I just read at the top of Stellar's forum a note from Joyce Kim, CEO of Stellar:<p>>We expect that as a price for stellar becomes more established, we'll have to continually adjust the total amount of the giveaway to make sure it keeps making sense.<p>So they're already dialing back their distribution promise. This is <i>exactly</i> what happened with Ripple. When Ripple first started, there were assurances that all but 20% of Ripples would be distributed "as quickly as possible".<p>That didn't happen.<p>Several years later now, Ripple has decided to basically keep as many ripples as they can, which is supposedly part of what led to the split between Jed and the Ripple leadership/owners.<p>All this is a funny commentary on human nature. As an outsider, it's as clear as day to me that in order to succeed, Ripple needed to rapidly distribute as many XRP as possible. After all, 5% of a lot of money is worth much more than 50% of nothing. The only other missing ingredient for Ripple was community engagement.<p>And with Stellar I fear we'll see the same thing (at least with respect to a rapidly decreasing distribution rate).<p>These issues are exactly why Bitcoiners are so scornful of "pre-mined" coins. All things considered, proof-of-work and proof-of-burn are still by far the fairest and most successful currency bootstrapping methods. Stellar uses neither.<p>Bootstrapping a currency is the ultimate Zen undertaking: in order to make money as a crypto-bootstrapper, you must find ways to distribute it, either by giving it away or (preferably) by fostering entrepreneurship and spending it on those merchants who take a chance on accepting it.<p>A lesson much of the Bitcoin community still hasn't taken to heart, which is likely the only reason why interest in the coin is failing to pass on from the early adopter to the early majority.