From libertarianism to democracy to oligarchy to tyranny, even faster than I expected.

In that case, how does this solve the nothing-at-stake problem?

I collect old accounts totaling >50%, and build a new chain with a different vote/delegate history. I control >50% of the coins/votes at all times, and can build a chain which, at the very end, looks almost exactly like the real chain.

In addition to owning a few accounts which were once delegates, I own an account which once held 10% of the total BTS. I can send these amounts to myself, while excluding all other transactions.

For a time, I control 100% of the votes seen by the attack-chain.

To try again...

A new node connects and sees two chains:

Chain 1 : 100 + 99 + 98 + 100 + 100 + 97 + ... + 100 + 99 = 4589 blocks of a possible 5000
Chain 2 : 100 + 99 + 49 + 49 + 49 + 52 + 59 + 60 + 100 + 100 + 100 + ... + 100 = 4590 blocks of a possible 5000

Both follow all the rules, have snapshots, etc. Which chain does this node select as reality?

I assumed that the network still operates if 51% of the delegates are tracked down and murdered, and their computers destroyed. Perhaps that assumption was false?

Quote from: Bytemaster

There has been significant progress and developments over the past several days.   One of the most significant is the introduction of a random number generation scheme and random delegate selection today.   This was done for two reasons: it resolves a security vulnerability discovered with sequential DPOS and it facilitates one of the more challenging parts of the Lotto DAC.

This is not an explanation. I hope you already know that....

MolonLabe,

Thanks for your input!  I think you bring up some real risks and this project is not without risk, at least from my level of knowledge of it.  I also think you are trying to ask important questions and I appreciate your focus on the tough technical obstacles. 

You're welcome.

That said, to me it seems bytemaster is working on the right problems and I think solving these problems could have a big impact on the world and be VERY valuable if they are solved, don't you?

Of course. The question is "what approach is most likely to actually get the problems solved" hence my concern about the simultaneous risks.

I also think bytemaster might be in a tough position in that as a leader for bitshares he must weigh projecting some confidence rather than saying "hey guys I'm stuck here and have hit a roadblock, is there anyone who knows enough to help me think through this without wasting my time making me explain a million things from scratch that they don't understand."

Sounds awful. I wouldn't do it. I'd say "you invested, go away and let me do my work." I'm so crazy I might even dock people their investment if they continue distracting me.

Have you taken time to read the source code and try to have a deep understanding of implementation?  It's not a criticism either way, I am just curious if you are a programmer etc.

Yes, but one thing that frustrates me, as I mentioned, is that the rules appear to change frequently. It takes a lot of effort to refocus on everything, and I think it indicates some lurking instability in the idea-generating process. Not that I'm a fan of peer review, but usually ideas are passed around to a few people before the work/investment is made, and therefore last minute changes are less frequent.

Well Bitcoin right now is widely deployed, so changing the core block validation algorithm would inevitably cause massive disruption to Bitcoin services and therefore the price as well.

No it wouldn't. Do you really believe that? A carefully staged, thoughtfully tested improvement? No one would care.

Therefore core Bitcoin developers are dis-incentivized from acknowledging that anything else in the cryto space could possibly provide a better solution than what Bitcoin offers. So Im not particularly interested in what core Bitcoin developers have to say.

This sounds like a rationalization. If gmaxwell endorsed dpos as a work of unique genius, you're saying you "wouldn't care"? Instead you'd probably be posting about it everywhere. There is constant disagreement from the Bitcoin devs, they are not a unified anti-Altcoin conspiracy. We already know that Bitcoin works, but feel free to suggest your own experts.

The fact is that mining leads to centralization - everyone agrees that something needs to be done about it.

No they don't (I don't, for example). Even if it did there is P2Pool. There are like 12 mining groups in perfect competition selling totally homogenous hashes. Even if there were only 1 mining pool there wouldn't be centralization. Google may not have competitors, but it faces competition.

