Episode 328 – The Bitcoin Psyop
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Yes, the blockchain is truly revolutionary. Yes, bitcoin is Tulipmania 2.0. Yes, cryptocurrency is a nail in the coffin of the bankster parasites. Yes, digital currency is a tool of the totalitarian tyrants. No, these statements are not contradictory. But don’t worry if you think they are. You’re just a victim of “The Bitcoin Psyop.”
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TRANSCRIPT
Yes, the blockchain is truly revolutionary.
Yes, bitcoin is Tulipmania 2.0.
Yes, cryptocurrency is a nail in the coffin of the bankster parasites.
Yes, digital currency is a tool of the totalitarian tyrants.
No, these statements are not contradictory. But don’t worry if you think they are. You’re just a victim of “The Bitcoin Psyop.”
This is The Corbett Report.
So what’s the bitcoin psyop? Well, look at a headline like this:
“Former Chairman of Federal Reserve to Speak at Blockchain Conferenceâ€
If you immediately think “Aha! I knew it! The Fed is behind this bitcoin nonsense, after all!†then you might want to stop and contemplate this headline from two years ago:
“Ben Bernanke: Bitcoin Has ‘Serious Problems’â€
Do you think there’s some kind of contradiction here? Or do you think that Bernanke has “flip-flopped†on the issue? Or do you suspect that Bernanke was always secretly behind bitcoin but couldn’t admit it until now?
If so, then you have fallen for an embarrassingly simple trick. That trick is to use the words “bitcoin†and “blockchain†and “cryptocurrency†and “digital currency†interchangeably, as if they are all the same thing. They are not.
Confused? Well, fear not! Our good friends at the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) have written a handy-dandy article that explains everything to you in simple, everyday language. They’ve even illustrated that article with easy-to-understand infographics!
Just kidding. Their unwieldy article on “Central Bank Cryptocurrencies†is a predictably hot mess of monetary jargon and Venn diagrams that somehow make things look even more complicated than they sound.
Now, to be fair, their proposed new “taxonomy of money†has real explanatory power, and the diagrams that result are genuinely insightful, but it hardly makes for light bedtime reading. So, let’s see if we can make it a little easier, shall we?
A blockchain is a cryptographically secured ledger that can be permissionless and decentralized.
The geeks in the crowd will appreciate the fact that the blockchain is a stupendously elegant solution to some incredibly complicated problems in the obscure recesses of arcane subjects like distributed computing and payment processing. But for the non-geeks, perhaps this will suffice: Some of the oldest documents ever discovered have been ledgers of one sort or another. Medical records, legal and business contracts, accounting ledgers; as long as there has been civilization, there has been the need for secure and accurate record-keeping of transactions and events. And since the birth of civilization there has only been one way to keep those records: a system where a recognized central administrator stores, secures and updates that ledger.
Until now, that is. With the advent of the blockchain, an accurate ledger can now be maintained without a single, central point where that information is stored, maintained or updated. Registrars? Notaries? You might as well be talking about farriers and chimney sweeps.
So how does it work? And what does it do?
Mike Maloney, the filmmaker behind the popular “Hidden Secrets of Money” documentary series, describes it this way:
The system that bitcoin runs on is called “blockchain.” Think of it as a modern version of an old-fashioned bookkeeping ledger, but instead of a handwritten list of entries and calculations, a blockchain is a digital list of entries and calculations. A “block” is simply a bundle of transactions. Think of a block as a whole page of transaction in the old-fashioned ledger. A blockchain is just a chain of blocks. It’s the same as a whole series of pages in the old-fashioned ledger.
Easy, huh? Here’s how it works: The Bitcoin blockchain actually exists in every one of the millions of computers on the network as exact copies of each other. However, for this example, so that we can zoom in and you can really see just how a blockchain works, I’m going to show it as one giant blockchain in the middle of a small network of computers.
Let’s follow a pizza transaction with bitcoin. When the transaction occurs it first appears on the network in a pool of unconfirmed transactions along with thousands of others from all around the world. Millions of different computers from the network then gather some of these transactions and place them in their own blocks. The computers are all creating blocks constantly in the hope that theirs will be the next one added to the official chain.
A new block is added to the chain every ten minutes or so, when one of the computers wins the right to have its block recognized as the next in the chain and is rewarded with a prize of newly created bitcoins. The way a computer wins the prize is by trying to guess the answer to an extremely difficult math problem. In fact, the problem is so difficult that even with millions of computers making guesses billions or even trillions of times per second it still takes roughly 10 minutes to find the answer. Once one of the computers guesses the correct answer and wins, all of the millions of computers on the network that did not win are instructed to throw away all the work they have done, update their ledgers with the block from the winning computer, and start again with a new math problem.
In doing so, the computers use an immense amount of power and cost a literal fortune to run. So why do they do it? Because it can be very profitable. This is where the term “mining for bitcoins” comes from. Instead of striking gold by mining for precious metals in the wilderness, these computers are hoping to strike bitcoin by mining precious numbers on the blockchain.
SOURCE: From Bitcoin To Hashgraph: The Crypto Revolution – Hidden Secrets Of Money Ep 8
But talking about the blockchain is like talking about the printing press. Yes, it’s revolutionary. Yes, it will change the course of history. But what, specifically, does it print? Well, whatever you want it to, of course. A papal bull or the Ninety-five Theses, the 9/11 Commission Report or The Road to 9/11, a GMO cookbook or The Anarchist Cookbook, colorful pieces of toilet paper or Federal Reserve notes (but I repeat myself).
So what does the blockchain record? Well, whatever you want it to, of course. It can be used as a tool for creating smart contracts or registering land ownership or creating decentralized cryptocurrencies.
This is where bitcoin comes in.
So what’s bitcoin?
Bitcoin is a peer-to-peer cryptocurrency whose transactions are recorded in a public blockchain ledger.
There are three things to note about this description of bitcoin.
Firstly, bitcoin is just one application of the blockchain ledger technology. They are not the same thing. Bitcoin is not blockchain. Blockchain is not bitcoin. Bitcoin uses the blockchain innovation to run an electronic payment system.
