Author Topic: Decentralized Autonomous Countries  (Read 6733 times)

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Offline Stan

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I'd like to ask a question about the object of decentralization, or what's decentralization.

Poof of Work distribute the coin to every bit of computing power put into mining, thus people with more computer will eventually get more coin from mining.
Poof of Stack tries to distribute the coin to every bit of money put into mining, thus people with more money will eventually get more coin.
Keyhotee solution tries to distribute the coin to every identity in keyhotee DAC into mining, thus people with more 'fake' identification will win more coin(vote).

So, what is the ultra form of decentralization expected by Invictus? Are you trying to find a way distributing coin(vote)s to every individuals? Or distributing coins to every creature on the world?

That's important for me to hold the bone of decentralization. Thanks  :)

http://invictus-innovations.com/mission/   :)
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Offline bytemaster

Proof of stake does not redistribute coin to rich. It does 0 redistribution after genesis block except by voluntary trade.

I don't want any redistribution. I want property rights and trade to drive allocation of resources.


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Offline shinh

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I'd like to ask a question about the object of decentralization, or what's decentralization.

Poof of Work distribute the coin to every bit of computing power put into mining, thus people with more computer will eventually get more coin from mining.
Poof of Stack tries to distribute the coin to every bit of money put into mining, thus people with more money will eventually get more coin.
Keyhotee solution tries to distribute the coin to every identity in keyhotee DAC into mining, thus people with more 'fake' identification will win more coin(vote).

So, what is the ultra form of decentralization expected by Invictus? Are you trying to find a way distributing coin(vote)s to every individuals? Or distributing coins to every creature on the world?

That's important for me to hold the bone of decentralization. Thanks  :)

Offline bytemaster

Random voting by keyhotee IDs would cause Sybil attack and the mining and registering of Keyhotee IDs simply so they could use them to vote.  This has the same problem as Proof of Work.

Like any system... the people who are 'elected as trustees' can only be corrupted in a single way... "stop including transactions" they cannot change the operating rules of the network without users upgrading their wallets.    This is not like electing a politician who can then pass any law they want. 

So the key is to make sure that transactions always go on... that it is not possible to block transactions.    This means that as long as there are few honest trustees that transactions can continue.   

Lastly, the final line of defense is the 'hard-fork' and election of a new trustee off chain.  Everyone keeps their balances and life goes on.   This is the ultimate line of defense in any system, the goal is to make this option less likely to be necessary.   

Note that the major corporations have another form of 'vote' and that is by selecting which form of currency *THEY* accept.   I suspect that if Amazon started taking Peercoin that it would quickly surpass Bitcoin in value, especially if Google, Amazon, and Microsoft followed suit.   In fact, if I were one of these large companies and wanted to get into this space, I would buy up a lot of some smaller Altcoin before launching.   

The market is the ultimate form of decentralization and our ultimate defense.  Once the code is out there, new forks are easy to create if the most popular fork becomes corrupted.
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Offline luckybit

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This thread reveals the gist of the problem with relying exclusively on PoW.
The problem is that Proof of Work consistently results in concentration of power around whomever can develop the best chip or whomever has the money to buy the best / most chips.

Governments (whether the United States, China, or their friends) and corporations (Apple, Nvidia, Intel, AMD, and their friends) will always have a strategic advantage which is insurmountable. They will always have the technological advantage (they will always be the most technologically sophisticated people at the table), and they'll also always have the most financial might. This is assuming they are fair players and not going to cheat.

Assuming they'll use any advantage to win, then you can see that Bitcoin in itself isn't free from political, state, or corporate influence. Bitcoin disperses the problem from being a centralized problem which governments and corporations can solve into being a decentralized problem with much greater complexity.

So a good strategy would be to decentralize as much as possible and increase complexity as much as possible for Eve (Byzantine adversary) and as expensive as possible for the computationally unbounded adversary.

