ID:35418
 
I hate to be harsh about something that at first glance is a pretty nifty idea. But someone has to.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7029564.stm

I have two objections.

1. This money would work great as playing pieces for a board game about the future. As actual money for the actual future, however, it lacks gravitas. In fact it looks like a prop from a cheesy early-70's sci-fi movie.

2. ""Anything with sharp edges, like coins, would be a risk to astronauts while the chips and magnetic strips used in our cards on Earth would be damaged beyond repair by cosmic radiation," he added." Let me ask you a question. When you reach into your pocket to grab some change, do you typically find yourself screaming in pain and leaving a dark red stain on your pants? My guess is No, because the design challenge of manufacturing coins without sharp edges was solved centuries ago, and remains solved to this very day.
lol circles
You're obviously missing the point, gug- it's all in the name. If the future galactic empire adopted the quid as its standard currency it would be bloody brilliant!
Where does it's value lay? We don't need another fiat currency like the Euro, intergalactic space travellers need currency backed by food and rocket fuel!
They're not gonna stack all that well, and the clear design just makes them that much harder to tell apart in spite of the color coding.

But clearly the artist who designed this is as self-deluded as the idiot who thought the Segway would change the world. I find the name irritating beyond belief, because it's so freaking stupid. "Intergalactic?" Aren't we getting a wee bit ahead of ourselves here?
Rinkuu wrote:
lol circles

Circles are totally the way of the future. Squares are like, totally for squares, dude.
Lummox- I'd like to see you stack anything in zero G. =P

Teebs if I had to design a new kind of currency for outerspace I'd probably make it have velcro bits on it so you could stick them together or on your sleeve or something. That'd be cool. You could use them to play zero-g tiddly winks.

By the way, isn't calling what is obviously a light-hearted joke article "freaking stupid" a bit much? =P
Mengasdotestenkits should be the kurransey of the fushure?
Personally I like it, only thing better would be electronic money. (Humans these days and their mediocre use of the sound spectrum, if we were a Class II civilization we'd already have lightspeed gamma waves for split-second data transfer..)
This is the most awesome stroke of marketing ever. Six and a half British pounds for a little plastic doohickey! Just take some polymers, hire a designer, add some outer space flavour and you've got yourself a marketable product. With free press coverage into the bargain. Now there's a stunt that only a marketing genius would think of. I love it.
According to the Travelex (the company the currency was developed for) website, it's the first intergalactic currency in the universe. So, seems Travelex have some sort of insider info on the state of any extraterrestrial development.

Seriously, it should at least have some gold in it or something. They are literally printing money at almost zero cost to themselves.
Hazman wrote:
According to the Travelex (the company the currency was developed for) website, it's the first intergalactic currency in the universe. So, seems Travelex have some sort of insider info on the state of any extraterrestrial development.

Seriously, it should at least have some gold in it or something. They are literally printing money at almost zero cost to themselves.

I'm thinking that the price of all of the high-polymer plastics and dyes would cover that, and besides, about 15 US cities have their own money. Some use plastic coins, so go figure.

I call bull on the magnetic strip thing. It's not like people inside space shuttles are surrounded by gigantic Tokamak fields or anything.

The second thing I call bull on is the coins-are-dangerous thing. Each one of those things is probably just as heavy as a coin, and in space I doubt the shape of a coin has more effect than the mass and velocity of that coin. Doesn't matter whether it's a five gram rock or a five gram cube, it's still going to hurt when someone chucks it across the room and beans you between the eyes.

Finally, I call bull on its status as a viable currency. That currency would be so easy to knock off.
Really poor design... Like Lummox points out, they won't stack very well...

And yes, coins can stack in zero G... Not held together by weight, but held together in a pocket or pouch, or whatever...

Ever have a pocketful of change? They form into nice compact stacks of coins... These "QUID" would be like having a pocketful of marbles...
Mechana2412 wrote:
(Humans these days and their mediocre use of the sound spectrum, if we were a Class II civilization we'd already have lightspeed gamma waves for split-second data transfer..)

You are just using sciencebabble to be amusing...right?
Incidentally, radio waves travel at light speed. All electromagnetic radiation does. =P
Not near. They travel at the speed of light, seeing as how they're a form of electromagnetic radiation.
Yeah, I fixed it after fact checking. You and your post-watching. =P
As Star Trek has proven, in the future there will be no money.