OK, I said up-front that the BTC IOUs are subject to counter-party risk. That does not make their intrinsic value zero, any more than money in the bank is worth zero. UIAs are shares in something, just like any other share.
The key point is can it be done in such a way, and risks minimised, that the market is comfortable with any residual counter-party risk. Nubits is subject to the custodial risk. They have 5 times what we have in bitUSD. bitReserve is subject to the risk of a completely unknown entity. They have 10 times what we have in bitUSD.
We have the dream of a perfect ideal. But the free market is under no obligation to fund our dream for as long as it takes. If funding dries up, the vision dies. If we want to be truly self-funding, we need to create value in the current market-place on the way to achieving our bigger vision. All I'm suggesting is we use the energy and brainpower in this community to meet current demands in the best way we can, and to lead the market toward something bigger.
[I'm not saying this is the idea to do that, I'm still just exploring it. I'm only saying I would not reject it on the basis of not meeting an ideal such as "must have zero counter-party risk".]