It seems to me Stellar (the organization) will be "the Central Bank" a la Bank for International Settlements at the global level or Federal Reserve for Stellar (the cryptocurrency). This is what makes me uncomfortable. The biggest point about cryptocurrencies is that they are not centralized. In that sense Stellar seems a lot worse than regular currency. With a regular currency, at least the respective Central Bank o…
Meh, I'm not that big on 'totally decentralized'. Most of the time when nobody is in charge, it just ends up as a clusterfuck (bitcoin being an obvious example, or Occupy Wall Street which had a governance structure so impossibly idealistic that it was doomed to failure...by design, IMHO). So yeah, you have a small self-appointed elite of 'leaders' who essentially have more power than everyone else. That's how human society functions, most of the time. If enough people like it, it will take off and that self-appointed elite will become disproportionately powerful and rich...but at least you know who they are and they're in a well-defined governance structure subject to specific laws and can be challenged well-defined procedural tactics. The creates a large degree of predictability, and business likes predictability, as do consumers. So while it may fall short of purely democratic ideals, if more poeple use it and it actually results ina greater consumer suprlues, then it enhances the lives of mroe people to a greater degree than an ideologically pure alternative that never acquires sufficient traction to deliver a significant economic benefit.
Cynical, maybe, but as a good utilitarian I'll take results over ideals any day.