in America can withdraw USD via another exchange or ATM.

My question is this:

If BitShares were to partner in some way with Ripple or Stellar.  And those chains worked to form a layer that is more loved by the "elite" psychopaths and their Agenda 21 brethren, could bitshares-based exchanges serve as counterpoints that sufficiently neutralize the toxic collaboration that XRP has with the current system? 

I think it would be more likely that Ripple would side with "regulation" and BitShares-based DACs would be forced to either go along to get along or face strict regulation and media campaigns/false flags that make liberty-loving BitShares promoters out to be "Terrorist-Sympathizers".  But I am up for dissenting opinions. 

[xiahui135]

Can we combine experience of ripple and our innovation?
We can solve the international money transfer as one step. Once we solve this, we will achieve massive number of users, and of course it is easier for people to accept bit-assets. This may be a possible way to promote. 
People may deposit bitCNY to an account via exchanges or ATM using fiat. And in minutes people in America can withdraw USD via another exchange or ATM.

[TurkeyLeg]

"Are we changing the paradigm? Or are we Upgrading it?" 

It's a huge opportunity provided that Bitshares holder are able to step back and look at the big picture objectively and realistically and understand that the state and financial industry aren't going away anyway.

You're wrong. They are going away. Because they aren't suited to the new paradigm that is emerging. And we are.

It wasn't the bunny rabbits that killed off the dinosaurs.

They aren't going away in our life time. Changing the world is a nice dream (and I hope it comes true) but I'll settle for getting rich in the old paradigm. I'm okay with being self interested for me and my family.,

The only problem is that getting rich in the old paradigm actually isn't the same as being self-interested for yourself and your family.

Yes - from a very idealistic perspective, you are correct. And one of the reasons why I'm playing around with BitShares is because in part, I share your ideals and optimism.

But our lenses are all shaded by our life experience. Maybe mine aren't quite as rose colored as others - doesn't make me wrong.

[davidpbrown]

I have no interest in 'we'. If delegates continue to perform tasks that help grow my personal vision, I will vote for them. If delegates go against my financial and social interests, I will campaign against them. Not everyone needs to drink the same Koolade for this project to be successful.

That's true but then in reality you do not have 101 developers. The core of BitShares needs to be considered and stay on target.

I guess that also raises a question about the prospect of Ripple just buying their way into BitShares and voting alongside everyone else, which I guess we couldn't argue with.

[hpenvy2]

I have no interest in 'we'. If delegates continue to perform tasks that help grow my personal vision, I will vote for them. If delegates go against my financial and social interests, I will campaign against them. Not everyone needs to drink the same Koolade for this project to be successful.

[davidpbrown]

Generating value for its equity holders is the principal goal of a company, but you know that already. In that perspective, homing on the steepest growth gradiant isn't lazy but effective.

Something is wrong with the economy; ever stop to wonder why? Greed is not Good.

Unfortunately, the world is the way it is, and only things that take into account the reality of our world and come up with realistic solutions can have an actual impact on it. Had Ripple been following libertarian ideals, it wouldn't have seized the oppotunity to partner with banks, and it's about another firm we would be discussing instead.

That is lazy. "the world is the way it is", so we just have to play along, rather than ever consider it could be bettered! The whole point of blockchain technology is to distribute power and wealth. That's a fundamental concept that Ripple seems to want to bypass. Such attitude is at the root of why there is an economic crisis. It's irresponsible.

It's not like the world has to choose a project exclusively among libertarian cryptocurrencies, and adapt itself to the project and its philosophical ideals. It doesn't work like that.

"The way it works is that" .. "the practical reality of the world in its current paradigm"

Give over.. that's just fallacy, chatter as faux academic authority, doesn't make truth and is not persuasive.

The point of my post is down to earth: Ripple has smelt an opportunity with the banking sector, has managed to gain a strong foothold in the place and is creating some in-draft for other complementary projects. Bitshares is a good candidate to jump on the bandwagon.

You sound like you're trying to exploit BitShares because it has what Ripple lacks. I can understand Ripple would want a partner like BitShares but understand that BitShares is the stronger partner. Ripple has a corrupted sense of what blockchain technology can do; it opted for the trivial near old banking remittance use of XRP as water but it needs to do what BitShares already can in order to survive; the reality of others like BitShares doing remittances without the wasted wealth value in XRP, will be too much to bare.


Don't get me wrong, I'm not unrealistic; others have noted that solving today's problems is often better than perpetually chasing perfection - Counterparty dev suggested that a while back too.

If Ripple could offer BitShares access to real markets, then I'd be all for that. You need to understand though that what makes BitShares and others effective, is what has Ripple compromised.

Open Source works for a reason and you cannot just "clone the latest crypto" if you do not have the skills to do that. There are too many examples of closed source vulnerabilities; so, don't mistake closed source as an option to hide incompetence.


Ripple may have strengths and partnering with BitShares could be useful but be realistic about why; and do not see everything as an opportunity to exploit others! Gifting ye old banksters another monopoly, is not going to solve any problem but their own. The world is progressing and Ripple cannot just sit by and do what old banking has done.