It’s important to stress this point. Confusing these terms is a purposeful tactic that a lot of 21st century snake oil salesmen are using to sucker a public that sees the bitcoin bubble and believes this is the next great investment opportunity. This “baffle them with BS” technique has been ridiculously effective in some cases. In one infamous example, “The Long Island Iced Tea Corporation” recently rebranded as “The Long Blockchain Corporation.” They still make iced tea, they just added blockchain to their name, and the market responded: The company’s stocks doubled overnight.
This is the exact phenomenon we saw emerge during the dotcom bubble when any company that added “.com” to their name saw their stock price rise. And it is a sure sign that people are being baffled by techno-speak that they don’t understand in the slightest.
Andreas Antanopoulos provides some straightforward advice for separating blockchain from BS:
So let’s get started. What exactly is going on here is this: the greatest technological innovation and explosion of innovation since the mobile internet, or maybe even the internet itself. Or is this the greatest load of hype ever arranged around the technology in the history of technology? Both. And in fact that’s a characteristic of advanced technologies.
I often say that where bitcoin and the other open block chains are today is approximately where the internet was in 1992. In terms of technology, in terms of infrastructure deployment, in terms of adoption patterns, this technology is approximately where the internet was in 1992. But the hype around blockchain is exactly where the hype around the internet was in 1998. You know what comes next.
There will be a shakeout. When the waters recede you can tell who on the beach wasn’t wearing a swimsuit. They stand there naked. It’s an empty promise this will happen in the blockchain space. There is a lot a lot of bullshit being peddled to VCs, to investors, to initial coin offering buyers, to uneducated investors. There’s a lot of Ponzi schemes, there’s a lot of pyramid schemes, there’s a lot of empty promises, there’s also a lot of business as usual disguised as innovation. Disguised as disruptive technology.
[…]
Now out of that came this fantastic saying: “blockchain is the technology behind bitcoin,” which is incorrect. Blockchain is one of the four foundational technologies behind bitcoin and it can’t stand alone, but that hasn’t stopped people from trying to sell it. Blockchain is bitcoin with a haircut and a suit that you parade in front of your board. It’s the ability to deliver a sanitized, clean, comfortable version of bitcoin to people who are too terrified of actually disruptive technology.
And so you get into this very strange world where the words no longer mean anything. Can you define “blockchain” for me? I think a few people in this room could probably define blockchain but the real challenge would be can you define blockchain in such a way that I can do search and replace with the word “database” and still make that sentence work? Because that’s the challenge. If what you’re doing is a database with signatures, it’s not interesting, it’s boring.
What is the essence of bitcoin? It’s not blockchain. The essence of bitcoin is the ability to operate in a decentralized way without having to trust anyone. The essence of Bitcoin is to be able to use software to authoritatively, independently, without appeal to authority, verify everything yourself. You don’t trust the other nodes you’re talking to; you assume they’re lying. You don’t trust the miners. You don’t trust the people creating the transactions. You don’t trust anything other than the outcome of your own verification and , through that you end up trusting in something more important: the network effect.
Bitcoin introduced the concept of decentralized security through computation and this has not yet sunk in. What bitcoin does is it allows you to replace a security model that is based around concentric circle most of access and control with an institution in the center with a security model that is inside out, open and accessible to everyone. A security model that is based on market forces and game theory. It is the first market-based security model where a series of incentives and punishments ensure that the ultimate result is you can trust the platform itself as a neutral arbiter, that is not controlled by anyone. Without third parties. Without intermediaries. Bitcoin revolutionizes trust.
SOURCE: Blockchain vs. Bullshit: Thoughts on the Future of Money
The second thing to note in our definition of bitcoin is that it is a cryptocurrency. That means it uses cryptographic functions to secure and verify transactions on the network and to control the issuance of new units. Bitcoin conforms to a certain protocol, and that protocol defines the rules by which the bitcoin network operates. You can tweak those rules and create similar-but-separate payment systems, each with its own qualities. These bitcoin-like cryptocurrencies are called altcoins.
Thirdly, bitcoin uses a specific kind of blockchain ledger called a “public†or “permissionless†blockchain. This means anyone can join the network and contribute to the maintenance of the ledger (“mining,†in the bitcoin parlance). There is another kind of blockchain, called a “private†or “permissioned†blockchain, that requires nodes to be invited to join the network or otherwise given permission to participate in maintaining the ledger.
And as a further level of analysis, it should be noted that all cryptocurrencies are digital currencies, but not all digital currencies are cryptocurrencies. Oh, and then there’s virtual currencies, which are, technically speaking, another thing altogether.
OK, this is starting to get confusing, isn’t it? This is about the point where we’d need to bust out the Venn diagrams and start coloring the overlapping parts, right? Well, if you’ve followed all of this, good for you. If not, don’t sweat it. The point for today is simply to recognize that there are a lot of separate-but-related concepts here, and to talk about them as if they are all just one big monolithic thing is not just unhelpful but purposefully misleading.
So, with all of this in mind, let’s look at those Bernanke headlines again:
“Former Chairman of Federal Reserve to Speak at Blockchain Conferenceâ€
and
“Ben Bernanke: Bitcoin Has ‘Serious Problems’â€
Are you at least beginning to get a handle on how those headlines are not contradictory? How it could be that a central banker could be interested in blockchain technology but dislike the bitcoin application of that technology?
If not, think of it this way: The same DVD player that can play Century of Enslavement can also play The Federal Reserve and You. The same printing press that can print Crossfire: The Plot that Killed Kennedy can also be used to print The Warren Commission Report. The same web browser that can take you to corbettreport.com can also take you to NYTimes.com (and no, I’m not recommending that you go there!).
So, yes, the blockchain could be used to create digital currencies that represent the very vision of a totalitarian tyrant’s wildest wet dream. Central banks could use private blockchains to administer national digital currencies that permanently record and track every transaction in the economy. That currency could be distributed through government-issued digital wallets that act as an individual ID and allow the government to track everything you ever purchase back to you personally. It could be used to create the perfect system of panoptic oversight, and the totalitarians could, as sole proprietors of the private blockchain, target anyone they saw as a threat for removal from the economy by simply revoking their wallet.
And, yes, the blockchain could be used to create a digital currency that represent the banksters’ worst nightmare. Free individuals could use a public blockchain to create a cryptocurrency not issued by or subject to any central authority. Or they could use it to raise untaxable cryptofunds for agoristic start-up ventures through unregistered ICOs. Or it could be used to transfer value or property instantaneously across the imaginary lines on the map that define the supposed boundaries of the would-be tyrants’ geographical monopolies without the permission of said tyrants.
