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Official Response to “Bancor Is Flawed”

blog.bancor.network

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Re: Official Response to “Bancor Is Flawed”

#11

Post by atmosx »

arethuza wrote: post #3
jstanley wrote: post #2

> Should all token development stop now that we have ETH? Should ETH never have been created because we had BTC? Should BTC never have been created when the USD was already a liquid medium of exchange? Bitcoin was created because it isn't possible to do Bitcoin with USD. Ethereum was created because it isn't possible to do Ethereum with BTC. Bancor was created because you want to make fat stacks of cash. It would wor…

I must admit that my familiarity with the term "Bancor" was only from Yanis Varoufakis explaining about Keynes, Bretton Woods, the Nixon Shock as background explaining the current plight of the Euro and the Eurozone: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bancor

Me too. I got to know the Bancor via proxy (Varoufakis).

Te idea is more than intriguing, what I would like to know is if JMK expected the US to go with it or knew it was a dead-end but had to pursue it anyway.

I believe that it was one of the most obscure and important mewtings of post WWII.

Re: Official Response to “Bancor Is Flawed”

#12

Post by grenoire »

I went through it, and I can't say that it's any better than what your average corporate response is like.

It brushes over Sirer's points by making note of irrelevant 'achievements' they have managed. The format also reads like a high school teacher nitpicking your paper, where most of his arguments boil down to 'yeah but that doesn't really matter, because...'

I read the whitepaper (a cryptocurrency-fanatic friend pointed it out to me) just a few days before Sirer's post was published, and I noted a few of Sirer's main arguments immediately after reading it. It's not hard to understand the essential problems regarding limited reserves and market-trailing, and this response addresses nothing. It's wishy-washy investor-rubbing talk, not the legitimate debate and discourse they say the want.

Re: Official Response to “Bancor Is Flawed”

#13

Post by wpietri »

This is... not a good response. I've been reading Emin Gün Sirer for years, and his analyses have been very sharp. He's not always right, but he's right often enough that I take him seriously. I don't think it's reasonable for the Bancor people to ask the world for millions and millions of dollars and be sad that people are not always warm and fuzzy in their responses.

It reminds me of those people who ask for feedback on something they wrote and then get upset when you give it to them. They didn't actually want feedback; they wanted compliments and ego-boosting. That's also a valid thing to want and ask for from friends when you're struggling through the writing process. But once you publish, the warm fuzzies end. Critics are not there for authors; they're working for readers.

Re: Official Response to “Bancor Is Flawed”

#14

Post by rockmeamedee »

> Our thinking here is that people invented money to solve the [Double coincidence of Wants] problem in barter, making trade asynchronous, more efficient and predictable.

Fun fact, that's not true! It's called "the barter myth", and was put forward by Adam Smith in The Wealth of Nations.

But anthropologists everywhere have looked for 'pre-money' societies in their field research and haven't really found any. Bartering today happens in systems like prison where people are used to using money, but they aren't allowed to have (or there isn't) any. Everywhere we've looked, we find complex systems of credit, debt and/or quid pro quo.

Read it in a book called "Debt: The first 5000 years".

Re: Official Response to “Bancor Is Flawed”

#15

Post by pdimitar »

I can't see anything substantial in this official response.

I am mostly seeing a mild corporate language about how they want to build the future, how their team has credentials, how they opened up for feedback on many places (in the past, not now, convenient isn't it?), and there was zero substance on the article up until the first quotes, and it doesn't get better from there on as well.

I see nothing they defend their current business with. They mostly appeal to the past.

And not even that, they admit they've been doing other cryptocurrencies in the past. To me that doesn't you mean you're experienced in the area and you have what to offer. To me that means you're now a seasoned veteran who can swindle people with a smile while wearing a suit and using soft language.

Sorry, Bancor. You need to write a substantive article to be taken seriously.

Re: Official Response to “Bancor Is Flawed”

#17

Post by quantdev »

I'm a fan of Emin Gün Sirer and I don't like Bancor's approach in this response, especially in criticizing his informal tone (who cares?), but it does seem that they're right that he's misunderstood two main points: (1) Bancor tokens are automatically created and destroyed as needed and (2) the pool is collectively owned by all the token holders and not the issuing company.

Disclaimer: I don't know whether this makes Bancor great.

Re: Official Response to “Bancor Is Flawed”

#19

Post by hedonistbot »

atmosx wrote: post #11
arethuza wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I must admit that my familiarity with the term "Bancor" was only from Yanis Varoufakis explaining about Keynes, Bretton Woods, the Nixon Shock as background explaining the current plight of the Euro and the Eurozone: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bancor

Me too. I got to know the Bancor via proxy (Varoufakis). Te idea is more than intriguing, what I would like to know is if JMK expected the US to go with it or knew it was a dead-end but had to pursue it anyway. I believe that it was one of the most obscure and important mewtings of post WWII.

If you are referring to Bretton-Woods Conference, it is not obscure at all. It is probably the most important monetary event in modern history and probably everyone with economics background knows about it. Also it was during WWII. But you are right that parts of it (like the international clearing union and its implications) are just mentioned in passing in economic courses and rarely acknowledged nowadays.

Re: Official Response to “Bancor Is Flawed”

#20

Post by BaronSamedi »

rhart92 wrote: post #8
johnnydoebk wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Ethereum was created because it isn't possible to do Ethereum with BTC. I don't think that is true. You can absolutely reuse BTC for your so called "smart contracts".

That's not entirely true. Bitcoin's scripting language is not Turing complete, among other limitations that Ethereum addresses. https://github.com/ethereum/wiki/wiki/White-Paper#scripting

It is true that Ethereum has a more powerful scripting language. The real question, however, is if that feature has practical value.

I think the jury is still out on that question but I personally lean towards no. If and when there are profitable applications of this technology, ones that wouldn't have been possible without ethereum scripts then I will be glad to change my mind.

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