Cooperation is about compromise.


One element of your posts that I agree with is that I expect there may come a point where there is a split between those who are unrealistic and those who want to get something done. However, that is a balance that works both ways. You can do too little too!

[klosure]

From my point of view, Ripple is doing the wisest thing by pursuing progressive change instead of disruption.

No. Ripple is taking the easiest path to a quick profit. Its lazy and that is not the better route to progress.
That post looks like a bed time story for Ripple execs.. it's nonsense.

Ripple is a company. Generating value for its equity holders is the main goal of a company, but you know that already. In that perspective, homing on the steepest growth gradiant isn't lazy but effective. I'm not saying that I support that from a philosophical perspective, but I'm not here to discuss philosophical ideals but practical down-to-earth matters such as first-mover advantage and opportunities.

I agree with a lot of what have been said above about ideals, but ideals are just that: ideals. They are what the perfect world would be if it wasn't the way it really is. Unfortunately, the world is the way it is, and only things that take into account the reality of our world and come up with realistic solutions can have an actual impact on it. Had Ripple been following libertarian ideals, it wouldn't have seized the oppotunity to partner with banks, and it's about another firm we would be discussing instead.

It's not like the world has to choose a project exclusively among libertarian cryptocurrencies, and adapt itself to the project and its philosophical ideals. It doesn't work like that. The way it works is that there are opportunities that are reflecting the practical reality of the world in its current paradigm, and the project that will success to adapt to the requirements will prevail. Other projects will remain irrelevant for an undefined amount of time until the paradigm has changed enough to make them relevant.

The point of my post is down to earth: Ripple has smelt an opportunity with the banking sector, has managed to gain a strong foothold in the place and is creating some in-draft for other complementary projects. Bitshares is a good candidate to jump on the bandwagon.

The question is: will Bitshares act as the company it is and seize the profit opportunity, or will it act as a libertarian community and wait for future hypothetical opportunities that match better it's ideals?

Let's not put the cart before the horses: the finance industry and the state are not dying yet and they show interest in blockchain technology out of curiosity rather than actual need; they will laugh at technologies that pretend to replace them and pick the projects that make the effort to fit their requirements. There are opportunities now to be seized and they will be seized no matter what. I would prefer to see projects from the current crypto community seizing opportunities in the real economy and entering the current power stucture even if they have to tone down a bit on their ideals until the time is ripe. If no one steps up and seize the opportunities, the old guard will react and close the opportunity window and you'll see the same old Paypal, Visa, Master, Amex, Bloomberg, Reuters, Swift, Tibco, NYSE technologies and the like stepping in the cryptospace. What do you prefer? Wouldn't Bitshares have a stronger impact on the world and more influence to shift the paradigm if it's an established brand on the Street rather than some obscure group of libertarian philosphers on the Internet waiting for the perfect opportunity to come?

When you invent the internet, you do not work alongside existing alternates; you replace them.

Excellent analogy: the hypertext technology that we now call the web was in fact really invented by Ted Nelson and the Xanadu project but they failed to be the first to market because they couldn't compromise on their ideals and release something simply good enough. Tim Berners Lee picked the idea and ran with it and his stripped down version of Xanadu became what we know today as the web. Actually it's lucky that Tim Berners Lee was level headed because as it turns out Xanadu never managed to distance itself from its unrealistic ideals and are still vaporware 30 years later. Without Tim Berners Lee the web would probably be the private property of Xerox and IBM.

When you invent blockchain technology, you do not work alongside existing alternate trust mechanisms; you replace them.

Well maybe that's what you do when you are called David P Brown, but when you are a developer at Swift and your boss asks you to create some crypto-based middleware for the banks, you just clone the latest crypto and you crank up some closed source thing that will be good enough to handle realtime transfers and settlements among banks while keeoing your firm as a necessary middleman. For all its defaults Ripple is open-source, freeish and it's public infrastructure. So really at this stage it's a question of whether you prefer opensource initiatives like Ripple and Bitshares to become the new financial standard or some proprietary stuff from the old guard. Maybe 10 years down the line if the financial system collapses you'll get better opportunities at your own terms but by then the market will be saturated by competing solutions that may not embarass themselves with too much ideals either.

[fuzzy]

"Are we changing the paradigm? Or are we Upgrading it?" 

It's a huge opportunity provided that Bitshares holder are able to step back and look at the big picture objectively and realistically and understand that the state and financial industry aren't going away anyway.

You're wrong. They are going away. Because they aren't suited to the new paradigm that is emerging. And we are.

It wasn't the bunny rabbits that killed off the dinosaurs.

They aren't going away in our life time. Changing the world is a nice dream (and I hope it comes true) but I'll settle for getting rich in the old paradigm. I'm okay with being self interested for me and my family.,

The only problem is that getting rich in the old paradigm actually isn't the same as being self-interested for yourself and your family.

[TurkeyLeg]

"Are we changing the paradigm? Or are we Upgrading it?" 

