5% annual fee. What is the point?

[oco101]

Cracking the private key is well impossible like Xeroc pointed out :

"So, if you could use the entire planet as a hard drive, storing 1 byte per atom, using stars as fuel, and cycling through 1 trillion keys per second, you'd need 37 octillion Earths to store it, and 237 billion suns to power the device capable of doing it, all of which would take you 3.6717 octodecillion years.
Better get cracking."

So this is should not be a concern for anyone. The best and simple solution would be :

I would suggest getting a separate laptop with linux as the OS and storing all your funds in THAT wallet. Open the laptop every 6 months and click the blue vote button. Backup the wallet .json file on USB key(s) and hide in two secret locations. Trying to get any more secure than this is a waste of time IMO, even if you have millions of dollars worth of BTSX. What I'm recommending here is extremely secure.

[Riverhead]

The 5% is more about proof of control of the funds to prove to the network that the funds aren't lost. I'm not sure there is really any way to prove that the funds aren't lost other than to spend them.


I made a mistake in my earlier post: A locked wallet will still show wallet_account_balance in the CLI. However that would require the hacker to be in possession of your wallet file.

[oldman]

Would still prefer the peace of mind of a complete air-gap between my funds and the rest of the world.
 storage is an issue that needs to be addressed thoroughly.

Without getting too pedantic your funds are never offline as they are always just a "score" on the blockchain. Once you send funds to the public key it's out there and can be brute forced (though most likely so hard no one bothers trying).

A better strategy would be to have your funds spread between a half dozen or so wallets each with a different passphrase and uploading them to DropBox, OneDrive, GoogleDrive, and whatever you have for usb storage, printing private keys, etc.

Cracking one of your private keys wouldn't gain them anything on the others and with TITAN it'd be very hard for a hacker to pick targets.

Also, it's highly unlikely that a hacker is going to spend significant resources on a wallet they can't get the balance of. TITAN takes care of that too.

Good points!

Perhaps it is a psychological thing.

The client feels like a hot wallet, and already most crypto investors feel hot /= secure.

Also, my last attempt at multiple wallets did not end well.

Currently it seems to be one wallet/password per machine which is obviously not conducive to this approach.

Best of all worlds would be a watch-only mechanism where BTSX and bitAssets could be transferred to a paper wallet or other media and physically secured.

The trick, of course, is avoiding the inactivity fee when in storage.

Perhaps the only way to do this is to pay a small cold storage fee to the network, like a safety deposit box fee.

Not really unreasonable at all!

The owner just burns a small amount of BTSX as proof that the funds in storage are being stored rather than lost.

Would still prefer the peace of mind of a complete air-gap between my funds and the rest of the world.
 storage is an issue that needs to be addressed thoroughly.

Without getting too pedantic your funds are never offline as they are always just a "score" on the blockchain. Once you send funds to the public key it's out there and can be brute forced (though most likely so hard no one bothers trying).

A better strategy would be to have your funds spread between a half dozen or so wallets each with a different passphrase and uploading them to DropBox, OneDrive, GoogleDrive, and whatever you have for usb storage, printing private keys, etc.

Cracking one of your private keys wouldn't gain them anything on the others and with TITAN it'd be very hard for a hacker to pick targets.

Also, it's highly unlikely that a hacker is going to spend significant resources on a wallet they can't get the balance of. TITAN takes care of that too.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1rurll/on_the_subject_of_listing_all_possible_private/

cracking TITAN keys is much more resource intensive as you still have to rescan the WHOLE blockchain on every single guess .. that is WAY .. WAY ... WAY .. to expensive!

We really need this sort of thing to be very visible to newcomers.

I've been here a while and did not know this.

This would give the typical BTSX/bitAsset owner a large measure of comfort.

[liondani]

I would suggest getting a separate laptop with linux as the OS and storing all your funds in THAT wallet. Open the laptop every 6 months and click the blue vote button. Backup the wallet .json file on USB key(s) and hide in two secret locations. Trying to get any more secure than this is a waste of time IMO, even if you have millions of dollars worth of BTSX. What I'm recommending here is extremely secure.

+5 +5 +5

PS and don't forget to erase permanently the backup  json file  that was automatically created on directory "wallets"  on your laptop...

[Chuckone]

Thanks for the tip! Much appreciated

[Riverhead]

Just want to be sure I understand fully the concept of the voting/inactivity fee...

Let's say I buy a few BTSX worth of bitUSD and sell those bitUSD back for BTSX once a year, does that cast my votes twice and reset the "inactivity clock" for each transaction?

Yes. Though the easiest way would be to click the "update vote" button which sends all your BTSX to yourself in one step.