It should be assumed in the design that perfection is not possible, and that if an adversary is big enough and determined enough that they can break it. Bitcoin can be broken but the ease of which it can be broken is what matters. If it's so hard to break that its not worth it then it is a deterrence against breaking it. If it were a World War scenario then for sure it would be broken by various militant forces who would compete for control of it but it will still be useful even if it were broken because none of them would admit if they could break it.

Proof of Stake makes it democratic and early adopters (not the government or companies) would end up owning the stake.

This is a very good point but Proof of Stake eventually shifts the point of failure onto whichever human beings hold the biggest stakes. For that reason I don't think pure Proof of Stake is good enough.

Assume we took the richest list of Protoshares and froze it in time as the Proof of Stake. It might not happen overnight but over time some of the people with high stakes will change their political views or become corrupted somehow and then with it would go everything beneath them.

Basically the concentration of power into too few people will result in the exact same outcome whether it's Proof of Work, Proof of Stake or the government of a traditional country. I don't have the solution to it but I know anonymity would be necessary, along with randomization so that power isn't predictably in the addresses of the richest list. If it is known where the power is and the protocol is not anonymous then the power will be corruptible, will shift, etc.

Flatten the power structure out as much as possible and if some people do rise in power let it be momentary and not permanent so that the system also attempts to be incorruptible from the bottom up. Anything top down is easily corrupted and that is why governments typically favor top down systems.

Any system will have some weakness. The advantage of POS is that the people with the greatest power to topple the system are usually the people with the most to loose. This will definitely keep out individuals and small groups that want to destroy the system, and the government probably won't bother to mess with it unless they can link it to drugs or tax evasion. So, can we just all form a social contract and all agree not to use any DACshares to purchase drugs or avoid paying taxes?

Did you ever see the movie the Matrix when the agents would literally corrupt whomever they had to in order to stop Neo? They would infiltrate and possess the body of anyone closest to Neo.

You're correct that with Proof of Stake the people who seem like they have the most to lose would have an incentive to protect their investment. Here are some ways it could go wrong.

1. The people with the highest stakes might be rich already and not really have the most to lose.
2. The people with the highest stakes might have the most to lose while they are still poor and now that they are millionaires or billionaires they are ready to cash out so rich that their lifestyle has changed. They no longer have anything to lose.
3. The people who are idealists who truly believe in the concept ideologically have the most to lose, but they might not have the highest stakes and might not end up with any power.

There are some ways around this. Early adopters in something like Protoshares probably are idealists because at this time most people don't have a clue what Protoshares are and why it is so important. The people who donated to reserve a name not only believe in the concept but wanted to be part of the genesis block for Keyhotee. So you do have at least some people who probably truly believe in it.

But those people might not be the people who have a lot of Protoshares. So Proof of Stake does have plenty of weaknesses too which become apparent down the road should people with very high stakes become very rich and cash some of their stake out in order to reduce their risks. The other reason is some of these people will not be anonymous and may even become celebrities and they'll be potentially corrupted because of fame.

I don't have a solution but Proof of Stake in my opinion has the same problem that oligarchy has. The same problem we'd have if we let hollywood celebrities have permanent voting power for the USA. We need a way to have social mobility so that if the people at the current top become corrupt a new group of people can take their place easily and instantly. Proof of Stake does not allow for people to easily take their place while an anonymous jury type system or even voting in a more flat manner would allow every Keyhotee name to be equal.

So how about you choose randomly from the Keyhotee names registered into the genesis block? Random jury pools can form to allow them to anonymously vote to select certain things or to balance off the Proof of Stake. Let them decide how much a vote is worth, or act in a way which can adjust the voting scheme if Proof of Stake ever fails or becomes corrupt. Since these names are associated with the project forever and they paid money on faith alone it might be a good group to choose from.

« Last Edit: December 15, 2013, 03:00:58 am by luckybit »
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Offline bytemaster

This thread reveals the gist of the problem with relying exclusively on PoW.
The problem is that Proof of Work consistently results in concentration of power around whomever can develop the best chip or whomever has the money to buy the best / most chips.