Are you starting to get the picture?
A gun can be used by a jackbooted minion of the police state to murder you and your family, or it can be used by you to defend yourself and your family. It is a tool, just like the blockchain, and can be used for good or for ill.
So what I’d like to equip you with is a set of criteria to understand when you are being presented with something, perhaps to invest or to be employed or to engage in some way, and it calls itself a “blockchain” or a “distributed ledger” or one of these other names that are coming out. How can you tell blockchain from bullshit? They both start with a “B.” What’s the difference? If you can replace the word “blockchain” with “database” and the brochure reads the samel it’s business as usual. It’s not decentralized, it’s not borderless, neutral, censorship-resistant, open. It re-establishes trust in intermediaries. It’s just a database and that is not disruptive.
The idea “we’re going to take this technology and use it to improve the operating margins of centralized institutions of trust so that they can continue business as usual,” I’d say it’s abhorrent but that’s a strong word. It’s just boring. Really, really boring. No one got into this in order to make a few billions for a financial services clearing house, and if you did, I’m really sorry; that’s boring. What’s really exciting is the possibility of fundamentally changing the way we allocate trust on this planet. Opening up the ability to collaborate, transact, engage on a global level with everyone. Simply by means of downloading an application you can become part of a giant platform of trust that doesn’t care who you are or where you came from. That doesn’t require permission to participate or innovate. Where a 12 year old JavaScript programmer has the same influence and power as JPMorgan Chase. More, in fact, because they’re doing open source and feeding into a community of collaboration that is creating a tsunami of innovation. Taking this technology and using it to strengthen the same centralized institutions so that they can improve their bottom line is boring. That is not what blockchain is, that’s just a database, and it doesn’t change anything.
In fact, there are some rather disturbing possibilities in this model. Let’s think about it for a second. The most commonly expressed application for these new distributed ledger technologies is to replace the function of a centralized clearing house with a consortium of n participants where n is 2, 3, 4, 5, 10 known, permissioned, controlled participants, who will assemble transactions and assign them, rather than compete through market forces in a security model like bitcoin. We discard currency as the underlying mechanism for building market based security. We discard proof of work as wasteful because all it allows you to do is decentralize a secure, neutral, censorship-resistant blockchain. And we trust five named parties to sign transactions. At that point, they don’t need to assemble these transactions in blocks, they can just sign the individual transactions. They don’t need to chain them together, because absent proof of work and a system of currency incentives. rewriting that is easy; there’s no immutability. So it’s not a blockchain anymore because there’s no blocks and there’s no chain.
Now that’s at a technical level, but let’s look at the more important level. What do you achieve by replacing a clearinghouse with a consortium of players? You know, there’s something unique a clearinghouse does. If you understand the role of a clearinghouse. one of its most important functions is that it is not a participant in the market. It has no skin in the game. The New York Stock Exchange is not an active trader. That’s not an accident. That’s called separation of concerns. The clearinghouse is an independent party with oversight that is not a market participant. If you take that party out and replace it with five banks, all of which have skin in the game, how do you run a consensus algorithm when the incentives to cheat, front run, manipulate the market and break the consensus rules (even adversarially against the other four parties) are so high there’s no incentive to keep the consensus rules. All you’re doing is you’re saying “trust us, we’re in a consortium.”
Trust us? These five banks? Where were you in 2008 where were you when Libor was fixed? Where were you when the gold markets were fixed? Where were you when front running and high-frequency trading was creating these monsters of crony capitalism? Trust us? Hell no!
Removing the clearinghouse and replacing it with…What’s the word? It’s not consortium…”Cartel!” That’s the word!…with a cartel of the same market makers who have manipulated and compromised every market in history, and doing that in a way that closes this from transparency, that’s not a recipe for efficiency, immutability security, transparency. That’s not a blockchain. That’s a bullshit. It’s a very profitable bullshit. It requires you to have confidence in the game. A “con game,” as it’s known.
Be careful what you evaluate when you see these technologies. Taking something whose fundamental purpose is to remove trusted intermediaries and create an open, borderless, neutral system and turning it into a tool for a bunch of untrustworthy trusted parties to manipulate markets is going to be a disaster. And they’re going to do it.
SOURCE: Blockchain vs. Bullshit: Thoughts on the Future of Money
Now let’s look once again at the statements that opened this podcast episode.
Is the blockchain revolutionary? Well, since no decentralized, peer-to-peer ledger has ever existed before, yes, it is that rarest of rare things: something new under the sun.
Is bitcoin Tulipmania 2.0? Yes, in the exact same sense that the dotcom bubble of the ’90s was Tulipmania 2.0. Just as Pets.com and other ventures that earned (and lost) hundreds of millions of dollars in the blink of an eye were the result of a speculative frenzy, so too are the sudden run-ups and run-downs in bitcoin’s price the result of a speculative frenzy. But the bursting of the dotcom bubble wasn’t the end of the worldwide web anymore than a future bursting of the bitcoin speculation bubble will be the end of cryptocurrency (or even bitcoin).
Is cryptocurrency a nail in the coffin of the banksters? Yes. Cryptocurrencies can now be (and already are being) used by millions around the world for instantaneous and virtually free international remittances, all without the aid of a bank account. Start ups have raised billions of dollars in capital through ICOs without a VC predator or investment bank underwriter in sight. More broadly, a whole host of banksters and their associated cronies in the third-party middleman parasitic class are already openly contemplating the fact that they have already been made obsolete by the blockchain technology which underlies the cryptocurrency boom. So is the blockchain the one and only silver bullet that will end banking all by itself? Don’t be ridiculous. But it’s one more arrow for the quiver.
Is digital currency a tool of the totalitarian tyrants? Well, we’ve already seen how the BIS is musing about central bank-issued cryptocurrencies, and we’ve contemplated how that nightmare scenario of control and surveillance might unfold. It hardly takes a Nostradamus to envision how the forces of centralization are going to push as hard as they can to put the cryptocurrency genie safely back in the bottle of central-bank issued fiat.
Are any of these statements contradictory? Nope. But the bitcoin psyop might have made you think they were. And now you know better.
