Nathaniel Thurston's Page

Dear Nathaniel, you are asking the right questions.
About interoperability / convertibility it will depend mostly on people's choice.

There are 2 important things, quite different:
- The technological platform: delivering the technology to create the currencies
- The design and creation of currencies

So to answer the convertibility will depend on people's choice for their own currency: everything is possible depending on the needs and sense they want to put in their currency.
For the transitioner's WE's: for now they are convertible 1:1€
My opinion about this shift is that when conventional money will be lacking in the everyday economy, free currencies will emerge quite quickly, as barter did in previous crisis. Giving the platform and the possibility to organise an independent currency change completely the game: once you tasted it, how to go back to the old model? It's like thinking about not reading blogs anymore (compared to conventional medias..)

How long will it take is a key question. Some things are sure, but depending on what scale we talk. I could do a forecast but it's really risky and not so useful. Our goal is to make it ready and stable as soon as possible. At the same time, there is a big need for an emerging collective consciousness of what is the invisible architecture behind money, and not only the "only solution when conv money will be out of the game". It's like free software, you can use it because its cost is 0 or you can use it because you believe in the philosophy behind it.
Our success will not only be in the usability but the change in philosophy.
As Jean François Noubel, founder of the transitioner will declare the Vow of Wealth it's a way of entering this free currencies world. You can see the transition as a conv+free currencies leading toward a world with only the free currencies in the end.
I hope this helps you. I don't hold the truth, this is just my understanding of what I see and feel.