Governments (whether the United States, China, or their friends) and corporations (Apple, Nvidia, Intel, AMD, and their friends) will always have a strategic advantage which is insurmountable. They will always have the technological advantage (they will always be the most technologically sophisticated people at the table), and they'll also always have the most financial might. This is assuming they are fair players and not going to cheat.

Assuming they'll use any advantage to win, then you can see that Bitcoin in itself isn't free from political, state, or corporate influence. Bitcoin disperses the problem from being a centralized problem which governments and corporations can solve into being a decentralized problem with much greater complexity.

So a good strategy would be to decentralize as much as possible and increase complexity as much as possible for Eve (Byzantine adversary) and as expensive as possible for the computationally unbounded adversary.

It should be assumed in the design that perfection is not possible, and that if an adversary is big enough and determined enough that they can break it. Bitcoin can be broken but the ease of which it can be broken is what matters. If it's so hard to break that its not worth it then it is a deterrence against breaking it. If it were a World War scenario then for sure it would be broken by various militant forces who would compete for control of it but it will still be useful even if it were broken because none of them would admit if they could break it.

Proof of Stake makes it democratic and early adopters (not the government or companies) would end up owning the stake.

This is a very good point but Proof of Stake eventually shifts the point of failure onto whichever human beings hold the biggest stakes. For that reason I don't think pure Proof of Stake is good enough.

Assume we took the richest list of Protoshares and froze it in time as the Proof of Stake. It might not happen overnight but over time some of the people with high stakes will change their political views or become corrupted somehow and then with it would go everything beneath them.

Basically the concentration of power into too few people will result in the exact same outcome whether it's Proof of Work, Proof of Stake or the government of a traditional country. I don't have the solution to it but I know anonymity would be necessary, along with randomization so that power isn't predictably in the addresses of the richest list. If it is known where the power is and the protocol is not anonymous then the power will be corruptible, will shift, etc.

Flatten the power structure out as much as possible and if some people do rise in power let it be momentary and not permanent so that the system also attempts to be incorruptible from the bottom up. Anything top down is easily corrupted and that is why governments typically favor top down systems.

Any system will have some weakness. The advantage of POS is that the people with the greatest power to topple the system are usually the people with the most to loose. This will definitely keep out individuals and small groups that want to destroy the system, and the government probably won't bother to mess with it unless they can link it to drugs or tax evasion. So, can we just all form a social contract and all agree not to use any DACshares to purchase drugs or avoid paying taxes?

1) Someone with 5% ownership in any network could sell their stake and buy enough mining power to control it all via PoW 51% attack
2) Someone would require 51% ownership in a network to perform a 51% attack... but if you think of it as a company, 51% ownership means you effectively control the company... no difference than with a DAC.
3) The trustees in power only has one option at their disposal: include a trx or don't include a trx.   That is IT! 
4) It would be little different than Ripple consensus model.   
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Offline phoenix

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This thread reveals the gist of the problem with relying exclusively on PoW.
The problem is that Proof of Work consistently results in concentration of power around whomever can develop the best chip or whomever has the money to buy the best / most chips.

Governments (whether the United States, China, or their friends) and corporations (Apple, Nvidia, Intel, AMD, and their friends) will always have a strategic advantage which is insurmountable. They will always have the technological advantage (they will always be the most technologically sophisticated people at the table), and they'll also always have the most financial might. This is assuming they are fair players and not going to cheat.

Assuming they'll use any advantage to win, then you can see that Bitcoin in itself isn't free from political, state, or corporate influence. Bitcoin disperses the problem from being a centralized problem which governments and corporations can solve into being a decentralized problem with much greater complexity.

So a good strategy would be to decentralize as much as possible and increase complexity as much as possible for Eve (Byzantine adversary) and as expensive as possible for the computationally unbounded adversary.