So, here’s a test of your newfound, nuanced understanding of the intricacies of digital currencies. Can you explain how this headline:
China’s Central Bank Has Begun Cautiously Testing a Digital Currency
And this headline:
China Is Shutting Down All of Beijing’s Bitcoin and Cryptocurrency Exchanges
Are perfectly compatible?
If so, then give yourself a pat on the back. You’ve just seen through the bitcoin psyop.
A version of this podcast first appeared in The Corbett Report Subscriber newsletter in September 2017. To keep up to date with the newsletter, and to support The Corbett Report, please subscribe today.
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On that note. Came across this yesterday.
The part about Blockchain 3.0 coins being launched on the Blockchain by governments and backed by physical assets, and the part noting that Blockchain 2.0 coins have basis in “nothing more than an idea†caught my attention.
A-SDR Cryptocurrency Basket from ACChain Aims to “Anchor†Cryptocurrencies Around the World
Highlights:
“…The idea of a full global-level anchoring of currencies and assets is certainly not a new one. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) had been working on a universal basket of currencies for several decades but the efforts could not ultimately prove fruitful. The reason behind this is often given that banks aren’t willing to relinquish their control over the assets they own nations want to avoid anchoring their currencies for socio-political reasons.
But, the efforts of IMF didn’t ultimately prove to be futile as now the concept is now being applied to the crypto world…
…ACChain are currently working on a supra national digital currency basket that uses three cryptocurrencies Bitcoin, Ethereum and ACCoin (ACCChain’s native currency) to anchor them against assets and cryptocurrencies around the world. The platform is called A-SDR and it is a transparent platform that determines and fixes exchange rates worldwide. A-SDR is the initiative of International decentralized Committee IDAXC (International Digital Assets Exchange Council).
This new platform is going to be especially important in the near future, with the Blockchain 3.0 coins. The blockchain 3.0 coins are the latest versions of coins being launched on a blockchain. Rather than Blockchain 2.0 coins, which have basis in nothing more than an idea, Blockchain 3.0 will have actual physical assets backing them especially if the governments around the world aim to launch new coins to act as their national currency.
This is a step in the right direction to assimilate the altcoin multiverse into the current financial system and bring transparency and competition to the international stage….â€
https://themerkle.com/a-sdr-cryptocurrency-basket-from-acchain-aims-to-anchor-cryptocurrencies-around-the-world/
Just checking – when you say:
“…ACChain are currently working on a supra national digital currency basket that uses three cryptocurrencies Bitcoin, Ethereum and ACCoin (ACCChain’s native currency) to anchor them against assets and cryptocurrencies around the world. The platform is called A-SDR and it is a transparent platform that determines and fixes exchange rates worldwide. A-SDR is the initiative of International decentralized Committee IDAXC (International Digital Assets Exchange Council).
This new platform is going to be especially important in the near future, with the Blockchain 3.0 coins. The blockchain 3.0 coins are the latest versions of coins being launched on a blockchain. Rather than Blockchain 2.0 coins, which have basis in nothing more than an idea, Blockchain 3.0 will have actual physical assets backing them especially if the governments around the world aim to launch new coins to act as their national currency.”
You’re up for a supra national digital currency or not?
And also – found this to be a real education on the various technologies involved to delver bitcoin. I have non but welcome this clarification. Thanks JC.
I wanted to point out one of the less intuitive aspects about mining. While it currently takes a shitload of power to add them new blocks to the chain, it only takes as much because there are so many miners competing. The point was to give the network about 10 minutes for the changes to spread so a miner will get a task solvable in 10 minutes. A zillion miners will get a zillion times more complex task.
Interesting. Thanks for bringing that up.
Even non-geeks can understand what blockchain is, how it works, and why it might be important.
If blockchain is a ledger system that is inherently incorruptible, that explains why the banksters are so busy with COINTELPRO, disinformation campaigns and psyops against blockchain.
I don’t know if the following video is 100% legit, but a lot of it seems to add-up pretty accurately, presenting a serious imperative (as if we didn’t already know that):
*WHISTLEBLOWER* Ex-Elite Banker Speaks Out Full Eng Audio/Eng Subs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZO3jtXv6jUg
15:35 minutes: “Cash used to be the predominant way of paying, where nowadays most is digital.â€
And in these digital times the system is still mostly corrupt!
Digitization, such as in a cashless society, does not insure traceability of the banksters’ money laundering and “shell game†systems, it only attacks the privacy of the average citizen who might even be engaged in dissent against the bankster system.
In fact digitization does the opposite, just as electronic voting, which has allowed for a far more pernicious type of election fraud (although I understand that this might not be a pressing concern for pure anti-statists).
Is the choice only between more of the same devil versus outright revolution right now?
Is it only between the current banking system as it stands versus independent blockchain crypto-currencies?
What would happen if blockchain ledger technology was applied to official chartered banking systems?
If blockchain ledger technology is indeed inherently secure in its decentralized digital structure, it might be a partial solution to the current inherently corrupt banking system all the way up to BIS?
Imagine if all chartered banking transactions were required to be recorded on an open source blockchain ledger, perhaps utilizing a blind-code to protect the privacy of individuals that could still be matched-up at the auditing level for proper inspection/verification – ultimately the same level of detail available to auditors currently.
Following the money would not just be a pie-in-the-sky concept.
There would be nowhere for banksters to hide their illegal transactions that couldn’t be further inspected.
It would also require that transaction-bundling-houses (as are used on the dark web) be illegal for chartered bank use.
All this might really be a monkey-wrench in the current corrupt systems.
If the banking industry is indeed the heart and soul of our tyrannical shadow government, imagine the impact of making its ledger system incorruptible!
What if the Pentagon’s budget was required to be recorded on an open-sourced block chain ledger?
If the corrupt political/monetary systems run by the banksters cannot be dismantled in one fell swoop, could this be a step towards leveling the playing field?
Come to think of it though, the huge volume of daily international banking systems would require a stepped blockchain structure, built up from separate blockchains utilized locally to populate higher rungs in a blockchain ladder all the way up to the BIS – not so simple after all.
But what about hashgraph over blockchain?
Could mean verifiability at the systemic institutional level, where it counts!
Don’t get it twisted, the blockchain is for YOU, not them.
Banks and governments LOVE blockchain technology because it can be used to track you.
https://www.corbettreport.com/the-criminalization-of-cash/#comment-25585
https://www.corbettreport.com/the-war-on-cash-a-country-by-country-guide/#comment-30947
Since I have no extra money to speak of and do not foresee any in my near future, I get it and I sill don’t get it!