[Chuckone]

Just want to be sure I understand fully the concept of the voting/inactivity fee...

Let's say I buy a few BTSX worth of bitUSD and sell those bitUSD back for BTSX once a year, does that cast my votes twice and reset the "inactivity clock" for each transaction?

[xeroc]

Would still prefer the peace of mind of a complete air-gap between my funds and the rest of the world.
 storage is an issue that needs to be addressed thoroughly.

Without getting too pedantic your funds are never offline as they are always just a "score" on the blockchain. Once you send funds to the public key it's out there and can be brute forced (though most likely so hard no one bothers trying).

A better strategy would be to have your funds spread between a half dozen or so wallets each with a different passphrase and uploading them to DropBox, OneDrive, GoogleDrive, and whatever you have for usb storage, printing private keys, etc.

Cracking one of your private keys wouldn't gain them anything on the others and with TITAN it'd be very hard for a hacker to pick targets.

Also, it's highly unlikely that a hacker is going to spend significant resources on a wallet they can't get the balance of. TITAN takes care of that too.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1rurll/on_the_subject_of_listing_all_possible_private/

cracking TITAN keys is much more resource intensive as you still have to rescan the WHOLE blockchain on every single guess .. that is WAY .. WAY ... WAY .. to expensive!

[Riverhead]

Would still prefer the peace of mind of a complete air-gap between my funds and the rest of the world.
 storage is an issue that needs to be addressed thoroughly.

Without getting too pedantic your funds are never offline as they are always just a "score" on the blockchain. Once you send funds to the public key it's out there and can be brute forced (though most likely so hard no one bothers trying).

A better strategy would be to have your funds spread between a half dozen or so wallets each with a different passphrase and uploading them to DropBox, OneDrive, GoogleDrive, and whatever you have for usb storage, printing private keys, etc.

Cracking one of your private keys wouldn't gain them anything on the others and with TITAN it'd be very hard for a hacker to pick targets.

Also, it's highly unlikely that a hacker is going to spend significant resources on a wallet they can't get the balance of. TITAN takes care of that too.

[gamey]

As a point of data/use case. 

My sister invested some $$ in BTSX after reading some promotional material.  I was happy to help her, because I'd just keep her funds with mine.

Then her bf who I don't particularly like told her he wanted to invest.  Well...  I wouldn't mind but this whole 5% thing means that I have to teach him something and someone has to maintain it.  I can't just help him buy it and put it in cold storage with a few copies of the private key and instructions.  So I basically told her I really didn't want to mess with it.

To argue for the other side, BTSX is not just like holding some shares. You are expected to take part in maintaining the network health, and if you can't take the trouble then we don't want you.

For multisig cold wallets, I think there might be an option where you can sign that address to show that you are still the owner of it and still active. I think we need some feature like that anyway so that I can show my balance to somebody if I want; its currently not possible due to TITAN.

Off topic, but I would like an armory type wallet, which I can keep on an unconnected laptop for ever.

This is a good point. We want holders of btsx to be active and participate in DPOS so if they can't participate then we kinda don't really want them. What good is a board of directors if they aren't around to vote? I have changed my stance, btsx should keep a inactivity fee bit the rest of bit assets should be allowed to store at will.

Voting is critical to the long-term viability of DPOS.

If users are not incentivized to vote, they won't.

Look at voter participation rates in current democratic systems. Awful.

Voter apathy is the reason democracies decay into corruption, centralization and cronyism.

Imaging how different the world would be if US citizens had to vote in order to access essential services... or if they were taxed at a higher rate for not voting.

The fee is an excellent way to return dead funds but more importantly - it will get people to vote.

If they don't want to vote, let them hold bitAssets.

I vote for keeping the fee. It is the best assurance of DPOS survival.

Edit: I am a buy-and-hold investor with limited technical skills and am actively seeking ways to dump my BTSX into cold storage for 2-3 years. So the fee is a thorn in my side as well. But I also recognize that without the fees DPOS will eventually centralize and corrupt. So I'm hoping someone clever will come up with a cold storage solution that permits voting with BTSX off-line.

I tend to be in favor of it too, I think. I posted the original thing just for the sake of conversation but was not for or against the 5% fee.  I think this post has put me in favor of it just from a security + incentive argument.

[oldman]

I really disagree with the above comment. It's likely only a minority of people will want hold bitshares for more than a year, so making those who want to hold long term storage move their funds once a year will only minorly impact voting. Plus, it will make them "vote," but it won't make them actually think about who they are voting for. Only the most involved users will ever make meaningful votes, let it stay that way.

The fee is an unnecessary inconvenience. Remove it.

I agree getting the average user to research and vote for 101 delegates is unrealistic.