It should be assumed in the design that perfection is not possible, and that if an adversary is big enough and determined enough that they can break it. Bitcoin can be broken but the ease of which it can be broken is what matters. If it's so hard to break that its not worth it then it is a deterrence against breaking it. If it were a World War scenario then for sure it would be broken by various militant forces who would compete for control of it but it will still be useful even if it were broken because none of them would admit if they could break it.

Proof of Stake makes it democratic and early adopters (not the government or companies) would end up owning the stake.

This is a very good point but Proof of Stake eventually shifts the point of failure onto whichever human beings hold the biggest stakes. For that reason I don't think pure Proof of Stake is good enough.

Assume we took the richest list of Protoshares and froze it in time as the Proof of Stake. It might not happen overnight but over time some of the people with high stakes will change their political views or become corrupted somehow and then with it would go everything beneath them.

Basically the concentration of power into too few people will result in the exact same outcome whether it's Proof of Work, Proof of Stake or the government of a traditional country. I don't have the solution to it but I know anonymity would be necessary, along with randomization so that power isn't predictably in the addresses of the richest list. If it is known where the power is and the protocol is not anonymous then the power will be corruptible, will shift, etc.

Flatten the power structure out as much as possible and if some people do rise in power let it be momentary and not permanent so that the system also attempts to be incorruptible from the bottom up. Anything top down is easily corrupted and that is why governments typically favor top down systems.

Any system will have some weakness. The advantage of POS is that the people with the greatest power to topple the system are usually the people with the most to loose. This will definitely keep out individuals and small groups that want to destroy the system, and the government probably won't bother to mess with it unless they can link it to drugs or tax evasion. So, can we just all form a social contract and all agree not to use any DACshares to purchase drugs or avoid paying taxes?
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Offline luckybit

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This thread reveals the gist of the problem with relying exclusively on PoW.
The problem is that Proof of Work consistently results in concentration of power around whomever can develop the best chip or whomever has the money to buy the best / most chips.

Governments (whether the United States, China, or their friends) and corporations (Apple, Nvidia, Intel, AMD, and their friends) will always have a strategic advantage which is insurmountable. They will always have the technological advantage (they will always be the most technologically sophisticated people at the table), and they'll also always have the most financial might. This is assuming they are fair players and not going to cheat.

Assuming they'll use any advantage to win, then you can see that Bitcoin in itself isn't free from political, state, or corporate influence. Bitcoin disperses the problem from being a centralized problem which governments and corporations can solve into being a decentralized problem with much greater complexity.

So a good strategy would be to decentralize as much as possible and increase complexity as much as possible for Eve (Byzantine adversary) and as expensive as possible for the computationally unbounded adversary.

It should be assumed in the design that perfection is not possible, and that if an adversary is big enough and determined enough that they can break it. Bitcoin can be broken but the ease of which it can be broken is what matters. If it's so hard to break that its not worth it then it is a deterrence against breaking it. If it were a World War scenario then for sure it would be broken by various militant forces who would compete for control of it but it will still be useful even if it were broken because none of them would admit if they could break it.

Proof of Stake makes it democratic and early adopters (not the government or companies) would end up owning the stake.

This is a very good point but Proof of Stake eventually shifts the point of failure onto whichever human beings hold the biggest stakes. For that reason I don't think pure Proof of Stake is good enough.

Assume we took the richest list of Protoshares and froze it in time as the Proof of Stake. It might not happen overnight but over time some of the people with high stakes will change their political views or become corrupted somehow and then with it would go everything beneath them.

Basically the concentration of power into too few people will result in the exact same outcome whether it's Proof of Work, Proof of Stake or the government of a traditional country. I don't have the solution to it but I know anonymity would be necessary, along with randomization so that power isn't predictably in the addresses of the richest list. If it is known where the power is and the protocol is not anonymous then the power will be corruptible, will shift, etc.