It's a huge opportunity provided that Bitshares holder are able to step back and look at the big picture objectively and realistically and understand that the state and financial industry aren't going away anyway.

You're wrong. They are going away. Because they aren't suited to the new paradigm that is emerging. And we are.

It wasn't the bunny rabbits that killed off the dinosaurs.

They aren't going away in our life time. Changing the world is a nice dream (and I hope it comes true) but I'll settle for getting rich in the old paradigm. I'm okay with being self interested for me and my family.,

[fuzzy]

From my point of view, Ripple is doing the wisest thing by pursuing progressive change instead of disruption.

No. Ripple is taking the easiest path to a quick profit. Its lazy and that is not the better route to progress.
That post looks like a bed time story for Ripple execs.. it's nonsense.

When you invent the internet, you do not work alongside existing alternates; you replace them.
When you invent blockchain technology, you do not work alongside existing alternate trust mechanisms; you replace them. Blockchain technology provides a way to replace third party authority; it provides a route to efficiency savings and a way to do trade.

For all the naive idealists within blockchain space - and granted there are a lot, it is still the case that X is better than Y. The challenge is not for us to compromise, it is for the rest of the world to adapt with us or become redundant. Same with the internet more widely, merchants offline need to take advantage of their opportunity or lose it.

You do not progress by doing the same as you did before.. which is what Ripple's big idea seems to be. I expect they will either fade in 5-6 years or have evolved into real blockchain technology. the lazy option is for Ripple to just adopt what BitShares is doing - the precursor to which is the suggestion that BitShares should work with Ripple!

Oh god this is why I love this community so much I can never leave it even in the most frustrating times...

[davidpbrown]

From my point of view, Ripple is doing the wisest thing by pursuing progressive change instead of disruption.

No. Ripple is taking the easiest path to a quick profit. Its lazy and that is not the better route to progress.
That post looks like a bed time story for Ripple execs.. it's nonsense.

When you invent the internet, you do not work alongside existing alternates; you replace them.
When you invent blockchain technology, you do not work alongside existing alternate trust mechanisms; you replace them. Blockchain technology provides a way to replace third party authority; it provides a route to efficiency savings and a way to do trade.

For all the naive idealists within blockchain space - and granted there are a lot, it is still the case that X is better than Y. The challenge is not for us to compromise, it is for the rest of the world to adapt with us or become redundant. Same with the internet more widely, merchants offline need to take advantage of their opportunity or lose it.

You do not progress by doing the same as you did before.. which is what Ripple's big idea seems to be. I expect they will either fade in 5-6 years or have evolved into real blockchain technology. the lazy option is for Ripple to just adopt what BitShares is doing - the precursor to which is the suggestion that BitShares should work with Ripple!

[fuzzy]

The bottom line is: if you are going to keep the financial industry and state in place because you can't replace them with a very little script, convince them that blockchain techno is good, and motivate them to move on, you'd better bet realistic about it in first place, and work with them to transition the finance industry and the state to the right paradigm rather than attempt to take over by force which they won't let you do anyway.

Change will come in multiple iterations of blocktech.  People will be allowed to freely float from one blockchain nation to the next.  You are looking at BitShares only from the DACompany-centric viewpoint.  We are looking at it from the DACommunity-Centric and DACountry perspective as well.  It is no doubt that Ripple (and Stellar) will do this more quickly than us because up to approximately 4 weeks ago, we had absolutely no marketing reach.  A media blackout incurred by most all Blockchain-Centric News outlets didn't help.  I have a theory about why, but I don't want to seem like a lunatic "libertarian".  I prefer to think of myself as a person who cares about others and believes we are capable of remaking ourselves to adapt to the world around us, even in times of great change...and I know I am by far not alone in this. 

In fact I believe the disruptive change is sometimes necessary to shake a society and a people out of addiction to destructive habits.  Where you think of "disruptive" as being synonymous with Chaos and total Discord...I see opportunity and motivation for a people to truly evolve. 

No. I think we are building something that will make them irrelevant (to us).

If you plan to live your life in a secluded libertarian community on an atoll in the pacific with a local grassroot economy, you are probably right. But if you expect the world to follow you, you are barking up the wrong tree.

Now this is the one place I can actually agree with you Klosure. 

Now that I know what you are saying...I have to (sadly) agree.  It doesn't mean I won't bang my head against the wall hoping I'm proven wrong though. 

[fuzzy]

1st.  Is it safe to say that drastic change cannot occur without killing all of us?  Drastic change occurred with the beginnings of the internet.  It was not long after that the internet became a store of informational wealth unlike any we have ever seen before.  It was only when governmental regulation came in that we started seeing the beginnings of an implementation based entirely on psychotic levels of fear, which slowly (Progressively) turned into a system of passive dominance over the entirety of society.  Now who guards the guardians?

