Geek Credit manual.

What is Geek Credit system

Geek Credit is a complementary currency designed for the internet. The complementary currencies are widely used offline. They are not intended to replace the casual money, but rather to provide the benefits of the currency system as a medium of exchange and common value that will benefit the local community. That is why this currencies are called complementary. The open complementary currencies are a community service. Geek Credit system does not require a central authority and thus it is cheaper to run than other popular complementary systems like LETS or HOURS. It is also less vulnerable to the administrative pressure. If authorities decide to forbid or control the community currency, Geek Credit based system will survive.

How to use Geek Credit

Geek Credit currently supports different communities. Each has a separate Geek Credit currency and is addressable by a uniq number.

Community 0 is a test community that I run for debugging Geek Credit system. Anyone is free to issue, accept and pay such Geek Credits, they do not have any value.
Community 1 is an internet community that is using Geek Credit in the way described at the Geek Credit home page.
Other communities are private local groups that use Geek Credit within the group: web sites, games, etc. If you are planning to run such community please drop me a note and I will add its number here to avoid conflicts.

To use Geek Credit system one should have GnuPG installed, and public key available to other Geek Credit users, i.e. published at the well known key server. It is also recommended to use the Geek Credit pocket software. When using other software or processing Geek Credits manually, please make sure you read and accept the Geek Credit policy.

Here is the typical transaction scenario:

Buyer and seller agree on number of Geek Credits to be paid. They also agree on the list of the issuers the seller accepts.
Buyer adds the transaction details to the Geek Credits seller will get and signs them. Buyer gets this Geek Credits from the pocket and issue new if needed.
Buyer sends seller this credits using any carrier, including insecure (FTP, instant message, e-mail, etc). Stealing Geek Credits either from pocket or from the wire during the transmittion is pointless. The only way to steal Geek Credits is to create a duplicate, but this is easily trackable and the attacker's guilt can be proven with his signature. The credits issued remain in buyers archive.
Seller checks the received credits signatures and issuers data. The credits that are issued by the seller are redeemed (destroyed). The transaction information goes to seller's archive.

Geek Credit example:

<EXAMPLE START>
Geek Credit 0.3 591847600 1
alice <alice@wonderland.ru>
bobby <bobby@wonderland.ru>
Sat Mar 20 11:31:38 2004
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.4 (MingW32)

iQCVAwUAQFwBalD6OYn9U7V6AQKF3wP/URRjRN1M5TqeFN7dpZFS7032ie84LkHD
FUYELNkp4P7kemLJeXTu4z7orvbYMu93ARBZQHC3lHPCVqYa8KpyiJiMBCekGcd2
MPEXLWivs94bf39k1vdhZHF+NpQLMsEgaOjOTXfEcc9KYDN2LDR5NU5mA649RcM5
Otke4LZGSKM=
=iegZ
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----



bobby <bobby@wonderland.ru>
catty <catty@wonderland.ru>
Sat Mar 20 11:32:47 2004
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.4 (MingW32)

iQCVAwUAQFwBr4DvBX7v1UrPAQIfDgP9HR8/49u4NjcDR36YdEVP3MMCkSAOMbJd
Y31vyBNHsmHw9Rh+/Wq3BJt6JJlNGW6UQvOpSqgFUeYytIBXFuQyTTslO76Z4MHX
97Nx784w+jspggQJXYAELHHGsU/bnWUlq6n5qzNfqPx5togstrowzR7/97gmONaA
qyzA9O9BM9M=
=f5jZ
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
</EXAMPLE END>

This Geek Credit was created by alice who paid to bobby few Geek Credits including this one. Later bobby paid to catty using this Geek Credit. If later catty will pay it to alice, this credit will be redeemed (destroyed).

Changed at Fri Apr 9 20:58:23 MSD 2004

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