On the issue of whether BitAssets will track properly - the underlying theory is that when a BTSX holder sees that each share is trading for $100 on the centralized exchanges, he will act in his own self interest and never demand any less than 100 BitUSD for his shares. He cant ask for any more than that because he knows that other buyers will bid at 100 BitUSD per share. On the short side the exact same psychology happens. Therefore the buyers and shorts will reach consensus at the real price of each share, and the correct amount of BitUSD will be created.

So yes BitUSD is going to track the price of "real" USD.

I am familiar with the arguments against my position (that BitUSD will not track). You, however, are not.

Well here is a reason to care - are you happy with the status quo...only banks are allowed to create dollars...corrupt opaque central bank backed by violence...use the blockchain to give that power back to the people...issue dollars backed by a real trustworthy asset...government lies.

I'm sorry but this is clearly political babble. I was not asking for reasons to care, I was asking if anyone would care. Surely you hold the opinion that people should care more about central banking, but they don't so care. Completely fatuous and embarrassing remark on your part, you've played into AdamBLevine's hand like the fool he predicted you'd be.

It's the delegates that provide the secret.

You're peaking my curiosity now. The obvious thing is that they collude with someone buying the lottery ticket and tell them the secret. Why wouldn't they do this? Is each delegate responsible for the funds of his personal lotto? That would be the obvious re-alignment, but you'd have to assume all delegates were interested in running lottos. If delegates have different ownership from shareholders there would be obvious agency problems.

For convenience sake would it be possible to split your points up in separate threads, because you've listed quite a large number of different topics that might make the discussion more confusing rather than enlightening. Maybe one for each number or main point of critique?

I think that, as you say, the posts have been made. I suppose the thesis of this post is that dpos should be tested separately from BitsharesX, which should run purely on proof of work until the novelties of BitsharesX can be tested. My comments about BitsharesX were just to reinforce how serious the simultaneous-risk problem is.

I might be even more critical about the chances of success for the entire blockchain ecosystem than you are MoLoLabe.

If you can't criticize, you can't optimize.

I've run out of time and have to run, so I hope you don't take my not responding to all your points as a token of ill will or any of the other original and very creative interpretations and assumptions about all members of the forums.

Nope. Again I would prefer the problems be avoided rather than addressed, through smaller projects.

 >)

I thrive on enemies.

This project is already asking people to accept many separate significant sources of uncertainty at once:

1] The "economic experiment" (that BitAssets will track real assets, which I personally don't believe in at all).
2] The economic model of this experiment (which I also don't believe in, as shorts have asymmetric fragility and inferior optionality).
3] Software/technical bugs (which have interfered even with Bitcoin [written by many programming geniuses] several times over its history).
4] Market response (Will a critical mass of merchants care bout this? Will a critical mass of traders use this?).
5] Other (legal response, competition, forking the project, theft/poaching/organizational decay).

However, on top of that, you are adding [6] a completely new consensus mechanism, "delegated proof of stake", which is less than 2 months old? Have any big names in cryptocoin security, eg Gmaxwell or andytoshi, endorsed this mechanism? Have any third-parties (ie, not positive bias, cognitive-dissonance fueled I3 investors) endorsed the mechanism? Have any notable people commented on it at all?

Worse, still, will there be Something New two months from now? Something that is even less understood and tested?

Why doesn't anyone else care about this?

I am not an investor in Bitshares, but I would like to see something in Bitcoin 2.0 space succeed. Surely it would be wiser to stick to an idea which already exists, yet is struggling to maintain trust or vitality (like e-gold), and start small by blockchaining it in as similar a way as possible. Take an existing service, like Dropbox (not like insurance or lending, which require complex and novel customer service and human input, nor something like Music-distribution which really isn't an industry at all anymore), and just copy it by changing as few things about Bitcoin as possible. Even this is likely to be impossibly risky and technical.

I'm sorry to say that it is my opinion that a great deal of money and talent will go to waste here. I can't imagine this project succeeding (ie running for 1 year without significant economic or technical problems), without more than a year of testing.

Pick a smaller project!