Jim Blasko Explains BitCoin Spinoff 'Unbreakable Coin' (Video 1 of 2)

Las Vegas seems an appropriate place for cryptocurrency businesses to emerge, both because the coins themselves are so volatile that some gambling instinct may be required, and because Vegas is a high-tech outpost with lower taxes and lower rents than many other West Coast hot-spots, well-suited to risky startups with ambition but without huge venture backing.Jim Blasko moved there to work on low-voltage engineering for Penn & Teller, and is a qualified Crestron programmer, too (useful in a town that looks from the air like one giant light-show), but has shifted to a quite different endeavor, or rather a complex of them — all related to cryptocurrency. I ran into Blasko during this month's CES, at a forum with several other cryptocoin startups, and the next day we met to talk about just how hard (or easy) it is to get into this world as an entrepreneur.

Blasko has some advice for anyone who'd like to try minting a new cryptocurrency. Making your own coin, he says, is the easy part: anyone can clone code from an existing entrant, like Bitcoin, and rename the result — and that's exactly what he did. The hard work is what comes after: making worthwhile changes, building trust, and making it tradeable. Blasko's done the legwork to get his own currency, which he's bravely called "Unbreakable Coin," listed on exchanges like Cryptsy, and is working on his own auction site as well. He's also got an interesting idea for cryptocoin trading cards, and had a few prototypes on hand. (Part 1 is below; Part 2 to follow.) Alternate Video Link

Comments

Useful changes

[Xylantiel]

How about a cryptocurrency that targets an inflation rate that is known to be economically stable, say 2%, by standardizing on a openly evaluated standard basket of goods. You know, how actual currencies work but without the middlemen of the reserve banks. Most of the discussion of cryptocurrencies don't even distinguish growth of money supply from inflation, even though they are two entirely different (though related) things. The cryptocurrencies currently termed "inflationary" just grow their money supply. That's not even what is meant by "inflation" when discussing real currencies like the dollar or the euro.

Re:Useful changes

[neilo_1701D]

I don't think inflation means what you think it means.

The supply of money has nothing to do with inflation; inflation is the change in the cost of good or services over time. As the cost of goods or services increases, a unit of currency buys less of those goods or services. Increasing the supply of money drives inflation up over time (supply of money increases; purchasing power increases; demand increases & the supply - demand curve settles on a new equilibrium state, as the supply side now has to compete for goods and services).

You're right in that an inflation rate of ~2% is economically stable: because inflationary effects are generally lagging in time it allows for an accumulation in wealth. But the currency has nothing to do with inflation; that's all economic conditions.

A currency whose value (somehow) tracked inflation would not have the outcome you might desire. Ultimately, a currency must trade against another currency so that country A can buy and sell goods and services to country B. If the value of country A's currency was tied to their inflation rate, residents of country A would get a rude shock whenever they wanted to buy goods made by country B (which doesn't have this inflation rate lock-in): the cost of those goods has gone up - which leads to inflation in country A anyway.

Economics is economics, no matter if dealing with a real currency or a crypto currency - and crypto currencies behave more like a commodity anyway.

Pump and Dump until proven otherwise

[SkunkPussy]

Every new altcoin should be regarded as a pre-mined pump and dump scam until proven otherwise.

The great strength of bitcoin is its network effect.

Every new coin has to demonstrate how they will gather sufficient network effect to make themselves useful, the equivalent of overtaking facebook, google or amazon. It could certainly be done but think how many years it is since facebook overtook myspace! It doesnt happen very often.

Another one?

[shutdown -p now]

There are over a hundred different altcoins by now. What makes this one so different that it's Slashdot-front-page worthy?

Is Bitcoin perfect?

[swb]

After a lot of widespread adoption, is bitcoin considered more or less perfect, or are there weaknesses or problems that should be changed/rethought? Not just software wise, but maybe in terms of assumptions like the maximum number of coins that can be minted or the nature of the blockchain network, etc.

I always wonder how you "improved" a cryptocurrency once it gained some widespread adoption? It seems like network effects and investment would make it kind of easy for an alternate currency that appears "good enough" for initial investors to get somewhat established would be impossible to fix or migrate off of, short of a panic situation where some serious flaw causes holders to be forced to dump it for something else.

Most new cryptocurrencies seem to be either just clones of bitcoin or pump and dump schemes where it's pre-mined for get-rick-quick promoters (or at least they get labeled as such). But those invested in an established one like bitcoin could also be seen as working their own vested interests, be they financial or otherwise, and either ignoring weaknesses or badmouthing potential competitors because they are invested in it.

I'm sure the former is more true than the latter, which is why I'm curious if bitcoin is as good as it can get or if after a period of adoption if there are things that could/should have been done differently.