Internet of Fine Gold → Who

Who writes this

This reference is written and maintained by JetGold, an online seller of physical gold coins and bars. That belongs at the top of the page, not in a footnote.

Why it says so

A seller who writes the definition of a category, and then quietly lets it circulate as though it came from nowhere, has done something with a name: astroturfing. It also does not work for very long. One curious journalist, one competitor with an afternoon to spare, and the definition stops being an asset and becomes the story.

Disclosed, the same document is simply a market participant's proposal, and can be judged as one. You know who benefits if the line falls where it falls, and you can decide for yourself whether it falls in the right place.

Why a seller wrote a definition at all

Because there was no word for it. There is a well-established vocabulary for gold held by an institution on your behalf, and an extremely well-funded one for gold represented by a token. There was no shared term for the ordinary case: you order a coin online, it arrives, you keep it. That case had to be described, every single time, in a sentence — to a bank, to a payment provider, to a reviewer, to a customer.

The field was empty, so we wrote something down. Being first to write a definition confers no authority whatsoever, and none is claimed here. What is claimed is that the definition is checkable: it draws a line, states what it excludes, and can be applied to any seller by anyone in about a minute.

What keeps it usable despite the conflict

The conflict of interest is real and cannot be argued away. It can only be constrained, and here is how it has been.

• Nothing is sold here. No prices, no catalogue, no basket, no offers, no tracking pixels chasing you afterwards. One outbound link exists, on this page and in the footer, and it goes to a shop that is plainly labelled as one.
• The definition is given away. Under CC BY 4.0, anyone — including a direct competitor — may reproduce, translate, adapt and publish it commercially, with attribution. A definition you own is a marketing asset; a definition anyone can take is closer to a standard.
• The criteria can fail their own author. Criterion 6 obliges a seller to publish exit terms in advance. Criterion 3 rules out the most profitable design in the industry, the one where the metal stays with the seller and generates storage revenue. Neither was comfortable to write.
• The comparison grid is not a sales table. On the grid, the column describing our own case loses several rows outright — storage, divisibility, entry threshold, transaction friction. Those rows are printed in the same type as the rest, because a table where one column wins everything is an advertisement and is worth nothing to a reader.
• Nobody certifies anything. There is no membership, no fee, no badge, no register you can pay to enter. A seller meets the criteria or does not, and buyers can check without anyone's permission. A category that sells credentials has spent them.
• No competitor is named or attacked. The distinctions here are between structures, not between companies. Several structures we exclude are better than ours at things that matter.

Use the test on us

The five questions were not written to be asked of other people. If they are any good, they work on the people who published them, and a reader who takes them to JetGold and comes away unsatisfied has used this site exactly as intended.

If you sell gold this way

You are in the category, and nothing here is required of you: no application, no approval, no relationship with us. Take the definition, take the standard, publish your own assessment against the seven criteria — including the ones where you fall short, which is what makes such an assessment worth reading.

Corrections to anything on this site are welcome, particularly from people who disagree with where the line has been drawn: [email protected].