backing?

[Alexander Reynolds <chrome@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu>]

> Alexander Reynolds () writes:
> > My first message ended something like this:  "how about multiple forms of
> > digital cash?  This removes a centralized monopolized bank as a form of
> > electronic power, i.e. the bank president could refuse digi-loans to those
> > elements of society he figured would usurp his(her?) bank's power."
> 
>    Sounds good but money isn't fiction. If there's nothing of value backing
> these "multiple forms of digital cash" you will still need to go to the
> evil nasty bank president. Otherwise, it's just monopoly money.
> 
>    That's what the bank of the internet proposes to do (provide
> digicash with backing). I doubt real banks would bother with digicash

	So what would back digicash?  A promise to pay?  That is all I can
see at the moment, other than the physical force of a government, which
would give digicash its worth, and somehow, human nature being what it is,
I doubt that would be a strong foundation for a digital economy.