Great pod cast vid though! Helpful!
I think I can simply this.
1- Block-chain technology = Decentralized technology
2- Cryptocurrency = Decentralized currency
Thing is, countries central banks now have their very own cryptocurrencies, meanwhile these countries governments have made other cryptocurrencies like “BitCoin” illegal.
In the end, government regulated/run cryptocurrencies will survive and thrive, because like it or not, most people pay their taxes and depend on government in one way or another. Whereas people that continue to use and prosper from unregulated cryptocurrencies like “BitCoin” will eventually be hunted down like Ross William Ulbricht once was.
That’s where I think this is all going, so if you have any $ in BitCoin, I’d cash out sooner rather than later.
PeaceFroggs,
Blockchain could be used by centralized authoritarians or it could be part of a decentralized structure.
HomeRemedySupply,
If I understand correctly, “Blockchain” technology is decentralized by its very nature regardless who uses it.
However, if you reread my post, I clearly mentioned that governments have created their very own “government approved” cryptocurrencies, and have already begun making “none regulated” cryptocurrencies, such as BitCoin, illegal.
So, if you own any BitCoin, I’d cash out sooner rather than later.
I am keeping my Bitcoin. And my Ethereum. Now, they are seen as a speculation, but eventually I feel that will calm down, especially if more places accept these tokens for payment.
My guess is that eventually when a bitcoin dollar value approaches $100,000 it will calm down as a speculative action.
I am not worried if these go down in dollar value… their true value is to be able to trade them with others. That ability will stay around for awhile.
But I will reinvest in silver within a few months.
I am watching some economic indicators hopefully to time a good buy-in.
Nice presentation, James and Brock. A topic that could follow along in the same kind of template as the recent video reports you have been putting together could be about the ruthlessness (psychopathy) of big corporations that simply follow their profits, even at the expense of human suffering. Some examples that come to mind are Bayer selling HIV infected blood products to hemophiliacs, IG Farben building Auschwitz, defense contractors selling WMDs to dictators, etc. I think a video report outlining this continual pattern will hold true and can be a useful tool to wake people up and make them aware of this type of psychopathy.
James,
I like your video however I am disappointed in some of your conclusions. In the end you said the Bitcoin was “Tulipmania”, however if used as an alternate currency worldwide 20K would seem very cheap. If all the people that was worth 30 million dollars or more each wanted 1 Bitcoin they could not. I believe you should have listened to Andreas Antonopoulos closer you would have understood that Bitcoin is what could disrupt the big bankers and not necessarily the blockchain. In fact they are trying to embrace the blockchain and discard Bitcoin because they becoming aware of the potential of Bitcoin. I propose that most if not all the “alt-coins” are now the “Tulipmania” you discussed.
James,
Please consider watching this from Andreas.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIsxE6DBxus
Great Corbett humor in the video with this line…
… colorful pieces of toilet paper or Federal Reserve notes (but I repeat myself).
https://youtu.be/FkhUn7nh33Q?t=6m16s
By the way, this particular video is an excellent way to introduce “The Corbett Report” to just about anyone.
There is nothing “conspiratorial” about it.
Excellent for normies. A graceful approach towards them taking their first steps.
It doesn’t matter that I’m at least 4 months late, or not the first commentator here: I have to SECOND that emotion that this is funny as ****:
“colorful pieces of toilet paper or Federal Reserve notes (but I repeat myself).”
Bravo, (again) James, and THANKS for brightening my (dare I say: OUR) Day.
Thank you.
If anyone is interested in the economy or wanting a heads-up prediction of coming market forces, I HIGHLY RECOMMEND watching some of Mike Maloney‘s videos.
He approaches things from a layman perspective with simple language and well defines Wall Street trends.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCThv5tYUVaG4ZPA3p6EXZbQ
Is it just me or does Mike Maloney sound just like Troy McClure from the Simpsons?
So I think I’m still hung up on the idea that if the system is totally open –
And entrance into the system is operated through buying bitcoin using existing rigged currencies (unless you have the computing power to become a miner)
then those who have access to particularly colossal quantities of said rigged currencies
would have an advantage through exponentially greater influence over the permissionless system (“sybil attacks”?) through supply and demand values…
But perhaps the idea is the following:
That a concerted effort to « crash » the value of bitcoin, or any blockchain based crypto-currency, by manipulating supply and demand values, is only dangerous for speculators – Not for those who continue to honour bitcoin as a means of exchange, (regardless of it’s given value in rigged currencies)Â
a system that continues to extract value out of a rigged system by placing it into an open, impartial one?
Is that the idea?
But couldn’t “They” keep the price high making it difficult to acquire Bitcoin for example? Unless “they” wanted people to start playing the digital or crypto currency game, enticing them through speculation to such currencies as Ripple who’s working with the banks, to get people used to them for when they roll out their asset-backed sdr supranational currency…? Different problem I guess…
hmmmm…I guess that explains the “massive land grab” described by Patrick Wood in Why Big Oil Conquered the World…
In the embedded video, did Stephanopoulos announce the arrival of a POW-less system (i.e. Hashgraph) ?
sigh, guess I’ll just have to watch again…Everything just can’t be done hastily…
sorry, Antanopoulos.
and that’s a lot of “guessing” I realize after rereading myself… better get down to really understanding… I would vote for adding more hours to a day or days to a week! now back to one of several drawing boards…
OK.. I get bitcoin and i get block-chain…
Can anyone here explain how both of those will be impacted by Quantum computing??
obviously, mining will be done super quickly, but what happens to being able to hack into the block-chain… is that going to be done super quickly too??
Feedback please?
Fixes Available!
From The Register Mr. VoA:
“Quantum computers could crack Bitcoin, but fixes are available now
Shor, we need a new sig scheme”
By Richard Chirgwin 9 Nov 2017 at 03:45
“…There are two items of good news in the paper for Bitcoin: its proof-of-work isn’t as vulnerable to “quantum speedup†as people think, and the signature can be replaced with something more quantum-resistant before the day of reckoning.
