Approval Voting vs Delegation

[bytemaster]

Case 2 is just as "bad" as case 1, those 51 still control the entire network and dictate the true chain.

Yes but they control slower network.
Other delegates are not participating.
Everyone is incentivised to find a consensus.
If they want smoothly running network they should all agree on something.

EDIT: As a shareholder I vote for whatever I like. I want my opinion to matter. When casting my vote for a delegate I want to know it will be accounted for even if I'm not in the majority.

It is counted in that all delegates are attempting to gain the highest possible approval rating to get in, so your vote matters to all delegates. 

The only time it doesn matter is when a single coordinated individual owns a majority stake.

[emski]

Case 2 is just as "bad" as case 1, those 51 still control the entire network and dictate the true chain.

Yes but they control slower network.
Other delegates are not participating.
Everyone is incentivised to find a consensus.
If they want smoothly running network they should all agree on something.

EDIT: As a shareholder I vote for whatever I like. I want my opinion to matter. When casting my vote for a delegate I want to know it will be accounted for even if I'm not in the majority.

[toast]

I wrote a prior post about the law of 51% and that you cannot escape it with any system.  Nxt is even subject to 51% despite their claims.

OK.
If the 51% disagree with the other 49% then we have an issue.
In that scenario:

Case 1: Approval voting with no limit
51% control all 101 delegates.
network runs without issues.
49% cant do anything except fork

Case 2: Approval voting with limit
51% controls ~51 delegates.
network runs slower until the issue is resolved (by voting).

Is there another option?
Which is better?

Case 2 is just as "bad" as case 1, those 51 still control the entire network and dictate the true chain.

[emski]

I wrote a prior post about the law of 51% and that you cannot escape it with any system.  Nxt is even subject to 51% despite their claims.

OK.
If the 51% disagree with the other 49% then we have an issue.
In that scenario:

Case 1: Approval voting with no limit
51% control all 101 delegates.
network runs without issues.
49% cant do anything except fork

Case 2: Approval voting with limit
51% controls ~51 delegates.
network runs slower until the issue is resolved (by voting).

Is there another option?
Which is better?

[bytemaster]

own over 51% of the delegates which is the same as owning it all

I tend to disagree in a sense.
If you control 55 delegates, other delegates will have incentive to expose you (if you are not honest) and/or fork.
Which is different than controlling all 101 delegates.

If you have 55 delegates you can ignore blocks produced by the 46 delegates... essentially hard forking anyway, except the masses of installed clients would follow the attackers fork unless updated.

Yes. And this will be obvious. Network will be slower. Questions will be asked. Publicity... While having all 101 delegates everything runs smootly

So you say that if we have a group with 51% stake they should control all 101 delegates regardless of the opinion of the other 49%?

I wrote a prior post about the law of 51% and that you cannot escape it with any system.  Nxt is even subject to 51% despite their claims.

[emski]

own over 51% of the delegates which is the same as owning it all

I tend to disagree in a sense.
If you control 55 delegates, other delegates will have incentive to expose you (if you are not honest) and/or fork.
Which is different than controlling all 101 delegates.

If you have 55 delegates you can ignore blocks produced by the 46 delegates... essentially hard forking anyway, except the masses of installed clients would follow the attackers fork unless updated.

Yes. And this will be obvious. Network will be slower. Questions will be asked. Publicity... While having all 101 delegates everything runs smootly

So you say that if we have a group with 51% stake they should control all 101 delegates regardless of the opinion of the other 49%?

[Agent86]

I'm very interested in this topic, but feel I missed most of the context.  Is there a source of informaiton where I could learn more about what all this means to Bitshares?  What is the current methods that are being used?

And what kind of deligation is there?  I like infinite delegation, where anyone can delegate their votes to anyone.  Making large hierarchical trees with significant power to move an large organization on a dime, out performing traditional hierarchies, yet of the leader screws up, his delegated tree of power will vanish instantly.

Is anything like that being used for this?

To the extent I've considered it, large hierarchical trees are very susceptible to vote buying / influence peddling.  Approval voting provides an incentive structure that allows representatives to put the interests of whole organization/DAC ahead of a constituency.  I think it works well for our application.

[xeroc]

I'm very interested in this topic, but feel I missed most of the context.  Is there a source of informaiton where I could learn more about what all this means to Bitshares?  What is the current methods that are being used?

