I just finally got round to finishing the whitepaper, great stuff.
I loved how you explained how the forks would work as the market expanded, makes perfect sense.
What is possible, however, is to fork the project to half the future judging activity
required on each of the two new blockchains. This could be done for simple reasons:
because Voters are fatigued at the number of Decisions they are asked to vote on, for the
sake of increased competition, or to charge different fees. More interestingly, forking
could change the quality of the Decisions accepted within that blockchain, for example to
create “Truthcoin Sports” or “Truthcoin Finance”. By forking off a new blockchain, all
previous Owners would maintain their old Truthcoins (and with them the voting
influence of their established reputation), which means that the established trust of the
system would be upheld in both the new and old chain. Eventually, some Owners would
sell, or simply not use, their coins of a disliked chain, and “Truthcoin Sports” would
eventually be owned by individuals especially interested in sports. When “Truthcoin
Sports” later splits itself into “Truthcoin Sports:Basketball” and “Truthcoin
Sports:NonBasketball” (because, for example, there are just so many basketball Markets),
the reputable sports fanatics owning Truthcoin Sports (and no other Truthcoin Owners)
will have their voting power transferred to the two new chains. Therefore the network
grows organically, branching in the same way that a healthy tree splits new branches
when the environment can support them.
My only other inputs or concerns are the following, apologies if they've been addressed elsewhere.
1. It seems you have to expose your private keys when you want to vote, I think there may need to be some alternative to this. (I know NXT has very low 'forging' participation rate, a) because the incentives are low but b) because users don't want to frequently expose their private keys to potential keyloggers etc.)
2. Have you considered a fail-safe dispute resolving mechanism?
I know you are confident that it is unlikely the TCPM will ever judge an outcome inaccurately even in thin markets but there is always the possibility that an error would occur. (Admittedly I don't understand all the maths, but personally I can see the potential that only a small % of total voters may end up voting for certain events, enough so that in small markets, a cartel may be successful. (I can see that the cartel would only be destroying the value/integrity of Truthcoin, (ie. their own holdings) but it's possible this may be their aim, eg. 'TPTB')
So what if for a few minutes after the outcome of an event is announced it is possible to lodge a dispute?
However to lodge a dispute is INCREDIBLY EXPENSIVE and if you're wrong you lose the funds you committed to it.
Eg. Truthcoin declares X won the race, when really Y won the race. (As in definite manipulation has taken place.)
The people who lost money on the outcome will obviously be willing to commit lots of funds to having the decision overturned if they are certain it has been manipulated and perhaps there is also an incentive for others to dispute a manipulated outcome too.
So lets say with a few minutes, a threshold of say $25 000 of Truthcoins in total has been committed to the dispute box. (Perhaps if X amount is reached, say $10 000, a dispute isn't lodged but the dispute time is extended to allow the dispute funding threshold to be reached.)
As a dispute will be such an unlikely event, if Truthcoin works as described. When there is one, we can have a 'special alarm/alert' go out over the entire network. Then nearly all (or a lot) of Truthcoin voters will then be drawn to vote in the dispute a) to protect the integrity of Truthcoin and b) The financial incentive for voting correctly in a dispute can be made much higher than a normal vote.
Having a dispute option and such a high % of the network participating in a dispute, would ensure there was no point trying to manipulate a thinly voted event.
If the people who lodged the dispute are right they get their funds returned plus a premium (that incentivises people to lodge disputes for false results) if they lose the dispute they lose the funds they committed to the dispute. (Enough to incentivise people never to dispute an accurate outcome.)
Just the presence of the fail-safe should ensure a cartel don't try to manipulate a small/thin market and also provide re-assurance to people who are sceptical of Truthcoin being 100% efficient. (Perhaps it can be removed after a while if it is proved that it is never needed)