In their paper, which landed at arXiv in late October, Divesh Aggarwal and his collaborators say ASIC-based mining rigs are fast compared to even optimistic theoretical quantum computer clock speeds…
…As with cracking the proof-of-work, the researchers assume quantum computers get big and fast relatively quickly, and even so, they fall slightly short: with a 10 GHz clock rate, around half a million qubits, and a low enough error rate of 10-1 could crack the signature in 30 minutes.
That’s close enough to make Bitcoin’s critical 10-minute rate “highly insecureâ€, so the authors recommend the Bitcoin protocol be migrated to a post-quantum signature scheme.”
manbearpig, can you provide some link?
What you have quoted doesn’t make a lot of sense.
Half a million qbits???
Around hundred is enough to crack elliptic curve encryption used by bitcoin.
Critical 10 min????
Your money is protected by cryptography. If your cypher is broken someone can steal your money. Hundred cases like this with MSM “support” and crypto-currency is gone.
Changing cryptography might not be so easy because ledger will loose consistency.
There is a lot of misunderstanding regarding quantum computers.
On link below there is a thread with lots of helpful links.
https://www.corbettreport.com/2017-the-year-of-technocracy-confirmed/#comment-46980
Just copy/paste the title mik but here’s the link.
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/11/09/quantum_computers_could_crack_bitcoin/
Further discussion:
“Many believe that an attack from a quantum computer could crack ECDSA, but that SHA-256 and RIPEMD160 would remain immune.”
https://news.bitcoin.com/bitcoin-ready-quantum-computing/
Yes, I’ve been lazy. But this laziness is useful, it prevents me from losing time on nonsense and there is tons of nonsense around these days.
In previous comment I said 100qbits are considered enough to crack today’s public-key encryption (ECDSA,RSA,…), that is also called asymmetric encryption (public & private key).
Actually, roughly 50+ is considered enough.
SHA-256 and RIPEMD160 are both hashing encryption and it is believed they are resistant to quantum attacks.
But the main protection and usefulness (transactions) is provided by ECDSA.
Hashing encryption cannot be used for authentication efficiently, because it’s symmetric encryption and it’s necessary that both sides have the same secret key.
How to provide key exchange?
Excerpt from:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Message_authentication_code
“MACs do not provide the property of non-repudiation offered by signatures specifically in the case of a network-wide shared secret key: any user who can verify a MAC is also capable of generating MACs for other messages. In contrast, a digital signature is generated using the private key of a key pair, which is public-key cryptography.”
To make myself clear. I would really like to see a working alternative to fake money. Bitcoin until recently looked like one, but not anymore for me.
In case of Bitcoin, I would like to see a proposition that includes resistant cryptography and how to manage a transition from old to new system.
We should not forget that it might be possible that solution is not feasible(for Bitcoin).
Others do not believe Bitcoin is a feasible alternative for fake money either, at least not on any massive scale.
I don’t believe this is meant as a threat or to discourage anyone, quite the contrary, but this is Erik Townsend’s prediction (as described in Ukdavec’s link just below) for future bitcoin-like networks:
“…While it would be difficult to impossible for
governments to prevent the continued
existence of a network like Bitcoin, they can and
will outlaw the exchange of Bitcoin for fiat
currency, and they can and will enact laws
allowing anyone caught trading Bitcoin for
monetary value to have their Bitcoin
confiscated on the spot…
…When they do these things, it won’t completely
defeat the Bitcoin network, but at that point
Bitcoin really will become what governments
previously alleged it was – the exclusive
playground of criminals. The people caught
trading Bitcoin for fiat after that won’t be
treated nicely…”
He says he hopes to be proven wrong. Me too.
Ok, this is some other topic.
Governments have their business, we have ours.
I believe the bitcoin-like networks being referred to above were “ours”. The so-called “illegal” ones. The criminals referred to are those folks who hope to have any alternative system.
“Theirs” will be the “legal” tax-identity-number-integrated digital currency networks.
Came across this article today….
http://www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?read=89771
About the origin of the invention!!! The patent as it is…
Only for the geeks though!!! Ha ha, didn’t understand much of it but maybe you guys can help me make sense of it!!!!
So I had a look at the following paper:
Tulip-Mania 2.0?
A Closer Look Into Crypto-Currencies
Christoher Campos ∗
Though decidedly over my head, it raised a few new vague ideas there…
Bitcoin is nothing if not an ideological tool…
With no inherent value (like fiat currencies), not even backed (or rigged) by tax-collecting states or banks…
can Bitcoin continue if mining proves largely unprofitable?
I’d wager that the choice to mine bitcoin is NOT solely determined by profitability concerns (as calculated by Campos).
The are also the obvious anti-establishment motivations and conversely,
those that would mine in order to ultimately undermine mining if you will, to undermine the bitcoin system. (You could imagine an ideological war being waged among miners). But as problems grow in complexity bitcoin does seem to be at the mercy of those entities, potential miners, with the most colossal access to resources.
So, ideological concerns influence miners
but also participants.
If participants profoundly want Bitcoin to function, to rival an existing bank-backed rigged currency as a means of exchange
then Bitcoin holders must not be primarily motivated by speculative ambitions. They must use it as it was, presumably, initially intended: to purchase goods and services. (Perhaps you could imagine an ideological war going on between speculative and peer-to-peer participants.)
So, in a sense, the asset backing Bitcoin is an ideology of emancipation from rigged systems, creating open and dynamic peer-to-peer forums.
Without a determined anti-establishment ideology behind it, Bitcoin seems considerably less robust and promising as a rival to existing rigged currencies.
Bitcoin, the new Religion?
Thanks for sharing that paper, MBP. The true value of money comes when it is easily and painlessly able to change hands. With the present instability of cryptos, in general, it is perfectly understandable that people would be hesitant to spend what they have if it meant that waiting a day would give him a better deal. It seems to me like most people see cryptocurrencies – BitCoin and Ethereum in particular – more as investment opportunities or as hedges, which essentially undermines their intended purpose.
“…most people see cryptocurrencies – BitCoin and Ethereum in particular – more as investment opportunities or as hedges, which essentially undermines their intended purpose…”
Could be considered as inherent to the totally open permissionless aspect of Bitcoin as it exists today. One of its weaknesses.
I personally haven’t found in France a zillion ways of spending my Bitcoin.
Bitcoin could also be seen as a test to gauge what percentage of the population is ready to assume a collectively and individually responsible attitude to consumption and trade even if it should cost them speculative gains. However, places to spend it must be sufficiently plentiful and diverse.
