Re: Public Domain Software (PDS)

mchiper wrote:
> Beth wrote:
> >The Neo-Aristocrats have misinformed you; Money is a measure of
credit
> >and debt...nothing more than that...
>
> Dear Beth,
> Who mis-informed you.
> Money can only be defined in terms of money.
> It measure nothing at all.
> It's worth what some one will give you for it.
> And NOT a penny more. :)
> Money is a "medium of exchange".

Ummm, yes...money is a measure of credit and debt...

What part is too complicated for you to understand?

No, really, if you look at UK money, then it still carries it bold as
brass on the actual notes...at the top of each note is written: "I
promise to pay the bearer on demand the sum of [ five / ten / twenty /
fifty pounds ]" signed by the chief cashier of the Bank of England at
that time (I also wouldn't be surprised - though I'm just guessing -
that very term "pound" itself comes measuring weights...e.g. five
pounds of gold...note, by the way, that it's just "tradition" to keep
the promise written on the UK notes...they repealed the practice of
actually _literally_ letting you exchange your notes for gold quite a
while ago when, basically, it became stupidly impractical...and, well,
technically, there's probably more money in the world than could
literally be exchanged for gold that they'd have one heck of a serious
problem if everyone asked for their promised gold at the same
time...us Brits are just odd like this - a bit like we've got a Queen
but she actually does nothing and has no real powers she can
exercise - we just like to keep things around for "tradition"...you
know, just a keepsake reminder of our history, even when it's no
longer actually applicable anymore...thanks to this weird obsession of
ours, like I say, I can actually point directly to our bank notes
which still, "for tradition's sake", carry the original promise of
exchange for gold still written on them...plus the head of the Queen
too, even though it's actually Parliament that has all the powers and
all she does is wave at tourists who just can't seem to get enough of
all that stuff...to be honest, we'd have become a republic ages back,
probably, if it weren't for all the tourists flocking to see her in
her palace...as tourists bring over lots of money...so, heck, just
remove all her powers but keep her around as, like, a sort of "moving
Eiffel Tower" or "living Statue of Liberty" which the tourists' dig
coming to see...it's like one of those "living history" exhibit things
but it's like actually _for real_...cool! :)...

Now, those who play card games for money may recognise exactly what
this is...it's an "I.O.U."...a promisory note...a promise to keep your
debt to someone else...coins and electronic records are _exactly the
same thing_, though they are just more convenient in some situation
than for _everything_ to be in notes (you can imagine counting out a
million notes one by one to buy a mansion...the building would have
fallen down from old age before you'd have finished paying ;)...and,
well, there's no room to write the full thing on the coin so it's
"taken as read"...and electronic records don't even have an actual
physicality to them for _anything_ to be written on them...

Really, money is merely a measure of credit and debt...an I.O.U. ("I
owe you" ;)...a promise to be kept to return a favour to
someone...that's _LITERALLY_ what it is...there's no "philosophy"
here...that's fact...

And what's wages? Well, you "hire" someone to do you a long-running
favour in doing work for you every day for your business...and, in
return, you promise to repay that debt you owe them...that's the
wages...and the contract you signed? That's the original promise that
you're going to be giving them a set of promises every week or month
to owe them favours for their work (plus, of course, extra stuff about
work conditions and that sort of non-money related things :)...

All money is, is a series of convenient "tokens" for accurately
measuring the amount of credit and debt a person has /
owes...unsurprisingly, this is why when someone has negative figures
in their bank account, this is called "being in debt"...and when they
are in black, this is called "being in credit"...that's NOT "jargon"
or anything, it's plain English...when you're "in debt", that means
you're _in debt_ (you owe someone something)...and when you're "in
credit", that means you're _in credit_ (someone somewhere owes you
something...for work done at your job, for the computer you sold them,
etc.)...it's not some magic voodoo jargon language...it's just literal
plain English to describe what's going on...

Now, I'm delibrately being "obvious" here because one _massive_
problem these days is that we've built so many systems and clever
methods and different sets of tokens and all that sort of thing,
there's a massive, massive danger that people have simply become
"detached" from what is really going on here...they've, like,
completely forgot (or have never known in the first place) what money
is in its _literal_ terms...like, for instance, you arguing
"philosophy" with me when I'm talking what it _LITERALLY_ is and
there's no actual debate here...this is just facts...

It's really exchanging a donkey for some food at the market in
disguise...but actually literally exchanging things is
inconvenient...food is perishable so can get ruined if left too
long...donkeys can't be divided up into convenient smaller "chunks" to
exchange for a number of smaller items because you'll kill the donkey
(thus, ruining its value as a means to carry things around on its
back)...

This basic system is _NO DIFFERENT_ today...it's entirely the same
exchange system...but, a bit like suddenly finding you're out of money
in a poker game but you still want to carry on, you can throw in other
things into the pot...your car keys, deeds to your house, an "I.O.U."
note (as long as everyone trusts you to keep your promise in the
I.O.U. note)...

The car keys are "representing" your car because you can't throw a car
onto the table...the title deeds of your house "represent" your house
because you can't throw a house on the table...

Money represents your credit and debt because you can't throw promises
onto a table...

And if you say "yes, you can...you write an I.O.U. note" then you've
just twigged what money actually is...but it's an agreed promise from
_everyone_...you know automatically that every store you go to will
accept the I.O.U. note...so you can, quite cleverly, exchange the debt
that your boss owes you for your work with the store keeper for a loaf
of bread...

The boss owes you a debt...and you want a favour (of relative worth)
from the storekeeper...so, you carry the boss's I.O.U. note - your
wages - to the storekeeper who then gives you the bread in exchange
for the debt the boss owes you...

Now, this is where it can start to get a little complicated but,
remember, it's _still the same thing_...we're all exchanging credits
and debts all over the place...and following the massively complex
network of "favours due and paid" is quite insane...but, of course, it
was exactly because it was so complicated to do that this simplified
"money" token system was agreed by everyone because it makes things
real easy...someone owes you? Get money off them...you owe someone?
Hand over the money...as to who owes who what all over the
world...well, no need for you to know..."money" is the agreed system
of measurement that frees you from having to have some big list of
"favours due and paid" written on the wall, running around chasing up
people for all the favours they owe you or keeping track of what you
owe them...

And this is sort of the problem here...this token system called
"money" is so abstract an idea that you really can easily forget what
it actually all boils down to...

So, like I said, some people suddenly think that "success" is measured
in money...well, only if you think that all "success" is, is to have
more people owe you things than you owe them...but, no, not really...

In a sense, it's so simple, so easy, so blatantly obvious that it
actually - like a ninja - tends to be "hiding in plain sight" for
large amounts of people...and they grow up with "money" already
working and established that they just don't - because, in a sense,
there's no need to, other than to get a better understanding - think
over what it _actually is_...and what is it?

Money is a measure of credit and debt...nothing more than that...

Now, _IF_ you want to debate what _people do with money_ then, yup,
there's a heck of a lot of "moral" and "philosophical" debate in
that...but that's a _separate issue_ to what money is...how people
choose to use their favours - to help or to hinder - is a very
interesting and massive arguable topic...but it's
_independent_...you'll need to start a different "How should money be
used?" thread for that ;)

Beth :)