Comments on: Funny money – what might we use as alternative currencies?

By: Paul Raven

Paul Raven — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 22:00:13 +0000

Thanks, Anthony – may have to look those Sternberg titles up!

By: Anthony

Anthony — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 21:17:03 +0000

In Elf Sternberg’s “Pendor” universe, after the first few hundred years or so, the economy seems to have steadied on several sorts of currencies, all of which are directly convertable to the things that are needed by people for survival. LIU is the most common – Light Industrial Unit – used for the manufacture of common, mostly personal goods. HIU – Heavy Industrial Unit – are a currency to pay for larger goods – homes, manufacturing facilities, and so on. There are also: Environmental, Agricultural, Computational, and Territorial units, and all of it is really just electronic bookkeeping.

I would submit that the Watt or Joule might be a useful currency of the future. If everything comes back to the manipulation of energy – why not come right out and state that? It might also make it easier to measure the true cost of producing an object.

By: Tom James

Tom James — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 22:53:28 +0000

What about real estate? I’m reminded of Ken MacLeod’s quip about the government giving everyone a land grant on the Moon to stimulate the economy.

I guess any currency is based on faith: in the case of the dollar or the euro it is faith in the continuing existence, power, and influence of a nation state.

Would it be possible to create a monetary economy (i.e. non-barter economy) without the Westphalian-style nation state concept to back up the currency?

Dunno – is state power a commodity? As it (theoretically) guards us while we sleep I suppose it has value…

By: Mark Herpel

Mark Herpel — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 12:07:02 +0000

I think that digital money and local script or notes are apples and oranges. The driving force behind local community money is to keep the dollars that are spent in the local area. If you have no where outside the area to spend them, you will shop locally and the dollars are recirculated. With Berkshares, Susan Witt recently said that on average, each note is spent 4 times locally before it makes the trip back to the exchange bank. On the contrary, about $.90 cents out of each dollar spent at a Wal-Mart, immediately leaves the area and possible country never to be used again at any local establishment. You can’t really measure or attempt to use a financial product in this manner over the Net. The Net made everyone around the world your close neighbor you can spend a dollar in China, Russia or San Diego just as easily so the concept of recirculating money ‘locally’ is lost over the Internet. I would have to disagree that local money is a backwards thing because of the Net, they are mutually exclusive and you can’t compare such items.
Mark

By: Kannea

Kannea — Sat, 17 Jan 2009 13:31:26 +0000

..oh and Second Life has failed, because it is oncool, because it as become associated with uncoolness, and as such Second Life money is not to be mentioned and shunned in articles.

But is that really the case?