Has Linux killed people because it enables anyone to build their own OS from kernel?  Linux has the potential to be disruptive, but humanity has the ability to create and adapt far more quickly than you give it credit for.  We can and have very quickly adapted in many instances throughout history without the inclusion of "the elite" to disruptive change and have built some amazing marvels based on decentralized collaboration and Self-Governance.  In fact the Early America is a perfect example of this.   

Sometimes when a person gets Cancer, the Tumor needs cut out.  Yes it is disruptive to the body's systems, but it is necessary because otherwise it can metastasize.  This is not the time for "Progressive" change...aka giving the power back to the old world elite as opposed to realizing our own power to change things for the better.     

2nd.

From my point of view, Ripple is doing the wisest thing by pursuing progressive change instead of disruption. Instead of going frontal against the establishment like the Bitcoin community is doing and trying to shove through the state and financial industry's throat a win-lose vision of the world where they would go the way of the dodo within a couple of year and be replaced by a bunch of fanatical libertarians, a)Ripple Labs is projecting an inclusive win-win vision of the world where the state, the financial industry, the software industry and the people at large can work together to build a better and fairer system. b)Of course, as a result of this vision, the state and the financial industry would survive but they will have lost some of their power and opacity and will have taken the right turn to transform into something better. c)Ripple is like a trojan horse in the establishment.

a) Is this why the token's original issuance was so centralized?  Is this why the same small group who initially started the network are the only ones who can vote new members into their network based on "reputation"?  Let's call it like it really is.  An exclusive blockchain of IOU's that were initially given almost totally to a very exclusive group of people.  The only "win-win" is when those original exclusive members decide to give power to another group of people.  What is worse?  No matter what the holders of XRP think about it, there is literally nothing they can do but sell.  If the old-world elites keep printing money from their free printing press, they can pump the value of Ripple indefinitely until the masses go into tulip frenzy buying it.  And if the Fed could produce 16 Trillion Dollars in a Secret Slush Fund to Prop Up their Ponzi, do you really think they are worried about being able to keep something like Ripple stable after the frenzy bubble bursts? 

b) Blockchain technology has the potential to track EVERY transaction a person makes.  Never before in history was this possible. With the "elite" from the old paradigm at the helm of Ripple Labs' roll-out, to say that they will not use this against us is insanity.  Furthermore, to call a bunch of Libertarian-leaning citizens "fanatical" isn't biased??
You can call it "fanatical libertarian"ism if you want, but facts are facts.  I don't know what world you are living in, but I live in one where all the common person's natural rights have been stolen from them with the stroke of a pen all in the name of a threat statistically less dangerous than falling in the shower--"terrorism".  If they spy on us in everything we do through in the current system...implementing something like Ripple is a trojan horse against the people.  Not the other way around. 

c) To track a person's transactions is to track their most intimate interactions...which is a very dangerous road to walk.  Issuing a substantial majority of a blockchain's tokens to a small, exclusive team of individuals who then use their leverage as a means by which they can gain entry into the "New Guard" is by no means a trojan horse for the establishment. 

Of course, this is a good time to tell everyone they should be careful of something called "COINTELPRO".  Klosure you are fooling no one.  Who are you really, btw? 

If Ripple will make us more free and take power away from the "Elites'" openly-stated objectives then Google and the internet of today would have done it. Guess what happened to Google.  Attending Illegal Summits on "World Governance"...


3rd 

Now, as far as Bitshares is concerned, I believe that it should seek to work hand in hand with Ripple and Ethereum. Ripple Labs is very professional and reasonnable, they are focusing on upgrading money markets, forex, payment and settlements and becoming the interface between the crypto-space and the financial industry. They don't have strong views on other niches that blockchain technology is bound to take over. Although their initial stance was to cover a wide spectrum, they have become reasonable as experience has shown them that 80+ employees is barely enough to chew the payment and forex space alone. The initial plan to integrate contracts in Ripple has turned into a non-profit generic approach to handling contracts: Codius. As the recent news show, they are more than happy to help Ethereum leverage on Codius to handle their Oracles, and it is very likely that this collaboration will pave the way to an ecosystem where Ethereum will be the default trustless contact engine, Ripple the default trustless foreign exchange, money market and payment rails, and the Codius the default external interface to interact with the (non-trustless) outside world.

Yep.  This would be very very profitable for all parties.  It would also be very interesting to see BitShares become 1000's of chains that compete against both Ripple (Obama's ex-advisor) and Ethereum (Goldman Sachs) on every level because BitShares decided to be the only chain that invited competition in the space rather than shutting it out. 

It is hard to say what the heck Ethereum will really look like on a technical level at this point because all they ever do is talk theory to produce hype. 


4) 3D printing, Autonomous Local Agriculture and a list of other technologies too long to cover here are coming and the only way that the "elite" can control it is to get the first-mover's advantage and ensure they use their Dark Funds to secretly prop up any and all foundational Transactional Technologies whose tech is potentially beneficial to them and attempt to break confidence in potential challengers to their systems. 