Flatten the power structure out as much as possible and if some people do rise in power let it be momentary and not permanent so that the system also attempts to be incorruptible from the bottom up. Anything top down is easily corrupted and that is why governments typically favor top down systems.
« Last Edit: December 15, 2013, 02:37:29 am by luckybit »
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Offline bytemaster

This thread reveals the gist of the problem with relying exclusively on PoW.
The problem is that Proof of Work consistently results in concentration of power around whomever can develop the best chip or whomever has the money to buy the best / most chips.

Governments (whether the United States, China, or their friends) and corporations (Apple, Nvidia, Intel, AMD, and their friends) will always have a strategic advantage which is insurmountable. They will always have the technological advantage (they will always be the most technologically sophisticated people at the table), and they'll also always have the most financial might. This is assuming they are fair players and not going to cheat.

Assuming they'll use any advantage to win, then you can see that Bitcoin in itself isn't free from political, state, or corporate influence. Bitcoin disperses the problem from being a centralized problem which governments and corporations can solve into being a decentralized problem with much greater complexity.

So a good strategy would be to decentralize as much as possible and increase complexity as much as possible for Eve (Byzantine adversary) and as expensive as possible for the computationally unbounded adversary.

It should be assumed in the design that perfection is not possible, and that if an adversary is big enough and determined enough that they can break it. Bitcoin can be broken but the ease of which it can be broken is what matters. If it's so hard to break that its not worth it then it is a deterrence against breaking it. If it were a World War scenario then for sure it would be broken by various militant forces who would compete for control of it but it will still be useful even if it were broken because none of them would admit if they could break it.

Proof of Stake makes it democratic and early adopters (not the government or companies) would end up owning the stake.   
For the latest updates checkout my blog: http://bytemaster.bitshares.org
Anything said on these forums does not constitute an intent to create a legal obligation or contract between myself and anyone else.   These are merely my opinions and I reserve the right to change them at any time.

Offline luckybit

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This thread reveals the gist of the problem with relying exclusively on PoW.
The problem is that Proof of Work consistently results in concentration of power around whomever can develop the best chip or whomever has the money to buy the best / most chips. ASIC companies control Bitcoin because they can generate them exclusively if they choose.

Governments (whether the United States, China, or their friends) and corporations (Apple, Nvidia, Intel, AMD, and their friends) will always have a strategic advantage which is insurmountable. They will always have the technological advantage (they will always be the most technologically sophisticated people at the table), and they'll also always have the most financial might. This is assuming they are fair players and are not going to cheat.

Assuming they'll use any advantage to win, then you can see that Bitcoin in itself isn't free from political, state, or corporate influence. Bitcoin disperses the problem from being a centralized problem which governments and corporations can solve into being a decentralized problem with much greater complexity.

So a good strategy would be to decentralize as much as possible and increase complexity as much as possible for Eve (Byzantine adversary) and as expensive as possible for the computationally unbounded adversary.

It should be assumed in the design that perfection is not possible, that if an adversary is big enough and determined enough that they can break it. Bitcoin can be broken but the ease of which it can be broken is what matters. If it's so hard to break that its not worth it then it is a deterrence against breaking it. If it were a World War scenario then for sure it would be broken by various militant forces who would compete for control of it but it will still be useful even if it were broken because none of them would admit if they could break it.
 

« Last Edit: December 15, 2013, 02:28:22 am by luckybit »
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Offline phoenix

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The best way to limit the Trustees power would be to make it as easy as possible to become a Trustee, thereby allowing almost anyone to become one. This would then spread out the power among the people, hopefully preventing the formation of political parties.
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Offline luckybit

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Decentralized Continuous Election of Trustees

Suppose we were to accept the notion that it may be beneficial to have a handful of “trusted” individuals around to certify the official block-chain.   We would want to ensure that these trustees are indeed trust-worthy and not simply self-appointed opportunists who had enough capital to corner the voting market.   Everyone should have a an opportunity to vote without having to purchase special hardware or spend billions every year in electricity just to cast their vote.  Lastly, only those who currently own the currency should have a vote proportional their investment in the currency instead of giving the vote to foreigners who have no current interest in the currency.

