Conscious Currency A proposal / white paper by Jeroen Lapre' 27 Dec 2K7 Traditional Currency According to Wikipedia: A currency is a unit of exchange, facilitating the transfer of goods and/or services. Limitations of Traditional Currency Socially reponsible investors want their investments go toward ventures with true positive value. People want to make a donation toward a cause. Unfortunately many donation websites that claim to deliver your donation to a selected target, often do not live up to their promise. With traditional currency, it is difficult to track, and therefore ensure their investment / donation reaches the intended party / cause. i.e. when a ten dollar bill is used to purchase an item, information is lost once that ten dollar bill re-enters circulation. Proposed Solution With the advent of credit cards, electronic commerce, and now virtual currencies in virtual worlds, a currency no longer need to be an "informationless transation". A conscious currency is a "smart" currency which is enabled by cutting age information technology. Targetted Sub-currencies Participants can "convert" their dimensionless currency, into a specific kind of credit. e.g. Education, Construction, Transport, Medical, Technology, Organic Produce, etc. Restrictions Organic Producers will only be able to spend "organic produce credits" on their activities, Education organisations will only be able to spend "education credits" on their activies, etc. These are automatically tracked, following open/transparent business practices. Lo Tech Analogy A low tech analogy would be the Food Stamp Program. Conscious currency takes this concept into the 21 Century, by using IT to ensure investments/donations reach their intended targets. Privacy Participants have the option, when converting traditional real world dollars, through conscious currency preference settings, for their conscious credits to "know" their originator. i.e. they can be anonymous transactions. The emphasis on conscious credits is to ensure their reach their intended targets. In the case of targetted donations, or socially resonsponsible investments, the originator may want to attach their identity to the contribution, for social recognition / positive feedback loop. Caveats In order for Conscious Currency to work, a community would need to voluntarily adopt this new means of transaction. As has already been demonstrated by Second Life, participants are perfectly happy to trade their "real" dollars for "linden" dollars. Related Proposals The Positive Portal proposal would be an ideal virtual community in which to develop Conscious Currency. The added insentive is that participants want to contribute positive activities, products and services. Conscious currency would assist in assuring this goal, by "baking in" the goals into the economic system. Conscious Credits would also lend itself to an N-Dimensional Sustainable Economic Model. External References Currency Wikipedia Entry Mad Meme Labs A division of distant-galaxy.com PO Box 817 Forest Knolls CA 94933 USA Business license number: 023379. Registered in the county of Marin. Contact: madmemelabs@distant-galaxy.com