BitShares has the potential to be the challenger to these systems by building a completely decentralized infrastructure.  The only thing I agree with you on is that what I am proposing is far slower   



However, I must say one thing---the general population will not care about any of my points.  They will see the price of blockchain technologies growing substantially and will sell out for a temporary hit of the cocaine-like sensations of "choosing a winner before it wins".  Ripple and Ethereum will both be on that list. 

I personally am biased, Klosure, because I believe people do not need you or any other individual who is afraid of the consequences of those who are bold enough to know they can change the world and to do it.  Yes, Ripple will do well.  Ethereum will even do well.  I'm simply saying when we are ready, we will not need Ripple or Ethereum.  They will need us.  Unfortunately it seems we (as in society...not BitShares and its many blossoms) are starting to go in the wrong direction. 

[klosure]

No. I think we are building something that will make them irrelevant (to us).

If you plan to live your life in a secluded libertarian community on an atoll in the pacific with a local grassroot economy, you are probably right. But if you expect the world to follow you, you are barking up the wrong tree.

As the system that you are so in awe of accelerates in its breakdown (you are paying attention to current events?) I trust that you will be glad of the lifeboats we build.

The Newest Dominoes to Fall from the Swiss Franc Revaluation
http://thewealthwatchman.com/the-newest-dominoes-to-fall-from-the-swiss-franc-revaluation/

Nothing new here, the fact the current system is corrupted is a base hypothesis.

The question here is not how corrupt the current system is but how realistic it is to believe that a bunch of crypto nerds can replace the world power structure just because they think they can do better and keep away from the zone of influence the millions of people who are currently running the show... Show me the traders who will bring liquidity and keep in sync your crypto-markets! Ooops, wallstreet people all around. I thought you were supposed to get rid of the finance industry .

You seem to think of the financial industry and the state as individual super villains that can exist one day and cease to exist the next day. That's not realistic. The financial industry and the state are groups of people, tens or hundreds of millions of them, with a huge influence and connections to pretty much every human on earth, and they are the only ones who know shit about finance and public administration. Whether you like it or not they are not going away, unless of course you are planning on going totalitarian and send them to the gulag.

You need people to run things. You can rename the finance industry the crypto-finance industry and rename the state the crypto-state just so that you can have your way, but you will still have the same people around with their old habits and old way of thinking and they will take time to adjust to a new paradigm and you'll have to convince them that blockchain technology is progress, reassure them that they are not getting left behind, stage everything, train people, make step-by-step migrations and so on and so forth.

The bottom line is: if you are going to keep the financial industry and state in place because you can't replace them with a very little script, convince them that blockchain techno is good, and motivate them to move on, you'd better bet realistic about it in first place, and work with them to transition the finance industry and the state to the right paradigm rather than attempt to take over by force which they won't let you do anyway.

[eagleeye]

"Are we changing the paradigm? Or are we Upgrading it?" 

Apparently, Ripple Labs wants to simply do the latter.  Many people will "get rich" investing in Ripple Labs.  In fact, it is pretty much guaranteed that Ripple is going to become a multi-billion dollar technology.  The question is, are they truly Changing the Paradigm?  Or are they simply Upgrading the Old, oppressive system?

Your question is biaised as you assume that change has to be something disruptive in essence and that progressive incremental change isn't "change". If you look around you, most of the change that occurs in every process be it natural or artificial is progressive. If it was not you would probably not be around to witness it. Disruption may be a shorter and expedite path to change but it also comes with a higher risk and higher cost and is likely to kill the patient as it cures the disease. History is sprinkled with disruptive change: revolutions, wars, mass extinction. Each time, the disruption shed unbelievable amounts of blood, pretty much totally resetted the system it was supposed to improve. Is that really what we want?

The change we are talking about here is about taking the power away from the state and giving it back to the people, globally. This is a death sentence for the state wordwide. It is  a given that the current power structure won't just let itself killed: it will fight to death to defend its ground with all the power it has, and it does have a tremendous power There won't be a revolution without a massive fight between pro-state and anti-state forces, and when I say forces I really mean people. People with families just like you and me. People who are going every day to work genuinely thinking that they are doing their fair part of making the world a better place. Statists and anarchists all the same. Do we really want these people to suffer through a massive disruption that will destroy the economy worldwide and throw our species in generations of suffering to build back from the ashes a better society? Many of us in the cryptoscene are financial industry folks and have indirectly participated to and profited from the corruption of the system. Does that mean that we are bad people individually who are not hoping for a better society?

And it's not only a question of what we want. There is also the question of whether a big-bang paradigm shift is realistically achieveable at all. As I said, the power structure won't let itself killed. It would rather revoke all freedoms, censor or even plain disconnect the Internet rather than letting disruption propagate to a point where it would lose control.

On ther other hand, the change can occur progressively. The same change, with the same results, but executed step by step in a progressive fashion over decades so that by the time the change is complete the power structure will have progressively and painlessly dissolved into the new paradigm without any blood shed. If we can force the state to loosen its grip on the world by slowly boiling it like the proverbial boiling frog, we are sure to win and make the world a better place. Instead of laying waste in the world wide economy, block chain technology if introduced progressively and diplomatically, can trigger a new era of growth as pretty much everything will need to be replaced to fit in the new paradigm which will create massive employment and would make blockchain technology somewhat of a godsend.

