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Comment by lisper | Hacker News Reader

Wow, this is one of the most confused articles about cryptocurrencies that I have ever read. He runs off the rails almost from the very beginning:

"currencies are systems of value exchange"

No, a currency is a physical token issued by an institution that is a proxy for money, usually bank notes and coins. Money is the system of exchange. The dollars in your bank account are money, but they aren't currency. The dollars in your wallet are both. Old Zimbabwean dollars are currency but not money.

It just goes downhill from there.

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The writing quality was grammatically poor and he resolved with an outrageous conclusion without actually presenting any evidence - just a bunch of poorly-understood generalizations about history. Stating you're basing something on evidence usually infers you will present some. There are too many squatters in this space who sense an opportunity but have no idea what it is yet.

Currencies are systems of value exchange. It is the reason why the term is derived from the word "current" as in a river's current because if you follow the exchange of money over the domain of a given money, eg. the US Dollar, you see its "current" or flow as units of money are traded between customers, retailers, banks and exchanges. A currency is defined by the domain of its value in relation to other currency and its exchange. Money is a "mostly" static value, this dollar is worth this much bread. Currency is an algebra of the domain of money measured over the economy of that money's exchanges including the changes in inflation in relation to the money value of a dollar in relation to bread.

> Currencies are systems of value exchange.

No. That's money. Not all currencies are money. Zimbabwean dollars, for example, are a currency but they are not money. "Worthless currency" is not an oxymoron, but "worthless money" is. Money has value by definition. Currency doesn't.

> It is the reason why the term is derived from the word "current"

The etymology of a word has very little to do with its current meaning. "Calculate" is derived from the latin word for "stone", but that doesn't mean that calculating has anything to do with stones. (It did at one time, but not any more.)

> Currency is an algebra of the domain of money measured over the economy of that money's exchanges including the changes in inflation in relation to the money value of a dollar in relation to bread.

That might be a useful definition, but it's not the one used by economists. "Currency" is a proper subset of "money", which also comprises bank money [1], cash-equivalent securities [2] and commodities [3], all of which are money and none of which are currencies.

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[1] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/bank%20money

[2] https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/cashequivalents.asp

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodity_money

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Currency

A currency (from Middle English: curraunt, "in circulation", from Latin: currens, -entis), in the most specific sense is money in any form when in use or circulation as a medium of exchange, especially circulating banknotes and coins.[1][2] A more general definition is that a currency is a system of money (monetary units) in common use, especially for people in a nation.[3] Under this definition, U.S. dollars (US$), pounds sterling (£), Australian dollars (A$), European euros (€), Russian rubles (₽) and Indian rupees (₹) are examples of currencies. These various currencies are recognized as stores of value and are traded between nations in foreign exchange markets, which determine the relative values of the different currencies.[4] Currencies in this sense are defined by governments, and each type has limited boundaries of acceptance.

The USD doesn't have to be stored physically (most isn't). Is it not a currency?

Twenty US dollars is just "money", an agreed upon medium of exchange. A twenty dollar bill is currency, i.e. a physical token representing that amount of money.

Not according to this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_dollar

or any other definition of currency I've ever seen

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Currency

"A currency (from Middle English: curraunt, "in circulation", from Latin: currens, -entis), in the most specific sense is money in any form when in use or circulation as a medium of exchange, especially circulating banknotes and coins." [Emphasis added]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money

"The money supply of a country consists of currency (banknotes and coins) and, depending on the particular definition used, one or more types of bank money..."

See also the caption on the first figure:

"A sample picture of a fictional ATM card. The largest part of the world's money exists only as accounting numbers which are transferred between financial computers. Various plastic cards and other devices give individual consumers the power to electronically transfer such money to and from their bank accounts, without the use of currency." [Emphasis added]

Especially, not exclusively.

Also, are cryptocurrencies not currencies?

> Especially, not exclusively.

It's like the difference between "car" and "vehicle". Not all vehicles are cars. Not all money is currency. The boundary is not precise. Is an SUV a car? Maybe. Is a semi truck a car? Definitely not. But it's still a vehicle.

Is a dollar bill currency? Yes. Is the balance in your checking account currency? Maybe. Is a check currency? Definitely not. But it's still money.

> Also, are cryptocurrencies not currencies?

No. It's arguable whether or not they are money. The U.S. government treats them like a commodity for tax purposes.

cool yeah the crypto balance moving networks also work pretty well without the semantics

scale to millions using it at the same time? nope! and no solution available yet! not holding my breath

cool if some teams solve it, cool if they don't

still using it myself

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