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GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society

taler.net

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Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society

#121

Post by hackuser »

ijktdot wrote: post #91
zerebubuth wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This system defeats any large payment entity from payment tracking. Merchants of physical goods must know the identity and delivery address of their customers in order to deliver them. Given how easy many companies find it to embed 3rd party trackers or adverts on their site, it seems reasonable to believe that they will also find it easy to sell this data ("to help detect and prevent fraud") to the payment process…

True, but at least Taler allows for the consumer to chose merchants who specify they don't sell data. Right now I can't buy anything online and not be tracked by the payment provider unless I use bitcoin. The prepaid credit cards here all require online registration and in store identification, Visa/Mc/Amex then track my purchases. If I show ID to buy $200 worth of Taler in a 7-11, there's no way for my Taler provide…

> Right now I can't buy anything online and not be tracked by the payment provider unless I use bitcoin

Here are a couple of solutions I've seen but haven't tried:

* Masked Cards by Abine (a privacy service): Abine gives you a card to use and you pay Abine. Obviously, you'll need to trust Abine.

https://dnt.abine.com/#feature/payments

* PaySafeCard: A prepaid card; "You don't have to enter any personal information or bank account or credit card details. Your privacy remains completely protected at all times with paysafecard!"

https://www.paysafecard.com/en-us/

Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society

#122

Post by afshin »

mindcrime wrote: post #88
afshin wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It may be that the disagreement you're encountering is based on your acceptance of the premise that taxes are collected at gunpoint. It's extending a principle to an extreme logical conclusion and appealing to a formulaic interpretation of the world. It is divorced from the real world and makes the perfect the enemy of the good.

It's not even slightly divorced from the real world. If you don't "pay your taxes" they will eventually send men with guns to confiscate your property and/or arrest you. And if you try to protect yourself, said "men with guns" will fucking shoot you dead. That is reality. And it's absolutely horrifying.

I'm pretty confident that the penalty for this crime, which has a name: "tax evasion", is not "men with guns will fucking shoot you dead".

Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society

#123

Post by benwerd »

This is the most political open source project I've seen in a while. I love the idea that it's designed to sit inside a progressive society where we all agree we have a social contract to the state. That is very different to a lot of similar efforts, and at the very least it's an important part of the discussion.

Right now it's vaporware, but I'm very interested in its release. I'd love to help give it a friendly face and integrate it with existing open source social platforms, to make it easier to send and receive money regardless of your technical ability.

Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society

#124

Post by placeybordeaux »

I don't understand why people seem to constantly associate bitcoin with tax free. There are no inherent reasons why cash transactions are taxable or non-taxable, it just turns out that people don't want to be destroyed by the IRS so they make an effort to pay their taxes.

Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society

#126

Post by oberstein »

notvladputin wrote: post #110
dnautics wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The underlying assumption is that governments don't care about how you spend money. This is patently untrue, because "liberal" governments explicitly use taxation as global social modification schemes, for all sorts of things beyond income redistribution - from minimizing percieved vices (alcohol, tobacco) to minimizing environmental footprint, etc. The idea that this sort of activity is able to be decoupled from sur…

Why did you specify liberal governments (is this not something all governments do?), and put it in quotes?

Other less liberal governments will simply ban something they consider sinful instead of try to make money off it while letting their populace (who they are supposed to care about) slide into hell (if the thing is truly sinful). Historically this doesn't work so well in the US, but in other places like Singapore it works better.

Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society

#127

Post by kijin »

eru wrote: post #120
ajross wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The text of the announcement seems to imply that individual transactions are not identifiable. The tax is taken per-transaction by the bank on behalf of the government or regulating entity without knowledge of the participants. > When you pay with Taler, your identity does not have to be revealed to the merchant. The bank, government and mint will also never learn how you spent your electronic money. Or something. Th…

> The tax is taken per-transaction by the bank on behalf of the government or regulating entity without knowledge of the participants. Sounds like a strictly proportional system only, then?

Most taxes that merchants and consumers need to worry about at the time of transaction, such as sales taxes in the US and VAT in the EU, are strictly proportional to the value of each purchase.

I don't think Taler is meant to help you do your taxes at the end of the year.

Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society

#128

Post by tsotha »

room271 wrote: post #90
choffman wrote: post #25

No thank you. With regards to my government, I would like to see more privacy rather than less. This seems to give me less. I do like the idea of complete transactional privacy between end users and/or merchants. But we already have this today with CryptoNote based cryptocurrencies like Monero - with optional transparency through "view keys".

As far as I understand it, Taler seems to be great for privacy and society (ensuring income is taxable). Governments can't see how you spend your money, but they can see who receives payments. Bitcoin and others will never succeed because they are too friendly towards illicit behaviour. Taler seems to strike a genuinely interesting and ethical balance here.

>Bitcoin and others will never succeed because they are too friendly towards illicit behaviour.

I doubt various governments can do a whole lot about it, which means it's likely to succeed eventually.

Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society

#129

Post by kijin »

stvswn wrote: post #125

Is the word "liberal" being used ironically?

"Liberal" has many definitions depending on who you ask, so your definition may very well be different from that of the authors.

Having said that, this is a GNU project so I would have preferred "free" to "liberal". A payment system consisting entirely of free software, perhaps.

Re: GNU Taler – Electronic payments for a liberal society

#130

Post by msandford »

afshin wrote: post #122
mindcrime wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not even slightly divorced from the real world. If you don't "pay your taxes" they will eventually send men with guns to confiscate your property and/or arrest you. And if you try to protect yourself, said "men with guns" will fucking shoot you dead. That is reality. And it's absolutely horrifying.

I'm pretty confident that the penalty for this crime, which has a name: "tax evasion", is not "men with guns will fucking shoot you dead".

Way to take his point completely out of context. Tax evasion doesn't get you killed, but resisting arrest for tax evasion just might end up with you dead.
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