Ok, so there's been a conversation going on about how to fund the creation of future DACs as there are far more opportunities than funds.  I believe the proposal put forward by Bytemaster to have 100% of Bitshares represented by angelshares and protoshares is a non-starter because it means that all coins that will potentially be created will be owned only by people able to contribute in Bitcoin, when the perception of PTS currently (as a "CPU MINABLE COIN" is that you don't need to do that.   I believe even if the vast majority of mining being performed by participants on the network is done by botnets or cloud miners, the initial marketing of Protoshares makes it untenable to change the social contract in any way that is not optional on a investor by investor basis.

With that in mind, I think we all recognize the value of having sufficient funds devoted to the creation of DACs and I for one have no problem putting my money where my mouth is. 

I would encourage the creation of PTS 2.0 (Angelcoins) that would be another 10% of Bitshares's 21 million, so 20% of total Bitshares would be claimed at the beginning through these two rounds of "venture".

Instead of the validated mining plan that turns Invictus into a central point of failure, Invictus should set up weekly or monthly "Exodus Addresses" and replicate Mastercoin, people send BTC or PTS to "Angel" addresses and at the end of that round whatever the allocation is, is divided evenly between the people who sent value on a proportional basis.   These funds should be clearly labeled with regard to how each % will be spent.

The exodus address would be transparent, so if people see that not many have invested they will want to invest becaues they will get more value for their value.   Invictus controls the address, but each distribution basically results in a large block that issues shares to all investors in the last round.   If I were you I would accept both Bitcoin and PTS in these angel rounds, and accept PTS at a premium to Bitcoin.

2.1 million would be  21 months @ 100k Angelcoins per month - The deal stays the same with Protosharesholders, you get to raise a shitload of money to finance multiple DACs at once and try your new mechanism.  The miners still working on PTS get to keep working, and you don't have to do anything.

Most importantly, Invictus hasn't committed to what they'll do with the other 80%, so when they really solve the problem and have the RIGHT idea their won't have tied yourself down.

What do you think?

Because Invictus has blown deadlines without much comment and now Bytemaster is publicly talking about renegotiating the social contract to exclude non-paying future adoption, as well as centralizing distribution of PTS to Invictus.  These are not bad ideas if they had been in the original plan, but the combination of failing to deliver anything besides PTS in November and now December has eaten holes in investor confidence which is being compounded by Bytemaster flatly saying they need money to deliver.     It's a community relations nightmare, we're lucky the price hasn't gone down more.

I bought into the PTS idea because the concepts of merged mining, multiple blockchains, blockchain security, DACs and its attraction to little miners. Now if mining is taken away from the picture, the bulk of it seems to be gone.

Essentially, the proposed change is an admission of two things:

1. Ripple model -- a centralized entity controlling money supply, issuing coins instead of mining them -- is better than Bitcoin model.

2. The MasterCoin model is better than the original PTS model, again, centralized control of funds.

I understand there may be some funding difficulty as the result of this, but to me these are not the right direction we should move to, there got to be better alternatives.

AFAIK, Ripple has some pretty deep pocket investors backing them, probably deeper than the ones you meet in Vegas, but as an investor, I won't touch it even with a 10 foot pole.

I had expected something like this would happen but didn't think it would come this early. The handling of this will not only have impact on the future of I3 and DACs, but also this type of business model,  many will be watching how this plays out with great interest.

This is precisely the result of the OP.  Invictus needs to deliver before they do anything else, and talking about changing the deal is arguably worse than actually changing the deal because it introduces uncertainty in the value. 

Where oh where is someone with a lick of marketing sense.  Stop posting, you are making things worse.   Talk to your team and if they can't explain to you why this whole exercise was really stupid you should get a new team.

This is real money for us as it is for you and your family, appreciate that introducing uncertainty even if you have good intentions is a much worse situation than just shutting up until you've figured out a plan that will actually work.

Quote from: Lighthouse on December 15, 2013, 04:59:49 pm

Quote from: bytemaster on December 15, 2013, 04:53:58 pm

I support  contests or giveaways as a means of bringing people in.  As long as we are giving away some of it, we should maximize the value to the PTS holders who are debased by it.

This is exactly your problem, the original deal was you were giving away ALL OF IT and competing to get some of your own on the free market.  Now you are proposing to renegotiate the deal so everyone coming in after you has to buy it from you. 

Your actions are an attempt to avoid botnets and cloud miners but the perception to the vast majority of users is that where they had opportunity before, now they don't.     "As long as we're giving some of it away" is the wrong approach, if you wanted to have that kind of control you shouldn't have tied your reputation to a social contract on a minable equity.  That opportunity has passed now.

The only way this will be pallatable is if you ALLOCATE a fixed % to go to inclusive initiatives as discussed previously, otherwise you've built a walled garden where investors you meet at vegas can play but not the little guy.   I appreciate anyone can pay, but not everyone can pay the way you're requiring with the new system.

Perhaps I am just too rational in how I view mining (as a miner).... I stopped mining and just purchased PTS and have long recommend others do the same.  I have since identified that mining does not result in decentralization (our primary goal) and have developed some proof-of-stake ideas that would make mining unnecessary for its original purpose (security). 