From my point of view, Ripple is doing the wisest thing by pursuing progressive change instead of disruption. Instead of going frontal against the establishment like the Bitcoin community is doing and trying to shove through the state and financial industry's throat a win-lose vision of the world where they would go the way of the dodo within a couple of year and be replaced by a bunch of fanatical libertarians, Ripple Labs is projecting an inclusive win-win vision of the world where the state, the financial industry, the software industry and the people at large can work together to build a better and fairer system. Of course, as a result of this vision, the state and the financial industry would survive but they will have lost some of their power and opacity and will have taken the right turn to transform into something better. Ripple is like a trojan horse in the establishment. It spares them the embarassment of having to stick with their ridiculously anticated infrastructure and struggle to catch up on decades of technological progress. But at the same time,  it forces them to open up, endorse blockchain technology, and integrate it at every level of society. The stakeholders of the state and financial industry are no idiots and they know that their boat is doomed, and that blockchain technology is what will sink their boat, but they also understand that Ripple is a lesser evil that will allow the boat to reach the shore as compared to the Bitcoin torpedo, and by the time they reach the shore, they'll have assimilated the idea that their boat sucked anyway.

It's much better to work hand in hand with the state than fight the state, if for any reason because the state is a part of mankind's current paradigm, and we don't want to kill ourselves in the process.

Now, as far as Bitshares is concerned, I believe that it should seek to work hand in hand with Ripple and Ethereum. Ripple Labs is very professional and reasonnable, they are focusing on upgrading money markets, forex, payment and settlements and becoming the interface between the crypto-space and the financial industry. They don't have strong views on other niches that blockchain technology is bound to take over. Although their initial stance was to cover a wide spectrum, they have become reasonable as experience has shown them that 80+ employees is barely enough to chew the payment and forex space alone. The initial plan to integrate contracts in Ripple has turned into a non-profit generic approach to handling contracts: Codius. As the recent news show, they are more than happy to help Ethereum leverage on Codius to handle their Oracles, and it is very likely that this collaboration will pave the way to an ecosystem where Ethereum will be the default trustless contact engine, Ripple the default trustless foreign exchange, money market and payment rails, and the Codius the default external interface to interact with the (non-trustless) outside world.

In that picture, there is a big niche that isn't occupied: equity, commodity and derivatives markets. Indeed, neither Ripple nor Ethereum has any views at the moment to become a decentralized equity / commodity / derivatives exchanges. On the other hand, Bitshares is very ahead of the curve on that side as it already has all the mechanisms in place such as colateral compensation, escrow, margin calls and extrinsic market data acquisition to handle financial mechanisms such as stop orders, short selling and derivative contracts. It's also Bitshares motto to be an equity market where companies could list their stocks. Bitshares even provides the tools for building the companies themselves around a DAC model.

Bitshares really is the right fit for that niche that is left alongside Ripple and Ethereum in tomorrow's real economy. Bitshares already has good relations with Ethereum which itself has good relations with Ripple Labs. It's only up to Bitshares to make a move and see with Ripple Labs people if a collaboration would be possible. Such a collaboration would be immensely beneficial to Bitshares. Instead of wasting time trying to figure how to get gateways and dealing with the massive regulatory headaches that comes with it, Bitshares only needs to interface with Ripple and it will instantly benefit from a sizeable and fast growing network of gateways in many countries and covering many currencies and commodities. It will also gain a lot of liquidity as Ripple liquidity starts to flow in the Bitshares network and into the counterparty-risk free assets that Ripplers can only dream of. Last but not list, being connected to Ripple means being accessible to institutional market makers: not a bad thing to keep bitAssets spreads tight. For end users, being integrated to Ripple means that people will be able to move money between their bank accounts and bitshares in a blink.

The possibility of such a collaboration are limitless: Bitshares can use Ethereum for contracts, Codius for oracles, Ripple to handle cash flows, so that it can concentrate on becoming a kick-ass decentralized securities trading plateform, a voting system, and naming system and a launchpad for all the other DACs.

It's a huge opportunity provided that Bitshares holder are able to step back and look at the big picture objectively and realistically and understand that the state and financial industry aren't going away anyway.

This is the best post ive ever seen on bitsharestalk other then that decentralized exchange guy.  I would give 3 +5 +5 +5 but im on the iphone

[onceuponatime]

No. I think we are building something that will make them irrelevant (to us).

If you plan to live your life in a secluded libertarian community on an atoll in the pacific with a local grassroot economy, you are probably right. But if you expect the world to follow you, you are barking up the wrong tree.

As the system that you are so in awe of accelerates in its breakdown (you are paying attention to current events?) I trust that you will be glad of the lifeboats we build.

The Newest Dominoes to Fall from the Swiss Franc Revaluation
http://thewealthwatchman.com/the-newest-dominoes-to-fall-from-the-swiss-franc-revaluation/

[klosure]

No. I think we are building something that will make them irrelevant (to us).