However, with slates/reputation voting becomes much more realistic.

Voters can pick a slate assembled by someone with a high reputation, or perhaps a service/DAC that researches/builds slates. One click and you're done.

At this point the inconvenience is simply the cost of participation.

Edit: I am a buy-and-hold investor with limited technical skills and am actively seeking ways to dump my BTSX into cold storage for 2-3 years. So the fee is a thorn in my side as well. But I also recognize that without the fees DPOS will eventually centralize and corrupt. So I'm hoping someone clever will come up with a cold storage solution that permits voting with BTSX off-line.

I would suggest getting a separate laptop with linux as the OS and storing all your funds in THAT wallet. Open the laptop every 6 months and click the blue vote button. Backup the wallet .json file on USB key(s) and hide in two secret locations. Trying to get any more secure than this is a waste of time IMO, even if you have millions of dollars worth of BTSX. What I'm recommending here is extremely secure.

This is excellent advice and I have implemented a very similar protocol. Works!

Would still prefer the peace of mind of a complete air-gap between my funds and the rest of the world.

I suspect as BTSX increases in market cap more and more folks are going to be looking for similar peace-of-mind.

Also, big money isn't going to jump in without simple/air tight security protocols.

Secure storage is an issue that needs to be addressed thoroughly.

[Method-X]

Edit: I am a buy-and-hold investor with limited technical skills and am actively seeking ways to dump my BTSX into cold storage for 2-3 years. So the fee is a thorn in my side as well. But I also recognize that without the fees DPOS will eventually centralize and corrupt. So I'm hoping someone clever will come up with a cold storage solution that permits voting with BTSX off-line.

I would suggest getting a separate laptop with linux as the OS and storing all your funds in THAT wallet. Open the laptop every 6 months and click the blue vote button. Backup the wallet .json file on USB key(s) and hide in two secret locations. Trying to get any more secure than this is a waste of time IMO, even if you have millions of dollars worth of BTSX. What I'm recommending here is extremely secure.

[xeroc]

I do slightly agree with OldMan and think there should be incentive for endusers to pro-actively vote .. it must not necessarily be a 5% inactivity fee but at the current stake I see no way around it .. especially when it also comes to "identifying" lost funds the inactivity fee is helpful

[teenagecheese]

I really disagree with the above comment. It's likely only a minority of people will want hold bitshares for more than a year, so making those who want to hold long term storage move their funds once a year will only minorly impact voting. Plus, it will make them "vote," but it won't make them actually think about who they are voting for. Only the most involved users will ever make meaningful votes, let it stay that way.

The fee is an unnecessary inconvenience. Remove it.

[oldman]

As a point of data/use case. 

My sister invested some $$ in BTSX after reading some promotional material.  I was happy to help her, because I'd just keep her funds with mine.

Then her bf who I don't particularly like told her he wanted to invest.  Well...  I wouldn't mind but this whole 5% thing means that I have to teach him something and someone has to maintain it.  I can't just help him buy it and put it in cold storage with a few copies of the private key and instructions.  So I basically told her I really didn't want to mess with it.

To argue for the other side, BTSX is not just like holding some shares. You are expected to take part in maintaining the network health, and if you can't take the trouble then we don't want you.

For multisig cold wallets, I think there might be an option where you can sign that address to show that you are still the owner of it and still active. I think we need some feature like that anyway so that I can show my balance to somebody if I want; its currently not possible due to TITAN.

Off topic, but I would like an armory type wallet, which I can keep on an unconnected laptop for ever.

This is a good point. We want holders of btsx to be active and participate in DPOS so if they can't participate then we kinda don't really want them. What good is a board of directors if they aren't around to vote? I have changed my stance, btsx should keep a inactivity fee bit the rest of bit assets should be allowed to store at will.

Voting is critical to the long-term viability of DPOS.

If users are not incentivized to vote, they won't.

Look at voter participation rates in current democratic systems. Awful.

Voter apathy is the reason democracies decay into corruption, centralization and cronyism.

Imaging how different the world would be if US citizens had to vote in order to access essential services... or if they were taxed at a higher rate for not voting.

The fee is an excellent way to return dead funds but more importantly - it will get people to vote.

If they don't want to vote, let them hold bitAssets.

I vote for keeping the fee. It is the best assurance of DPOS survival.

Edit: I am a buy-and-hold investor with limited technical skills and am actively seeking ways to dump my BTSX into cold storage for 2-3 years. So the fee is a thorn in my side as well. But I also recognize that without the fees DPOS will eventually centralize and corrupt. So I'm hoping someone clever will come up with a cold storage solution that permits voting with BTSX off-line.