Related papers: Grassroots Currencies: Foundations for Grassroots …
Global cryptocurrencies are unbacked and have high transaction cost incurred by global consensus. In contrast, grassroots cryptocurrencies are backed by the goods and services of their issuers -- any person, natural or legal -- and have no…
Informally, a grassroots system is a distributed system that can have multiple instances, independent of each other and of any global resources, that can interoperate once interconnected. Grassroots applications are potentially important as…
Grassroots platforms aim to offer an egalitarian alternative to global platforms. Whereas global platforms can have only a single instance, grassroots platforms can have multiple instances that emerge and operate independently of each other…
The goal of grassroots cryptocurrencies is to provide a foundation with which local digital economies can emerge independently of each other and of global digital platforms and global cryptocurrencies; can form and grow without initial…
We present an architectural alternative to global digital platforms termed grassroots, designed to serve the social, economic, civic, and political needs of local digital communities, as well as their federation. Grassroots platforms may…
Cryptocurrency refers to a type of digital asset that uses distributed ledger, or blockchain, technology to enable a secure transaction. Although the technology is widely misunderstood, many central banks are considering launching their own…
Classical monetary systems regularly subject the most vulnerable majority of the world's population to debilitating financial shocks, and have manifestly allowed uncontrolled global inequality over the long term. Given these basic failures,…
The internet era has generated a requirement for low cost, anonymous and rapidly verifiable transactions to be used for online barter, and fast settling money have emerged as a consequence. For the most part, e-money has fulfilled this…
Cryptocurrencies are a digital medium of exchange with decentralized control that renders the community operating the cryptocurrency its sovereign. Leading cryptocurrencies use proof-of-work or proof-of-stake to reach consensus, thus are…
In recent years, electronic retail payment mechanisms, especially e-commerce and card payments at the point of sale, have increasingly replaced cash in many developed countries. As a result, societies are losing a critical public retail…
While the physical lives of many of us are in democracies (one person, one vote - e.g., the EU and the US), our digital lives are mostly in autocracies (one person, all votes - e.g., Facebook). Cryptocurrencies promise liberation but stop…
We review different classes of cryptocurrencies with emphasis on their economic properties. Pure-asset coins such as Bitcoin, Ethereum and Ripple are characterized by not being a liability of any economic agent and most resemble commodities…
Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) have been implemented by only a handful of countries, but they are being explored by many more. CBDCs are digital currencies issued and backed by a central bank. Consumer trust can encourage or…
Cryptocurrencies came to the world in the recent decade and attempted to offer a new order where the financial system is not governed by a centralized entity, and where you have complete control over your account without the need to trust…
Cryptocurrencies offer an alternative to traditional methods of electronic value exchange, promising anonymous, cash-like electronic transfers, but in practice they fall short for several key reasons. We consider the false choice between…
Many proposals for the design and implementation of digital wallets assume that the purpose of the wallet is to enable offline payments via custodial accounts, ignoring the real problems faced by individuals and businesses that engage in…
By comparing cryptocurrencies with other existing payment methods, including banknotes and bank cards, it is clear that the use of Bitcoin and its competitors (Ethereum, \dots) is almost insignificant in world trade. We may also note that…
Offering an architecture for social networking in which people have agency over their personal information and social graph is an open challenge. Here we present a grassroots architecture for serverless, permissionless, peer-to-peer social…
Two taxonomies of money that include cryptocurrencies are analyzed. A definition of the term cryptocurrency is given and a taxonomy of them is presented, based on how its price is fixed. The characteristics of the use of current fiat money…
The current crisis, at the time of writing, has had a profound impact on the financial world, introducing the need for creative approaches to revitalising the economy at the micro level as well as the macro level. In this informal analysis…