On Sunday, March 31, 2002, at 10:13 AM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: >>> Even if e-gold had no anonymity and pseudonymity capabilities, >>> it is still a necessary infrastructure to support real e-cash, >>> as there is no other internet medium that supports reasonably >>> irrevocable and instant payments. > > Tim May: >> My contention is that physical gold sitting in a warehouse in, >> say, the Bank of Bermuda, is no different from a stack of $20 >> bills sitting in that same bank. > > The difference comes when the physical stuff has to move in and > out of the bank in Bermuda. > > The gold does not carry serial numbers, and if it does the bank > can melt it down.
I must be grossly misunderstanding something here. When I "transfer" $1000 to an account in Bermuda, no "serial numbers" are involved. Shipment of FRNs is relatively rare, except sometimes between FR Banks. If a bank is "holding" either dollars or francs or E-gold, the traceability is at the points of entry and exit to the bank, not because of serial numbers on the dollars or francs. Again, E-gold without physical delivery of gold is just another warehouse receipt, like many other forms of money. It is no more "untraceable" than digits in an accounting book are. > The problem is not that the serial numbers > permit attacks on the customers of the Bank in Bermuda, but that > they permit attacks by the federal reserve on the Bank in Bermuda. Serial numbers on bank notes--which are not even _in_ the Bank of Bermuda except for the convenience of customers showing up at the bank's door--are NOT why FINCEN and other such entities are able to pressure Bermuda, Switzerland, etc. > > This important difference gives the issuer of that stack of $20 > bills more power to meddle if the bank in Bermuda is carrying $20 > bills than if the bank in Bermuda is carrying bars of gold. But it _doesn't_ store stacks of $20 bills. --Tim May