And what kind of deligation is there?  I like infinite delegation, where anyone can delegate their votes to anyone.  Making large hierarchical trees with significant power to move an large organization on a dime, out performing traditional hierarchies, yet of the leader screws up, his delegated tree of power will vanish instantly.

Is anything like that being used for this?

There's a wiki currently under contruction non-publicly .. to be released very soon!

[Brent.Allsop]

I'm very interested in this topic, but feel I missed most of the context.  Is there a source of informaiton where I could learn more about what all this means to Bitshares?  What is the current methods that are being used?

And what kind of deligation is there?  I like infinite delegation, where anyone can delegate their votes to anyone.  Making large hierarchical trees with significant power to move an large organization on a dime, out performing traditional hierarchies, yet of the leader screws up, his delegated tree of power will vanish instantly.

Is anything like that being used for this?

[emski]

own over 51% of the delegates which is the same as owning it all

I tend to disagree in a sense.
If you control 55 delegates, other delegates will have incentive to expose you (if you are not honest) and/or fork.
Which is different than controlling all 101 delegates.

If you have 55 delegates you can ignore blocks produced by the 46 delegates... essentially hard forking anyway, except the masses of installed clients would follow the attackers fork unless updated.

Yes. And this will be obvious. Network will be slower. Questions will be asked. Publicity... While having all 101 delegates everything runs smootly

[bytemaster]

own over 51% of the delegates which is the same as owning it all

I tend to disagree in a sense.
If you control 55 delegates, other delegates will have incentive to expose you (if you are not honest) and/or fork.
Which is different than controlling all 101 delegates.

If you have 55 delegates you can ignore blocks produced by the 46 delegates... essentially hard forking anyway, except the masses of installed clients would follow the attackers fork unless updated.

[emski]

own over 51% of the delegates which is the same as owning it all

I tend to disagree in a sense.
If you control 55 delegates, other delegates will have incentive to expose you (if you are not honest) and/or fork.
Which is different than controlling all 101 delegates.

[xeroc]

Stick a label to your answer makes it a perfect entey for a FAQ .. thx

[bytemaster]

Well if you have 51% you will obviously get all the delegate seats unless there is a limit on the amount of delegates you can vote for.
I personally think the limit as a very good idea.

If you have one entity that has 51%, you have bigger problems and you must trust this entity to use the system anyway.  Limiting the votes doesn't change this at all. 51% could control the network no matter what, and ignore votes cast for any other delegates, this is the nature of POS the same way that 51% of hashing power controls bitcoin (if one entity controls 51% of the hash power you must trust that entity to use the system).

Getting rid of the limit is a good idea and makes it harder for bad actors with less than 51% to get their unpopular delegates elected.  If a bad actor gets 51% stake the network must be forked to remove them regardless.

The fork can happen at any time when there is disagreement regardless of the % of any party (5% can fork ignoring the rest and you cant do anything about this).
Even if those 51% decide to fork and separate it is their choice. However an entity (may be a group) controlling 51% shouldn't be given total control over the network.

In the previous scenario when the stakeholders' vote was limited to max 33 delegates an entity with 51% will not be able to get all the delegate seats. Guaranteed representation at 33% wasn't a bad idea either.

That's why I think limiting the amount of delegates you can vote for was a good idea and pyre approval voting is not (although pyre approval voting is better than the previous system). EDIT: This is my opinion feel free to disagree and share your thoughts.

PS: Each sequential state is better , isn't this cool ?

By limiting the number of delegates you can vote for to 33 you can be guaranteed a delegate seat with 17% of the shares.   You simply give 50.0001% of you shares to 66 delegates.  Everyone else combined would be unable to muster enough votes to kick you out.    So the lower limit actually makes it vulnerable to a much lower threshold.

So if you allow 101 votes, someone with 51% can own it all.   If you only allow 33 votes, then someone with 51% can still own over 51% of the delegates which is the same as owning it all.  But now they can be assured a spot with just 17% of the shares because you are always subject to the 51% attack in what ever group you happen to be in.   So if you allow everyone 33 votes then 51% of 33 is enough to control all 33 delegates in that group and no one else will have enough stake to elect another group of 33 with more than 49% approval. 

Assume 67% of the people agree 100% on 67% of the delegates.   The other 33% are up for grabs and can be taken by who ever has 17% of the shares. 

[xeroc]

PS: Each sequential state is better , isn't this cool ?

cool but awesome!