If you plan to live your life in a secluded libertarian community on an atoll in the pacific with a local grassroot economy, you are probably right. But if you expect the world to follow you, you are barking up the wrong tree.

[onceuponatime]

No. I think we are building something that will make them irrelevant (to us).

[klosure]

"Are we changing the paradigm? Or are we Upgrading it?" 

It's a huge opportunity provided that Bitshares holder are able to step back and look at the big picture objectively and realistically and understand that the state and financial industry aren't going away anyway.

You're wrong. They are going away. Because they aren't suited to the new paradigm that is emerging. And we are.

It wasn't the bunny rabbits that killed off the dinosaurs.

So you think the financial industry is here handling settlements, and suddenly pouf next day they are gone?
Sounds like a plan...

[onceuponatime]

"Are we changing the paradigm? Or are we Upgrading it?" 

It's a huge opportunity provided that Bitshares holder are able to step back and look at the big picture objectively and realistically and understand that the state and financial industry aren't going away anyway.

You're wrong. They are going away. Because they aren't suited to the new paradigm that is emerging. And we are.

It wasn't the bunny rabbits that killed off the dinosaurs.

[klosure]

"Are we changing the paradigm? Or are we Upgrading it?" 

Apparently, Ripple Labs wants to simply do the latter.  Many people will "get rich" investing in Ripple Labs.  In fact, it is pretty much guaranteed that Ripple is going to become a multi-billion dollar technology.  The question is, are they truly Changing the Paradigm?  Or are they simply Upgrading the Old, oppressive system?

Your question is biaised as you assume that change has to be something disruptive in essence and that progressive incremental change isn't "change". If you look around you, most of the change that occurs in every process be it natural or artificial is progressive. If it was not you would probably not be around to witness it. Disruption may be a shorter and expedite path to change but it also comes with a higher risk and higher cost and is likely to kill the patient as it cures the disease. History is sprinkled with disruptive change: revolutions, wars, mass extinction. Each time, the disruption shed unbelievable amounts of blood, pretty much totally resetted the system it was supposed to improve. Is that really what we want?

The change we are talking about here is about taking the power away from the state and giving it back to the people, globally. This is a death sentence for the state wordwide. It is  a given that the current power structure won't just let itself killed: it will fight to death to defend its ground with all the power it has, and it does have a tremendous power There won't be a revolution without a massive fight between pro-state and anti-state forces, and when I say forces I really mean people. People with families just like you and me. People who are going every day to work genuinely thinking that they are doing their fair part of making the world a better place. Statists and anarchists all the same. Do we really want these people to suffer through a massive disruption that will destroy the economy worldwide and throw our species in generations of suffering to build back from the ashes a better society? Many of us in the cryptoscene are financial industry folks and have indirectly participated to and profited from the corruption of the system. Does that mean that we are bad people individually who are not hoping for a better society?

And it's not only a question of what we want. There is also the question of whether a big-bang paradigm shift is realistically achieveable at all. As I said, the power structure won't let itself killed. It would rather revoke all freedoms, censor or even plain disconnect the Internet rather than letting disruption propagate to a point where it would lose control.

On ther other hand, the change can occur progressively. The same change, with the same results, but executed step by step in a progressive fashion over decades so that by the time the change is complete the power structure will have progressively and painlessly dissolved into the new paradigm without any blood shed. If we can force the state to loosen its grip on the world by slowly boiling it like the proverbial boiling frog, we are sure to win and make the world a better place. Instead of laying waste in the world wide economy, block chain technology if introduced progressively and diplomatically, can trigger a new era of growth as pretty much everything will need to be replaced to fit in the new paradigm which will create massive employment and would make blockchain technology somewhat of a godsend.

From my point of view, Ripple is doing the wisest thing by pursuing progressive change instead of disruption. Instead of going frontal against the establishment like the Bitcoin community is doing and trying to shove through the state and financial industry's throat a win-lose vision of the world where they would go the way of the dodo within a couple of year and be replaced by a bunch of fanatical libertarians, Ripple Labs is projecting an inclusive win-win vision of the world where the state, the financial industry, the software industry and the people at large can work together to build a better and fairer system. Of course, as a result of this vision, the state and the financial industry would survive but they will have lost some of their power and opacity and will have taken the right turn to transform into something better. Ripple is like a trojan horse in the establishment. It spares them the embarassment of having to stick with their ridiculously anticated infrastructure and struggle to catch up on decades of technological progress. But at the same time,  it forces them to open up, endorse blockchain technology, and integrate it at every level of society. The stakeholders of the state and financial industry are no idiots and they know that their boat is doomed, and that blockchain technology is what will sink their boat, but they also understand that Ripple is a lesser evil that will allow the boat to reach the shore as compared to the Bitcoin torpedo, and by the time they reach the shore, they'll have assimilated the idea that their boat sucked anyway.

