Silk Road forums
Discussion => Philosophy, Economics and Justice => Topic started by: connoisseur on February 05, 2013, 10:05 am
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While it was the desire to aquire drugs not available in my environment that pulled me towards SR, I become more and more fascinated with the thought that SR is actually the ultimate libertarian market model.
While it will never be possible to weed out scammers completely, the rating system and forum information give you a good idea whom to buy from and who is best avoided.
Reading the forum and checking prices since last November I notice price competition is about to begin. With a near to zero risk for small intra-EU orders and domestic orders in general, near to zero interventions by authorities give me the hope that the factor prohibition will not be mirrored in prices much longer as this factor can be taken out of the equation.
Drug prices consist mainly of 3 factors:
+ Quality of the substance
+ Professionalism of vendor
+ risk compensation for vendors
#3 will go out of the window due to a >99 success rate and I have the impression that the few busts in and between stemmed rather from vendors who were heavily involved IRL transactions. AUS is special case - and this is reflected in AUS prices on SR.
Apart from this prices will over time come down as the structure of transactions eliminates a lot of the middlemen, leading to a very vertical distribution model where even large vendors and bulk vendors can supply the retail market.
Competition will ensure lower prices as vendors with flawless 100 ratings will begin to undercut each other until this vertical structure is mirrored in prices; the prohibition upmark will disappear over time.
Your thoughts?
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I don't know much theory behind ultimate libertarian market model, but I agree with your 3 points that define prices.
#3 is, as you already said, almost out of question, but still we can read on vendor's profiles that they risk their lives, wife etc. for us, buyers. I really can't see how that could be true. If you sell on the street, you are exposed to the buyer and to the surroundings, and people who know you deal can turn you in at anytime. And in order for buyers to contact you, they have to use some sort of technology, which is easily tracable (apart from the fact that LE is limited by law).
But on SR, the only one who can be easily identified is the customer (giving out your address), while if a vendor is smart enough, they can easily ship products without any unwanted attention. The weak link is only in buying stuff to sell, but this can also be minimized to minimum.Attachments and other options
#1 and #2 I totally agree with, stealth shipping is a must and good communication is also something you can't really get on the street (no feedback and reviews there). But there is always a minimum to where prices can go. They can't drop below production cost, and if vendor wants to earn something, we have to calculate in some additional rise in price.
But due to such an open, concurent market, we could see (in case there comes to big competition) some vendors dumping prices below their bulk buy cost, thus losing money in the short run, just to get rid of old/new competition. But this is nothing new, this is already an old tactic in capitalist world.
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prices will decrease
quality will increase
but what is an ultimate libertarian model?
perhaps it should be judged the freedoms it delivers to its participants?
if this is indeed the criterion silk road has delivered the goods.
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I think SR, along with other anonymizing technologies, is a profound step toward facilitating the growth of libertarian ideals in the geopolitical context we (humans) now find ourselves in.
anything that lets us run parallel to/outside of the established and oppressive structures we see all around us is on the right track, but attaining any 'ultimate' end will be and arduous and lengthy process indeed.
hold fast fellow subversives!
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But due to such an open, concurent market, we could see (in case there comes to big competition) some vendors dumping prices below their bulk buy cost, thus losing money in the short run, just to get rid of old/new competition. But this is nothing new, this is already an old tactic in capitalist world.
Given the nature of anonymous markets like SR and the finite capacity of a cryptocurrency such as BTC, I do not think (or would at least hope) that capitalistic traits like price dumping would be tolerated within such a politically disparate community as SR has brought together. The feedback and product-quality reports on SR are what informs vendor reputations and I believe the majority will go for quality over quantity every time. As long as vendors aren't looking to take over a significant proportion of any market, it still keeps distribution as decentred and as autonomous as possible.
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The woods are lovely, dark, and deep
But I have promises to keep
u watched too much Charles Bronson movies ("Telefon") ?
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^ I think it's lines from a poem by I want to say Robert Browning?
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Robert Frost
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It is a step towards it, maybe even the closest we will ever get but not the ultimate by any means.
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Frost. That's what I meant. ;D I woke up in the middle of night thinking "it was frost. Not browning!"
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I think SR, along with other anonymizing technologies, is a profound step toward facilitating the growth of libertarian ideals in the geopolitical context we (humans) now find ourselves in.
anything that lets us run parallel to/outside of the established and oppressive structures we see all around us is on the right track, but attaining any 'ultimate' end will be and arduous and lengthy process indeed.
hold fast fellow subversives!
envicirate the prolitairate.
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To add more fuel to the discussion.
I see SR as a functioning libertarian model as there is no authority that limits vendors and buyers in any way but still provides the resolution system that is an analogue to a mediator between contracting parties if one side of deal does not fulfill it contractual obligations.
Everything else is left to the market and the review system guarantees symmetric information for all participants.
It is the absence of courts that defines anarchism, which is not a lawless society but a society that honors contracts and therefore has no need for a court or executive powers.
Remembering the few cases of outright fraud, e.g. Tony76 or ETM, consolidates the perception that the "crime" rate on SR is far below the figures IRL.
This proves - at least to me - that crime will only flourish when a societal system leaves no more room for the very personal economic expansion we call getting rich. Take away limits from a market and crime will decline because vendors will direct their efforts to develop a solid stream of income from organically grown relations with their clients, making both sides feel comfortable.
