I did my first talk @ DC858
2025 Nov 13 (E: 2025 Dec 03)
View 1 comment(s).My talk went for roughly 30 minutes, extending to 40 minutes during questions and answers.
The slides (n=31) can be downloaded at /downloads/talk1.pdf.
Q&A
What is the ‘dividend’ of a barter economy?
Barter economies do not have a dividend, but they experience entropy differently.
For example, Diablo II had an obsoleted currency (gold) for its player economy on Battle.net servers. Players later appropriated game items to use as a currency (Stone of Jordan, high runes).
What about ‘work’?
The concern of the talk is how money is created, not if merit is rewarded.
Generally, your employer does not create money (unless they are a bank), and the creation of money is not related to work.
The focus isn’t whether you drove 3 miles to the bank, 5 to the credit union, or 20 to the brokerage, it’s whether you opened a loan, for what amount, and at which interest rate.
What was ‘spatial symmetry’? (mentioned, but not given any slides)
Spatial symmetry (symmetry of space) means the location does not affect economic outcomes.
The talk makes an unrealistic assumption of ‘spatial symmetry’ in that every creditor is earning 5% APY or miner has the same hash rate for the sake of simplicity and focus.
Do supply models need to be always increasing (derivative > 0)?
I’m not familiar with monetary systems or online games where the supply decreases periodically. It would be like cash disappearing from your wallet.
Does a linear supply model solve wealth inequality?
No, even though the standard deviation between balances will incline to 0 over time. Example: it’s still possible to win Monopoly.