I have a very likeable and highly aware student (who works in IT) whose ambition is to seriously invest in bank-approved Ripple (and even perhaps arms and other “sure values”) as soon as he can. His personal need to make money exceeds his faith in improving the world through investing in “anti-establishment” crypto-currencies. He’s a compelling subject of sociological study.
In today’s disillusioned, impoverished world many people have abandoned their faith in any trumpeted solution along with faith in themselves and human beings in general and are more tempted by overnight gains. I’m not in a position to judge.
“…I have a very likeable and highly aware student (who works in IT) whose ambition is to seriously invest in bank-approved Ripple (and even perhaps arms and other “sure valuesâ€) as soon as he can. His personal need to make money exceeds his faith in improving the world through investing in “anti-establishment†crypto-currencies. He’s a compelling subject of sociological study…”
I think this is a testament as to how total the indoctrination equating bank-issued fiat with something of value is.
“…In today’s disillusioned, impoverished world many people have abandoned their faith in any trumpeted solution along with faith in themselves and human beings in general and are more tempted by overnight gains…”
I see this trend in people too. I believe that a lifetime of never producing anything for one’s self creates a sort of perpetual adolescence. Urban living today is so disconnected from nature that all people see are products to consume; neither the processes that brought such products into being, nor the consequences thereafter need any consideration. Everything anyone could ever want is just a few clicks of the mouse, or a quick trip to the store away.
What kind of person does a lifetime of such dependency create? Not one who is very much aware, in my opinion.
Yea, in view of my highly limited perspectives, the world’s in serious trouble if I ever become appointed judge of ‘Who is Wideawake!’ 😎
What I meant is that this person was among the minority of my very numerous students in the business world who know a lot about 9/11, deep states, the imminence of smart technocracies, the dubious reasons and massive lies instrumentalized in their creation, etc etc etc…
and who despite this, or crushed by the fatality of it all, has opted for the “if you can’t beat’em, join’em” strategy…
Yea, lifestyles that are increasingly facilitated and dependant on technologies, social customs etc. certainly don’t foster self-sufficiency, survival know-how, critical thinking with regards to authority etc etc… All this goes hand-in-hand with a campaign to infantilize the population while paradoxically hypersexualizing it and making it utterly dependant on the evaluation of “peers” and authority figures.
Anyhow…I’d better get that hamster wheel creaking!
Good work James – very clear and concise.
The following paper is relevant and may be of interest on this subject
https://www.macrovoices.com/macrovoices-content/list-research-roundup/1474-blockchain-debunked/file
Hey UKDAVEC!
Thanks muchly for that highly entertaining and brilliantly explained exposé by Erik Townsend of MacroVoices. You’re good at digging up interesting links! (Had a little trouble opening it though.)
One thing piqued my curiosity: that about governments being slow to adopt and adapt to new techs etc…
What intrigues me is that governments auction off huge quantities of seized bitcoin and make a lot of noise about it in the media with charismatic progressive businessmen from California becoming the new posterchildren…
That was the mixed message about bitcoin that left me pensive a few years back. When Ulbricht’s bitcoin was seized it was auctioned off and put back into circulation.
An article from “Motherboard” entitled:
Why Doesn’t the US Government HODL Seized Bitcoins?
The US government keeps seized cash, but auctions seized Bitcoin. What gives?
Daniel Oberhaus, January 18th, 2018
“…A spokesperson for the DOJ told me that bitcoins are officially classified as a financial instrument. Yet unlike seized foreign currencies, which the DOJ says should be “converted and deposited†into the DOJ’s asset forfeiture fund, seized bitcoins aren’t sold for US dollars on a Bitcoin exchange. Instead, they are auctioned off just like tangible properties such as a car or gold coins…
…According to Kessler, there doesn’t appear to be a legal reason the DOJ couldn’t hold seized bitcoins and sell them directly on a Bitcoin exchange for a larger profit rather than auctioning them off. It’s simply not the agency’s prerogative. Instead of maximizing profit, the DOJ tries to liquidate the assets for a “fair market value,†according to its own forfeiture guidelines…”
So the act of not engaging directly with the Bitcoin exchange could very well be symbolic of a position that will eventually make Bitcoin and other non-government approved digitalcoin exchange illegal (as noted by Townsend). (While still profiting from the sale.)
One could argue that it would be very difficult to enforce making “Bitcoin” illegal at the moment (although discouraging businesses from making it possible to purchase with the digital currency has been effective in transforming Bitcoin into a speculative instrument that you’d best “Hodl”…destroying its original mission)
The question is, if “governments” plan to make it illegal once they’ve rolled out their official tax-integrated digital currencies why are they taking such a high profile Bitcoin-acceptance stance by headlining their auctions?
Because “They” know Bitcoin is like the Wright Flyer…? Pure lucrative convenience? Or “capitalizing” on Bitcoin fever to habituate the world to the use of digital currencies? Making populations believe they’ll have Asked For the rigged ones they’ll be rolling out soon? Allowing the open-source market to innovate and test privately-produced new Distributed Ledger technologies to create the most elegant and efficient ones as quickly as possible so as to appropriate and apply them on a global level?
Do you smell a cryptocurrency false flag proving need for regulation?
Think I may’ve answered my own question but I’d be grateful for input.
I would love to say that blockchain will set us free, but:
a) Technocracy will not allow that (Inventories will be 99% controlled by the governments. And it will be too much work to find the 1%, if 1%, in the black market.)
b) The real war on independent blockchains hasn’t started yet (The CentralBanksters are allowing us to help them arrange the ‘miners’ who are going to be contracted to run regulated blockchain operations.)
I do not agree with him 100%, but some concepts make sense:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSn7Iomisyc
c) Blockchain smart contracts will be the ultimate tool to confiscate all properties (Once there are no more paper certificates, there will be some kind of engineered crises, EMP or something like that, that will ‘reset’ the right on properties and governments will take over all of them because of that.)
Real communism as it’s been planned by the psychopaths.
Though it will be only 20 or 30 years from now. That’s the ‘good’ news!
Still watching, but just had to note that “colorful pieces of toilet paper” bit was truly priceless…
Corbett report being quoted by a hedge fund Newsletter !!
http://media.capitaltradinggroup.com/acton/attachment/26292/f-011d/1/-/-/-/-/1%2024%202018%20Executive%20Club%20Of%20Chicago%20Annual%20Event.pdf
” The Corbett Report put out a great piece and must see for our readers, called the “Bitcoin Psyop†it is really informative and can be found here “
EXCELLENT FIND!