Fortunately such a voting system is easy to setup by utilizing a concept known as coin-days-destroyed by a transaction to vote for trustees.  Coin-days-destroyed is calculated as your account balance multiplied by the length of time you have held that balance.    When you create a transaction to make a purchase you also include the address of the Trustee you would like to vote for using the coin-days destroyed by the transaction.

Each trustee would accumulate coin-days-destroyed in their voting balance, and when they vote on a block they consume some of their accumulated coin-days.  The best block is the one which has been voted upon by the most trustees.    While Bitcoin block creation is centralized in one person at a time, this new system would require several unique individuals as elected by the shareholders to approve every block.  As a result not even a single block is centralized into a single user.

The trustee’s could use a consensus model based upon the Ripple algorithm to agree on which blocks to create.    This means that in theory blocks could be produced multiple times per minute.   

Trusting the Trustees in an otherwise Trust-less system. 

The major innovation of Bitcoin was that it claimed to create a trust-less currency; however, as we have seen recent developments have reintroduced trust focused on the mining pools.   Does electing Trustees to certify the network open the network up to abuse of power?  In our opinion there is no such risk as the Trustee cannot create transactions that violate the rules of the block-chain and they have their signature on every block they produce.  Any trustee that signed two different blocks that would result in a double spend could be held accountable and of course as long as there are more honest trustees than dishonest trustees this is not a problem.

Pseudo-anonymous random elections may be the only way (similar to a draft or a grand jury system). If their identities are known they will be corrupted eventually (they won't remain trusted for very long). Just look at what happened recently with the shut downs of many centralized trusted exchanges like Bitfunder or BTCT. Look at Mike Caldwell the maker of Casascius fame. I don't think there is any way to do it without an acceptable level of anonymity for voters and trustees. I also don't think any trustee should be in a position for too long. The longer we must trust them the more risk there is for us.

I think it's a bad idea to put our trust in human beings for long periods of time. Power corrupts the human being and it's only a matter when not if it will happen.
« Last Edit: December 15, 2013, 02:08:32 am by luckybit »
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Offline bytemaster

Trustee has no additional role other than running a server.
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Offline phoenix

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Decentralized Continuous Election of Trustees

Suppose we were to accept the notion that it may be beneficial to have a handful of “trusted” individuals around to certify the official block-chain.   We would want to ensure that these trustees are indeed trust-worthy and not simply self-appointed opportunists who had enough capital to corner the voting market.   Everyone should have a an opportunity to vote without having to purchase special hardware or spend billions every year in electricity just to cast their vote.  Lastly, only those who currently own the currency should have a vote proportional their investment in the currency instead of giving the vote to foreigners who have no current interest in the currency.

Fortunately such a voting system is easy to setup by utilizing a concept known as coin-days-destroyed by a transaction to vote for trustees.  Coin-days-destroyed is calculated as your account balance multiplied by the length of time you have held that balance.    When you create a transaction to make a purchase you also include the address of the Trustee you would like to vote for using the coin-days destroyed by the transaction.

Each trustee would accumulate coin-days-destroyed in their voting balance, and when they vote on a block they consume some of their accumulated coin-days.  The best block is the one which has been voted upon by the most trustees.    While Bitcoin block creation is centralized in one person at a time, this new system would require several unique individuals as elected by the shareholders to approve every block.  As a result not even a single block is centralized into a single user.

The trustee’s could use a consensus model based upon the Ripple algorithm to agree on which blocks to create.    This means that in theory blocks could be produced multiple times per minute.   

Trusting the Trustees in an otherwise Trust-less system. 

The major innovation of Bitcoin was that it claimed to create a trust-less currency; however, as we have seen recent developments have reintroduced trust focused on the mining pools.   Does electing Trustees to certify the network open the network up to abuse of power?  In our opinion there is no such risk as the Trustee cannot create transactions that violate the rules of the block-chain and they have their signature on every block they produce.  Any trustee that signed two different blocks that would result in a double spend could be held accountable and of course as long as there are more honest trustees than dishonest trustees this is not a problem.