It's much better to work hand in hand with the state than fight the state, if for any reason because the state is a part of mankind's current paradigm, and we don't want to kill ourselves in the process.

Now, as far as Bitshares is concerned, I believe that it should seek to work hand in hand with Ripple and Ethereum. Ripple Labs is very professional and reasonnable, they are focusing on upgrading money markets, forex, payment and settlements and becoming the interface between the crypto-space and the financial industry. They don't have strong views on other niches that blockchain technology is bound to take over. Although their initial stance was to cover a wide spectrum, they have become reasonable as experience has shown them that 80+ employees is barely enough to chew the payment and forex space alone. The initial plan to integrate contracts in Ripple has turned into a non-profit generic approach to handling contracts: Codius. As the recent news show, they are more than happy to help Ethereum leverage on Codius to handle their Oracles, and it is very likely that this collaboration will pave the way to an ecosystem where Ethereum will be the default trustless contact engine, Ripple the default trustless foreign exchange, money market and payment rails, and the Codius the default external interface to interact with the (non-trustless) outside world.

In that picture, there is a big niche that isn't occupied: equity, commodity and derivatives markets. Indeed, neither Ripple nor Ethereum has any views at the moment to become a decentralized equity / commodity / derivatives exchanges. On the other hand, Bitshares is very ahead of the curve on that side as it already has all the mechanisms in place such as colateral compensation, escrow, margin calls and extrinsic market data acquisition to handle financial mechanisms such as stop orders, short selling and derivative contracts. It's also Bitshares motto to be an equity market where companies could list their stocks. Bitshares even provides the tools for building the companies themselves around a DAC model.

Bitshares really is the right fit for that niche that is left alongside Ripple and Ethereum in tomorrow's real economy. Bitshares already has good relations with Ethereum which itself has good relations with Ripple Labs. It's only up to Bitshares to make a move and see with Ripple Labs people if a collaboration would be possible. Such a collaboration would be immensely beneficial to Bitshares. Instead of wasting time trying to figure how to get gateways and dealing with the massive regulatory headaches that comes with it, Bitshares only needs to interface with Ripple and it will instantly benefit from a sizeable and fast growing network of gateways in many countries and covering many currencies and commodities. It will also gain a lot of liquidity as Ripple liquidity starts to flow in the Bitshares network and into the counterparty-risk free assets that Ripplers can only dream of. Last but not list, being connected to Ripple means being accessible to institutional market makers: not a bad thing to keep bitAssets spreads tight. For end users, being integrated to Ripple means that people will be able to move money between their bank accounts and bitshares in a blink.

The possibility of such a collaboration are limitless: Bitshares can use Ethereum for contracts, Codius for oracles, Ripple to handle cash flows, so that it can concentrate on becoming a kick-ass decentralized securities trading plateform, a voting system, and naming system and a launchpad for all the other DACs.

It's a huge opportunity provided that Bitshares holder are able to step back and look at the big picture objectively and realistically and understand that the state and financial industry aren't going away anyway.

[bytemaster]

Yeah i am also thinking what bitshares want to provide to the world.
Stellar is founded by who founded Ripple. Though it is not that decentralized, it is good solution to the real world.  it is easy for average people to understand what they are doing. They just want to do things like "send USD and receive JPY in any place of the world in seconds" .  It is so easy to understand and attract millions of people join to establish that organization.
Stellar announce they have 3 million users and the number are fast natural growing.   
The goal is described in words that average people can understand, so easy to spread. And the tool is usable. It cost nothing to realize dream for ordinary people.
What is the bitshares goal in one sentence?

To find free market solutions to secure life, liberty, and property.   

[xiahui135]

Yeah i am also thinking what bitshares want to provide to the world.
Stellar is founded by who founded Ripple. Though it is not that decentralized, it is good solution to the real world.  it is easy for average people to understand what they are doing. They just want to do things like "send USD and receive JPY in any place of the world in seconds" .  It is so easy to understand and attract millions of people join to establish that organization.
Stellar announce they have 3 million users and the number are fast natural growing.   
The goal is described in words that average people can understand, so easy to spread. And the tool is usable. It cost nothing to realize dream for ordinary people.
What is the bitshares goal in one sentence?

[fuzzy]

We need to really sit back at some point and ask ourselves if "getting rich" trumps "getting Change".  And I'm not talking about "Change you can Believe In".

I'm talking about change that empowers everyone. 

Cryptocurrency is a technology...and no matter how powerful the protocols and no matter how vast the applications, we should always consider the question:  "Are we changing the paradigm? Or are we Upgrading it?" 

Apparently, Ripple Labs wants to simply do the latter.  Many people will "get rich" investing in Ripple Labs.  In fact, it is pretty much guaranteed that Ripple is going to become a multi-billion dollar technology.  The question is, are they truly Changing the Paradigm?  Or are they simply Upgrading the Old, oppressive system? 

Here is your answer.  Jeeez I dislike posting this crap as much as I do knowing it exists...but it has to be done. 

http://www.coindesk.com/ripples-labs-names-former-obama-advisor-board-directors/