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Prices will ultimately decline, partly for the reason you suggest: lower risk of interception.
Profits will increase, due to an uptick in trade e.g. people who wouldn't normally take drugs such as MDMA or amphetamine will now do so, as well as the decline in prices encouraging traditional drug consumers.
However due to increasing purity and availability, while drug consumption will increase overall, I think the increase in knowledge about appropriate dosages, correct practices and increased social acceptance (less "I take drugs to be a rebel y'all") shall reduce the harm, which puts downward pressure on any uptick in those who become chemically dependent. People will find other things to addict themselves to, fully immersed augmented or virtual reality experiences or something.
I think the biggest impact is actually none of those things which are so frequently discussed such as the above. The biggest impact shall be entirely new business models and arbitrage strategies. That sounds like 'b-school' nonsense talk, but it actually isn't, search for my posts on "integration" to see why. Today's drug markets are horribly inefficient, and economies of scale creating million percent profits are possible. You read the previous sentence correctly.
This is the start of the black market's industrial revolution, SR is the incubator of a gold rush that is going to last a long, long time. This is the time to work hard, build your syndicates, corporations and ancillary technology services and products for those companies, because it'll pay off big time with serious capital, power and money. Today's SRians and Darknet participants are going to be tomorrow's Rockefellers and Vanderbilts. Outside of scale oil/gas and a few other blips, this is the only growth market in America. People who go the traditional route like their parents did are consigned to becoming armies of drones, because in today's world it is unfortunately the case that hard work in the regular market doesn't pay off anymore thanks to a combination of high taxation, high unemployment and low economic prospects. For those with a combination of brains and guts, the Darknet is like virgin uncontested territory, just like the New World used to be. A few pesky Indians/DEA agents to provide high drama and entertainment value, but other than that it's onwards and upwards.
Ultimately, as with Tryptamine's vision of the future I hope to see market forces encouraging new drug markets in areas that don't really exist in the mainstream yet, such as nootropic markets (drugs that enhance your mental faculties for specific kinds of work without neurotoxic damage) e.g. you need 10 minutes of pattern recognition ability followed by 20 minutes of creative problem solving. Think dermal patches injecting dozens of different types of drugs via thousands of microinjections depending on your commands as a situation evolves. Certainly it would be a must for academics, soldiers, and many others. We are seeing the start of this on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan among coalition forces. Future armies are scaling downwards as the cost of equipping and training soldiers accelerates, which means you'll need to get as much bang for your buck as possible, hence chemical enhancement, that is why those soldiers are taking nootropics like moda. Analogous phenomenons exist in the business and academic worlds. It is bizarre that many humans simultaneously think the use of medical drugs outweighs the negative consequences while thinking all other drugs outside of that have equally positive and negative effects, or just negative effects. I'm making it sound a bit like a runaway positive feedback loop, but actually I think it'll occur quite naturally and that existing fears over 'excessive competition' are overblown.
tldr; Libertarianism leads to Limitless... :D
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Robert Frost
;)
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Not yet ultimate, currently sr protects only vendors, not until
somebody comes up with the anonymous buying model and integrates it..
The market has two sides..
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Not yet ultimate, currently sr protects only vendors, not until
somebody comes up with the anonymous buying model and integrates it..
The market has two sides..
Yes, but this is being solved by current and future developments:
http://dkn255hz262ypmii.onion/index.php?topic=155526.0
Alongside this the wave of the future is going to be cheap intrusion detection devices and reverse surveillance.
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Not yet ultimate, currently sr protects only vendors, not until
somebody comes up with the anonymous buying model and integrates it..
The market has two sides..
Yes, but this is being solved by current and future developments:
http://dkn255hz262ypmii.onion/index.php?topic=155526.0
Alongside this the wave of the future is going to be cheap intrusion detection devices and reverse surveillance.
Nice thread, pine, thanks for re-sharing that. I guess the idea of virtual offices and the like have been around in some form or another for yonks, (PO boxes, mail forwarding etc) but this locker thing (mentioned in the linked thread) is interesting to say the least. Development of schemes like these wold certainly go some way to benefiting buyers, if only for the simple reason that it provides yet another option by which to receive goods, making it more difficult for LE to detect/identify just by sheer volume. But presumably if this were to become mainstream, steps would be taken by government to regulate such a thing.... how could they resist?
Unfortunately, in the society we currently live in - there is no way of truly anonymous buying - unless you're buying non-tangible goods. You've always gotta give away some personal info, or make direct personal contact somewhere in the delivery system.
So in regards to Xe's point - the imbalance in accountability between buyers and vendors, does prevent SR from being the "ultimate" model for me. What I do think it is, if anonymity technology and anonymous currency continues to develop (or at least continue), is an excellent starting point - and a sign of good things to come; More the basis for the ultimate libertarian market, as opposed to the fully fledged end product 8)
Just speaking for myself - I do indeed feel liberated.
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Not yet ultimate, currently sr protects only vendors, not until
somebody comes up with the anonymous buying model and integrates it..
The market has two sides..
indeed, good point. right now the consumers are in many ways relying on the fact that LE primarily targets distributors, and personal amount users generally get more slaps on the wrist.
however, if this model continues to burgeon, LE will likely have to change their tactics, one of which I could see being large-scale arrests of consumer level SR users in an attempt to 'make an example'