†The Corbett Report put out a great piece and must see for our readers, called the “Bitcoin Psyop†it is really informative and can be found here (LINK) “
January 23, 2018 – Mike Maloney
This Amazing Chart Shows Bitcoin Investors Diversifying Into Gold & Silver
i.e. using Bitcoin to purchase gold/silver
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=18WLvcY9d4o
It is also interesting to see how the value of the Dollar compared to other currencies has dropped throughout last year and continuing down. Of course, this may help U.S. exports and some other economic indicators.
https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/currency
January 25, 2018
Stock app Robinhood is adding no-fee bitcoin trading (with 5 minute video)
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/stock-app-robinhood-adding-no-fee-bitcoin-trading-155905506.html
EXCERPTS
The stock-trading smartphone app Robinhood, which has amassed 3 million users and recently raised $110 million at a $1.3 billion “unicorn†valuation, is jumping into cryptocurrencies.
Robinhood Crypto will launch in February with no-fee buying and selling of bitcoin and ether (token of the blockchain network Ethereum), but in only 5 states: California, Massachusetts, Missouri, Montana, and New Hampshire. (The company says it determined those states “based on a mix of strategic and regulatory considerations.â€)
The move represents new competition for Coinbase, which is the No. 1 mainstream brokerage for buying bitcoin and has more than 13 million users, but has been criticized for its occasional exorbitant fees, which vary based on network activity at the time you want to buy or sell.
Robinhood charges users no commission fee. It makes its revenue from premium services like Robinhood Gold, which offers margin trading and extended-hours trading for $10 per month, and from interest on outstanding cash sitting in user accounts….
open the prison gates, and they’ll just rush on in to feast on the fantasy food within the brightly-painted cells in which the nice new gadgets are up and ready to go!
Masses of slaves. Loving their servitude, as the bad man predicted.
March 6, 2018
Feds auctioning $25 million in bitcoins
https://community.oilprice.com/topic/1145-feds-auctioning-25-million-in-bitcoins/
Bitcoin and blockchain are the same — if you do not have decentralization than you do not have blockchain — what u have is a central encrypted ledger. This is important because it is the decentralization that gives a blockchain its security and makes it that there is no central data base that can be hacked.
I’d wager other means of control are of a greater concern than hacking.
Public ledger isn’t impervious to hacking, it’s just statistically very difficult to do.
A recent PressforTruth video had a guest who asked (if I understood correctly…);
“What good is your alternative decentralized blockchain cryptocurrency for anonymity if the goods and services you’re buying and selling are all chipped or in some way marked and trackable by TPTSB?”
Is it possible to create enough “unchipped” goods and services necessary for anyone to circumvent “the super smart surveillance system”?
I have this crazy idea that the spraying of some sort of generic nano-marker over all of humanity that becomes identity specific through grandual interaction with personal devices would eventually make any sort of anonymity impossible anyway…
End of late grumpy fatalistic lunch break…
If getting the right answer for ” an extremely difficult math problem” (as mentioned in the video above) is the key to having the right to have the next block on the chain, who or what is the overlord that deems the answer correct or not? Shouldn’t we be thinking about this closely. Is that not the source of control for what is otherwise painted as a system free of control? By the way, how do we know what work the mining computers are actually up to anyway?
Anyone verifying all is as assumed?
Ok, so I watched this the first time around and never got on board with it, but understood the concept.
I want to set up a few more monthly subscriptions (for favored online media outlets). The two I set up already are off my savings bank account as a direct debit. However, I kind of anticipate that if certain sites and material ever get ‘black listed’ it might not be possible to continue with the subscription via a bank account. What do you think?
What is the state of block chain and cryptocurrencies currently? Has anyone got a good ‘start here, 2020’ guide? I remember James encouraging everyone to get a crypto wallet at one point (wish I did), but not sure if that was on this video or elsewhere.
Just buy a little bitcoin to get started.
You can always buy more.
It seems that the price of bitcoin went up these past couple days.
It is much easier to buy bitcoin now than it was 5 years ago.
I bought some then, ONLY because that was the only currency an online newspaper ad service (“Backpage”) would accept. The banks and credit card companies had blacklisted them. I wanted to run some 9/11 Truth ads. It took me all night and lots of hassle.
My more recent purchases of bitcoin have been through Coinbase.
It is simple. They do report data to the IRS, as do most U.S. places.
Some folks buy bitcoin as a speculative device.
I buy it because it can be an alternative currency. Of course, I am happy when the “value” relative to the dollar increases.
Corbett does accept bitcoin. You have to email him for specifics.
However, right now, I am betting his inbox is slammed with hundreds of pending emails.
Thank you for the response. I’m UK based. Do you know anything about the differences between UK and USA regarding reporting? Why is there more than one place to buy Bitcoin?
would it be safe to say, that block chain technology will be here to stay since the outcome will be that all fiat will be digitized. however, bitcoin, will not be longer feasible as the govt all over will conspire to launch their own currency and thus be able to track our every move more concisely. more or less, bitcoin providing sovereignty and total control of their own money to people is not in the plans anytime soon.
HOWEVER:
is it safe to also say that they want to have the majority of people inaugurated into the system? and if that means to let this bitcoin technology stay for a while, keep it breathing, letting the people think what may about it, until it reaches highs never reached before, AND then kill it, thereby educating the people about using said technology but essentially pulling the rug from underneath them.
Like the dot come bubble, knowing the end, doesn’t mean i cannot take advantage while the bull run is happening.
I think they will let Bitcoin stay for a while, not forever, but until they get everything ready. In the mean time, there are people ready to take advantage, and hopefully cash in before the eventual engineering of its collapse. the trick is to predict when.
Taking speculation of higher Bitcoin prices off to the side for a moment…
I feel that when any form of non-centralized currency becomes popular in practice, that those who wish to control us will try to suppress it.
They can do this in any number of ways, such as obfuscating the fact that something is a decentralized currency curving it to be more of a speculative commodity.
In fact, I will hypothesize:
When a very large segment of the population uses a decentralized currency or method of exchange, that segment of the population will experience tremendous liberty.