So, other than setting up a computer to verify blocks, what is the role of a Trustee in the network itself? Obviously they have an incentive to work on promoting the network, but this doesn't directly impact their role in verifying blocks.
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Offline Stan

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Nice read but I don't understand.  Its a bit above me but, are you saying that Bitcoin will eventually be controlled by governments in a country some day no matter what?  I may not have understood.

I am saying that Proof-of-Work based upon consumption cannot achieve decentralization.  I am also saying that the current Bitcoin ecosystem is rather corrupt and while existing players are acting in a benevolent manner, we are ultimately at their mercy and thus living under a dictatorship without any checks and balances built into the protocol.  Two players could effectively enforce that tainted coins could not be transferred. 

Bottom line, proof-of-work in this form is incompatible with Invictus' goal of decentralization.

I understand.

The everyday user (like me) see bitcoin as a way to earn quickly and with huge profits.  Bitshares has a challenge on its hands if we are going to compete or play along side?  Yes it isn't totally decentralized so for it to work with Invictus, what do you purpose?

Let Bitcoin go on its merry (and very successful) pathfinding way.  Just don't blithely copy everything about it in new applications if you are serious about decentralization. 

Naturally we wouldn't say this if we weren't in hot pursuit of a better way...   :)


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Offline bytemaster

Decentralized Continuous Election of Trustees

Suppose we were to accept the notion that it may be beneficial to have a handful of “trusted” individuals around to certify the official block-chain.   We would want to ensure that these trustees are indeed trust-worthy and not simply self-appointed opportunists who had enough capital to corner the voting market.   Everyone should have a an opportunity to vote without having to purchase special hardware or spend billions every year in electricity just to cast their vote.  Lastly, only those who currently own the currency should have a vote proportional their investment in the currency instead of giving the vote to foreigners who have no current interest in the currency.

Fortunately such a voting system is easy to setup by utilizing a concept known as coin-days-destroyed by a transaction to vote for trustees.  Coin-days-destroyed is calculated as your account balance multiplied by the length of time you have held that balance.    When you create a transaction to make a purchase you also include the address of the Trustee you would like to vote for using the coin-days destroyed by the transaction.

Each trustee would accumulate coin-days-destroyed in their voting balance, and when they vote on a block they consume some of their accumulated coin-days.  The best block is the one which has been voted upon by the most trustees.    While Bitcoin block creation is centralized in one person at a time, this new system would require several unique individuals as elected by the shareholders to approve every block.  As a result not even a single block is centralized into a single user.

The trustee’s could use a consensus model based upon the Ripple algorithm to agree on which blocks to create.    This means that in theory blocks could be produced multiple times per minute.   

Trusting the Trustees in an otherwise Trust-less system. 

The major innovation of Bitcoin was that it claimed to create a trust-less currency; however, as we have seen recent developments have reintroduced trust focused on the mining pools.   Does electing Trustees to certify the network open the network up to abuse of power?  In our opinion there is no such risk as the Trustee cannot create transactions that violate the rules of the block-chain and they have their signature on every block they produce.  Any trustee that signed two different blocks that would result in a double spend could be held accountable and of course as long as there are more honest trustees than dishonest trustees this is not a problem.
For the latest updates checkout my blog: http://bytemaster.bitshares.org
Anything said on these forums does not constitute an intent to create a legal obligation or contract between myself and anyone else.   These are merely my opinions and I reserve the right to change them at any time.

Offline NineLives

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Nice read but I don't understand.  Its a bit above me but, are you saying that Bitcoin will eventually be controlled by governments in a country some day no matter what?  I may not have understood.

I am saying that Proof-of-Work based upon consumption cannot achieve decentralization.  I am also saying that the current Bitcoin ecosystem is rather corrupt and while existing players are acting in a benevolent manner, we are ultimately at their mercy and thus living under a dictatorship without any checks and balances built into the protocol.  Two players could effectively enforce that tainted coins could not be transferred. 

