[p2p-research] All Money is Fantasy

[Ryan]

Jamais Cascio and Stow Boyd on "all money is fantasy."

Sent to you by Ryan via Google Reader: All Money is Fantasy via Open
the Future by Jamais Cascio on 10/13/09

My friend Stowe Boyd, consultant and provocateur, interviewed me
recently for his Future of Money project. The video of that interview
is now available at Stowe's blog, /Message.

It's a good conversation, although I clearly haven't learned the
blogger video conversation practice of simply talking over the person
I'm conversing with. I'm far too polite.

I start with the observation that all money is fantasy. I laugh/sigh
when I see "gold bugs" going on and on about how money should be tied
to gold, because gold has "real value." The only intrinsic value that
gold has relates to how we can use it (in electronics, mostly, or as
meal garnish); its utility as money is just as imaginary, just
as "fiat," as post-Bretton Woods currency. It's a mutually-agreed upon
fantasy. A "consensual hallucination," to steal from Gibson.

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