[2452] in cryptography@c2.net mail archive
Re: Blind Signatures Digital Cash in Russia?
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Robert Hettinga)
Wed Apr 8 10:29:07 1998
In-Reply-To: <199804070143.AA13419@world.std.com>
Date: Wed, 8 Apr 1998 07:53:18 -0400
To: worley@ariadne.com (Dale R. Worley), cypherpunks@cyberpass.net,
cryptography@c2.net, dbs@philodox.com, e$@vmeng.com, dcsb@ai.mit.edu
From: Robert Hettinga <rah@shipwright.com>
At 9:43 PM -0400 on 4/6/98, Dale R. Worley wrote:
> Patents are granted by individual States, and are valid only in those
> States. So unless Chaum has filed in Russia, he's probably out of
> luck.
Actually, Russia didn't exist when blind signatures existed. :-). However...
> And that works only if Russia issues (and enforces) patents on
> algorithms, anyway.
Something we've already determined. They don't. But lack of a clear market
model (which we now have ;-)) is probably the major reason why it hasn't
been done yet.
> More likely would be trouble over the fact that Russia regulates
> cryptography, at least in theory, and you'd need a license from the
> government. That might be enforced by the intelligence agencies,
> which are probably still quite efficient.
Except that the Russians allow the export of cryptography, or Elvis+ would
never have gotten started to begin with. Elvis+'s current problems are
caused more by our own government than theirs.
> It might be a large enough body of e-money to affect the overall money
> supply of dollars, since there would be no limit to issuing money that
> wasn't backed by reserves. That could be ... messy.
Ah. You've been reading Tanaka. :-). Actually, I expect that market
conditions would require 1:1 reserves for a long time to come, especially
in the early stages, because the, what, half-life(?) of a dollar taken to
the net will probably be measured in days if not hours.
However, once you have other digital bearer assets on the net, like digital
bearer bonds, then money will stay on the net longer, and seignorage (which
is not *that* much money fed-wise, however much it might be to a small
netrepreneur) will start to pile up. Competition will probably dictate less
than 100% reserves at that point. Nice problem to have, as by that time you
could have currency reserved by market-risk debt pools or even equity, as
we've discussed before.
Cheers,
Bob Hettinga
-----------------
Robert Hettinga (rah@shipwright.com), Philodox
e$, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
The e$ Home Page: http://www.shipwright.com/
