On ripple

Ripple is a scam cryptocurrency.  Pity, since the alleged design is more scalable than bitcoin.

A cryptocurrency is mainly worth its speculative value, worth the possibility it could replace the US$. Obviously Ripple is not going to replace the US$, being a wholly controlled muppet of Cathedral minions.

If Ripple was funded by Baidu rather than Google, I would be on it like a tomcat on a pussy in heat.

Ripple is backed by Google, which means it has all the money it needs to get the software written right, and do all the things it has been promising to do.  But if it did all the things it has been promising to do, the Cathedral would be mighty pissed, and Google is entirely subservient to the Cathedral.

The way Ripple is supposed to work is that there should be no one central authority that sets, and changes, the rules, and issues more money at will. No one person or small group should be able to change the rules, because if they do, their software will generate a different root hash to the other person’s software and they will not be able to transact with the other person’s software. Unfortunately, ripple.com controls the software, and can change the code on all users at will, without most users knowing about the update, or being able to easily prevent the update, making it effectively a centralized currency under the control of an entity wholly subservient to the USG, like Paypal.

The alleged design is nice, but I have absolutely no confidence that the implementation reflects the alleged design. And if it does reflect the design today, that could be abruptly changed on you tomorrow.

I prefer the alleged Ripple design to Bitcoin, but we need an implementation where updates require user initiative, rather than being automagically rolled out, where some substantial number of users themselves compile their money client from source, and where the major transacting entities are physically located in places somewhat resistant to USG power – where the major holders of the currency, major performers of transactions, and major software developers are serious about destroying US hegemony and causing the collapse of the US$ and, if possible, the USG with the US$, and intend to get rich by doing so.

A cryptocurrency is only worth the probability that it could replace the US$, times ten trillion dollars or so, divided by the number of cryptocurrency units. And that probability depends on having a revolutionary as lead developer, and other revolutionaries as leading entrepreneurs.