comment on: http://trustcurrency.blogspot.com/2011/03/bitcoin-rube-goldberg-machine-for.html

This article reflects nicely on some of the things that are wrong with bitcoin: wasted energy, "proof of work" etc, which IMO stem from basing the currency on something as unuseful and abstract as algorithmic complexity. Many people who advocate complementary currencies agree that Bitcoin is a step away from central currencies and therefore in the right direction but not the right solution.

Too bad other commenters who state things like "completely misunderstands almost everything about bitcoin." (Anonymous) and "I can't believe people write about bitcoin without basic understanding of economics."(JulianG) completely fail to qualify their comments, otherwise their comments would lead to fruitful discussion.

mr anthrope, what exactly makes you say anonymity is unneccessary? "Nothing to hide" fails to take into account problems like aggregation and exclusion of information, secondary use, distortion, in other words the slow accretion of harms that can cause leaks, pattern matching, the freezing of assets, identity theft and fraud caused by errors, carelessness of state and criminal endeavour, not to mention the erosion of trust in our culture.