So now that we got 90% of the money supply back I want to maximize its value.

To claim that I am selling it (and keeping it as a profit) is to completely pervert the concept of investing.  Miners are selling it and keeping it as a profit, I am offering to spend 100% of funds received building and deploying DACs... how many PTS miners are willing to spend 100% of the profits they received re-investing in the ecosystem?   Most take their profits and buy new computers, tablets, and other toys for themselves.   

The elephant in the room here is that in the name of the 'little guy' who may mine perhaps 1% of future coins, the 'big miners' and "bot nets" will mine the other 99% for a profit and dump it.

So I think we can agree to ALLOCATE a fixed % to go to inclusive initiatives as that will satisfy the 1% of PTS that would go to the little guy.  That contests and promotional activities are a better use for that 1% and that PTS holders and miners will have gained more as a result of these proposals than if we changed nothing.

If the only place people can acquire PTS is to pay Bitcoins to your mining fund, which then gets them a split of the PTS created proportional to their contribution that is called a group auction and yes you are selling them.  You can dress it up like mining but don't kid yourself, if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck it's a fucking duck.   

You realists all have the same problem, you only care about reality when you make your judgements.   YOU HAVE BEEN TELLING PEOPLE FROM DAY ONE THEY CAN MINE IT WITH THEIR COMPUTERS.  Just because you were wrong about that, and it's not true doesn't make it OK for you to change the rules mid-stream and say "Oh well they would have only gotten one percent so we'll devote one percent and keep the other 99kPTS profit per week for things we think deserve funding.

The offer was "Mine with us!" and now it's "Pay us to mine for you!" which is VERY DIFFERENT because one is as a peer and the other is with you as master, suddenly recieving revenue that was not yours to claim.

It doesn't matter what you want to do, it matters what you committed to.  Deliver on your promises then try to change the deal.   If every time you get a good idea you modify the arrangement NOBODY WILL TRUST THE ARRANGEMENT BECAUSE IT IS ALWAYS CHANGING.  The whole advantage of crypto is it takes out the arbitrary

sheesh, you're a brilliant guy but it seems like you're just not getting this.

Seriously, where is marketing?  Why are you still the only one posting in this very important and frankly terrifying thread.

Quote from: Lighthouse on December 15, 2013, 04:39:03 pm

Quote from: coyote47 on December 15, 2013, 04:35:03 pm

Bytemaster, you have explained that this move would be an effort to increase value for current shareholders. That value is set by market forces not energy costs. If new investors can't be lured into your ecosystem PTS lose their value. I have been purchasing Protoshares under the assumption that Protoshares were only the beginning and that the vast majority of stake in future projects would still up for grabs. Newcomers like me drive the price of PTS up. Energy costs have nothing to do with it.

Precisely.  Everyone acknowledges this increases the fundamental value of PTS (reducing supply without changing existing holdings) but that's not really necessarily or even desirable.   To succeed the project needs to be inclusive because inclusion is growth is value.

To the extent that mining grows the network effect, this does add value to the coin.    So put yourself in the shoes of the DAC that is PTS and ask yourself how much equity you should give away for free through a process that destroys $100K per day?

Which is why I'm not advocating mining, I'm advocating contests or giveaways.  Have a flash game created that walks you through the value proposition of PTS and Bitshares, when they complete the game and provide a PTS address they get a small amount of PTS, use http://www.rafflecopter.com/ to create giveaways that are easy to manage, yield data for Invictus, encourage viral spreading of the message and run them every week or two.

There are lots of ways you can do this without the inefficiencies of mining, I agree it's a waste of money but the purpose it serves is anyone can waste their money equally and most aren't consciously doing it (just running their or multiple computers, which is percieved as a cost you already incur with or without mining)

Quote from: Lighthouse on December 15, 2013, 03:51:42 pm

I think Invictus should not completely forsake potential users and advocates just because they have no time or skill.  Referrals is a bad system, makes the whole thing look like a pump because they get paid by the person.   If instead you let them get invested without that cost BEFORE advocating, the positioning is very different and they're not being directly paid by Invictus to pimp their product, instead they gain by the increase in value overall.

People who have no money or skills tend to have a LOT of time, seriously - Make sure you do give-aways and promotions, all of which should build your reputation.  You could reach out to some of the larger crypto blogs and give them the chance to host the contest for their readers.  The blog gets traffic, invictus gets introduced to a new audience, and the chance to win something valuable for nothing is exciting.   That is the primary thing you are doing here, removing the excitement from mining and turning it into an investment.   Fine for people who want that, but the gold rush atmosphere of early PTS did good things for the project as well as bad.   

Gold Rush is mostly over now.... it did its job marketing wise and the community has been founded.   

Good point, and now that it's founded its success is a guaranteed quantity, right?   

Wrong.   Who is in charge of Marketing at Invictus?  This is all about marketing and I don't think thats part of your job Bytemaster.

Loaded it up, crashed after a few minutes while I was adding nodes.  Reinstalled, same deal.  What's up?

Where does the 2 million number come from, last I heard it was 100k new PTS per month indefinitely?