Bottom line, proof-of-work in this form is incompatible with Invictus' goal of decentralization.

I understand.

The everyday user (like me) see bitcoin as a way to earn quickly and with huge profits.  Bitshares has a challenge on its hands if we are going to compete or play along side?  Yes it isn't totally decentralized so for it to work with Invictus, what do you purpose?
Keyhotee / BTSX:  Merah    PTS:  PskEDN4AeWc1trW4zV7DGGTQi3y5LeVhFR 

BTC Mining Hardware IN STOCK NOW:  http://www.mininghardware.co.uk

Offline bytemaster

Nice read but I don't understand.  Its a bit above me but, are you saying that Bitcoin will eventually be controlled by governments in a country some day no matter what?  I may not have understood.

I am saying that Proof-of-Work based upon consumption cannot achieve decentralization.  I am also saying that the current Bitcoin ecosystem is rather corrupt and while existing players are acting in a benevolent manner, we are ultimately at their mercy and thus living under a dictatorship without any checks and balances built into the protocol.  Two players could effectively enforce that tainted coins could not be transferred. 

Bottom line, proof-of-work in this form is incompatible with Invictus' goal of decentralization. 
For the latest updates checkout my blog: http://bytemaster.bitshares.org
Anything said on these forums does not constitute an intent to create a legal obligation or contract between myself and anyone else.   These are merely my opinions and I reserve the right to change them at any time.

Offline NineLives

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Nice read but I don't understand.  Its a bit above me but, are you saying that Bitcoin will eventually be controlled by governments in a country some day no matter what?  I may not have understood.
Keyhotee / BTSX:  Merah    PTS:  PskEDN4AeWc1trW4zV7DGGTQi3y5LeVhFR 

BTC Mining Hardware IN STOCK NOW:  http://www.mininghardware.co.uk

Offline bytemaster

Every user of Bitcoin is a citizen of the Bitcoin Country and has an opportunity to vote on which transactions get included in the blockchain.   In order to cast a vote they must purchase electricity and computing power.   If they decide to vote for themselves, they must purchase a lot of power or they effectively have no influence.   Your odds of being elected ‘President for a Block’ are about as good as being elected a term as President of the Untied States.   Instead, most people choose to join a political party known as a ‘mining pool’.  Everyone mining in a pool is voting the party line. 

As a country Bitcoin will burn almost $1 billion dollars in the coming year to reach consensus via voting on which blockchain is the official chain.  This is a billion dollars that could have been invested into other businesses in the Bitcoin economy. 

If you view bitcoin as the currency of the Bitcoin country, then the Bitcoin Government must impose a 12% wealth tax to fund its elections and provide for the common defense. The heads of various political parties take a cut of these taxes as well as the lobbyists (miners) which represent a small minority of bitcoin users and thus could be thought of as “special interests” compared to the vast majority of bitcoin users who have no influence.  If you would like become a special interest, you must purchase your right to vote from other special interests whom sell voting rights (ASICs) for a profit.

The interesting thing about Bitcoin voting rights, is that they allow foreigners to vote who may not own a single Bitcoin but instead are mercenaries for hire ready to work for any country that will pay them the most. 

Effectively, control of the Bitcoin is defined by who ever is willing to consume the most capital for the least reward and I know no one can compete with the United States Government in this metric.   

No mining system based upon computation and electricity will be able to avoid Bitcoin’s fate.  Even a mining algorithm that can only run on a CPU will result in mining being concentrated into specialized computers lacking everything but a CPU and RAM cooled in massive warehouses.  Mining pools will be created and “political parties” will form. 

Existing Proof-of-Work systems that operate on the basis of consumption of capital will result in centralization and in the hands of a few self-appointed mining Zars.
For the latest updates checkout my blog: http://bytemaster.bitshares.org
Anything said on these forums does not constitute an intent to create a legal obligation or contract between myself and anyone else.   These are merely my opinions and I reserve the right to change them at any time.