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There's Kanye West-Themed Crypto-Currency On the Way

Posted by samzenpus on from the yo-bitcoin-imma-let-you-be-spent-but-coinye-is-the-best-crypto-currency-of-all-time dept.

Nerval's Lobster writes "A bunch of anonymous developers are working on 'Coinye West,' a crypto-currency named after rapper Kanye West. Coinye West isn't an official production of Kanye West, and the developers are staying anonymous because they probably fear the inevitable copyright lawsuits. (Of course, if the currency hits the online market and proves a success, it's always possible the real Kanye West would drop any suit in exchange for a massive amount of Coinye West coins—every hip-hop artist on the planet might claim to drive a Maybach, but how many can claim a currency?) 'DROPPING JANUARY 11, 2014. 11 PM EST,' read a note on Coinyewest.com. 'No premine, no screwed up fake "fair" launches, shyster devs, muted channels, and f**ked up wallets,' it helpfully added. 'We will be releasing password protected, encrypted archives containing binaries and source for the wallet and daemon BEFORE LAUNCH, with the passwords to be released at the specified time.' Just to emphasize the supposed fairness of this particular crypto-currency, the note repeated: 'We will work with multiple pools to orchestrate a PROPER and FAIR release.' A chat room is available at irc.freenode.net. Technical details for the crypto-currency include: Algorithm: Scrypt; max Coins: 133,333,333,333; block time: 90 seconds; difficulty Re-Target Time: 12 hours; block Rewards: 666,666 COYE; every 100k blocks, the payout halves. In the future, will every major celebrity will have a crypto-currency named after him or her? And how long until Jay-Z decides to launch something similar?"

11 of 237 comments (clear)

  1. Good grief... by Frosty+Piss · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I know it's now a cliche to pontificate "Why is this on Slashdot", but seriously? This is not news for anyone, certainly not "nerds", and clearly doesn't matter. It's not even funny. This "story" would be more appropriate next April.

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    1. Re:Good grief... by bob_super · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It proves that anyone can create a cryptocurrency based on whatever stupid meme they feel like, therefore all cryptocurrencies have no actual reason to have a value outside of the gullibility of their users.
      They're modern art.

    2. Re:Good grief... by AlphaWolf_HK · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Really you can say the same thing about any fiat currency.

      Like playing a game of poker and saying "Ok, red chips are worth $1, white chips $5, and blue chips $10". Even the US dollar is this way -- its value is very much arbitrary.

      Now just because it is only worth whatever you think its worth does not necessarily make it worth nothing.

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    3. Re:Good grief... by rsborg · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Really you can say the same thing about any fiat currency.

      Like playing a game of poker and saying "Ok, red chips are worth $1, white chips $5, and blue chips $10". Even the US dollar is this way -- its value is very much arbitrary.

      Now just because it is only worth whatever you think its worth does not necessarily make it worth nothing.

      No, you can't. Fiat currencies are backed by the will of countries or large organizations, often with armies/guns to support their decisions. That some fiat currencies are effectively worthless says more about the country/organization than it does about fiat currencies in general.

      Sure a crypto currency could be used as the main currency of some large organization, but until then they all have very little intrinsic worth and no guarantee of guns and/or a large populace to back up their worth.

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    4. Re: Good grief... by iamhassi · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Exactly. Until someone is willing to exchange something of real value or cash for a crypto currency then it is still worthless. I can't even find someone to give me real money in exchange for bitcoins.

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    5. Re:Good grief... by the+eric+conspiracy · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The US dollar has some advantages over other currencies. For example it is accepted in payment of taxes and other debts by the US government.

       

    6. Re:Good grief... by schnell · · Score: 4, Insightful

      That the "US dollar" exists is the biggest lie in America.

      That's funny, I have several here in my wallet right now.

      The US dollar (or, more precisely, the US $20 or $100 bill) is the most fungible fucking thing on the planet Earth right now. You can spend it or exchange it almost anywhere else on the planet for goods or services at a well established market rate. THAT'S WHAT A CURRENCY IS SUPPOSED TO DO.

      I keep promising myself that I'll stop reading the Slashdot articles about Bitcoin, but I don't... that must be what the Dice Overlords are counting on in the hopes that their banner ads sparking my purchases of clever T-shirts or IBM ... something ... will finally pay off. Brilliant!

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    7. Re:Good grief... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

      Then you can't exchange bitcoins, you vapid piece of shit. Usage of bitcoins requires communication with (a significant portion of) the rest of ''the bitcoin network''.

      If you have no internet access, you can't deal in bitcoins.

  2. Kanye can just screw off already by msobkow · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Kanye this. Kanye that.

    The bloodsucking money hungry leech just won't go away...

    Bastard can't even sing.

    --
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  3. Fail, but idea has possibilities by Animats · · Score: 3, Insightful

    This is yet another lame altcoin. It barely has a mention on bitcointalk. It's not really associated with someone famous. But it points the way to a potential success.

    This could be a way to monetize fame. What if some major performer came out with an alt coin? They could anchor the coin value by making it exchangeable for concert tickets, downloaded tracks, and promotional merchandise. None of those things cost much to make, so they're not too vulnerable to price swings. The coin client can be combined with a music player/store client program, distributed with a few free tracks.

    The problem with most of these alt coins is that you can't buy anything with them. If they were at least guaranteed to be tradeable for some music tracks and a T-shirt, there'd be some backing behind them.

  4. Re:More important than just taxes by vakuona · · Score: 3, Insightful

    One of the reasons that gold stopped being useful as a currency as that the amount of gold in circulation had no direct (or indirect) link to the amount of economic activity. The value of gold fluctuates too much compared to the value of the commodities that you would want ot buy with the gold. If you don't believe it, just look at what the price of gold has been doing over the last 10 years.

    Bitcoin would be even worse since it is designed with very specific finite limits. Yes gold is also finite, but we have been mining the stuff for millenia, and we are still producing a fair amount of it.

    A currency ideally need to be linked to the amount of economic activity to prevent wild swings in its value. So if the economy grows by 2%, you would want at least 2% growth in the amount of currency available. Bitcoin is unable to do that indefinitely. I would add that ideally, the amount of Bitcoin needed to increase to reflect the amount of transactions being undertaken in Bitcoin. Bitcoin does not do this.

    Secondly, a currency needs a little bit of inflation. Bitcoin, at least at the moment, has the opposite of that. Because the value of Bitcoin has been rising, people are encouraged to hoard Bitcoin (you become wealthier just by holding on to them). You want the opposite. You want people to become a little poorer if they just hold on to their currency to encourage them to either spend of invest their money. This may be a little controversial, but there is no good reason why the intertemporal transfer of wealth should be costless.

    Because of these flaws Bitcoin cannot be a currency. At best, it will be another commodity (like gold, or oil or copper), whose value swings wildly depending on the mood and the outlook.