Bitcoin Forum

How does it benefit a community to..

• ..give a moderator of an internet forum 6,000 BTC?
• ..require moderators and moderation from anyone other than a thread OP?
• ..have advertising forced on them?
• ..have a trust system without rebuttals?
• ..have a barrier on their activity requiring posts and time served in order to function in the community?
• ..not have basic encryption for messaging and thread visibility?
• ..be assumed as scammers instead of just untrusted?

I'm not pretending to know all the answers and these questions I'm asking and more present individual issues all of their own, but this is what I am dedicating myself to for the rest of the year until we are able to create a forum for the community that in fact serves the community.

Through a transparent process of task based work, we will be partnering with Ian Knowles CIYAM Open work system (OpenTransactions is also currently using this system). There are many things to hammer out, but the general picture is:

• The software will be a standalone C++ application, increasing the speed, scalability and security for everyone.
• Messages in the system will be encrypted by default by the browser
• Threads will only be visible if you have chosen to listen to, with the ability to individually and systematically remove parties from feeds
• New members will not have to wait to participate, but as with real life, will need to know someone or earn someone's trust before being able to participate in private discussions unless thread starters enable public viewing and participation
• Thread starters are moderators, programmatically impossible to add another moderator that the thread creator did not add themselves, or censor anyone system-wide without a user removing them from their listening feed.
• Thread types will vary, including debate threads with pro/con sides that work in similar fashion to StackExchange but for both sides. Voting a popular answer up will require agreeing with the pro/con side first and disable your ability to vote the opposing side up or down. There will also be live chat threads that allow voting of important chat posts to be permanently part of the thread (at the discretion of the moderator) to allow for both live and forum-style communication on a topic (not all topics are important enough to make threads about, but almost all topics end up having educational outcomes).
• Threads will allow other resources/evidence to be attached to and voted up. There is no need to hunt through 30 pages for a link, it will be on the thread's resources tab just as Wikipedia's article sources are.
• Votes only count towards issues/threads/members that have trusted your opinions
• Groups can communicate in encrypted invisible threads only inviting in whom they want to

Why should you be forced to listen to my Off-topic ramblings just because I wanted to start a topic?
Why can't you ignore topics?
Why would you even see my topics unless someone you trust, trusted me to post something worthwhile?
Why is spam supported and encouraged?
Do you want to shut me up? Then support a system that would empower you to do so without needing to make it a political or dramatic stand, yet affect what I say be forcing me to watch what I say so that you and others will listen to me and take me seriously. The cost of spamming here is far too low.

Bottom line, this new software will solve both the trust and integrity issues of moderation, discussion and advertising in the bitcoin community, and the long noticed but never fixed noise-to-ratio issues.

These are just a few simple additions that are planned, some are experimental and innovative to the internet as well, and as such may be faulty at first and need to be tested by a live community. It is not expected to be an overnight job but I will not give up until it has proven itself to be a success or failure as deemed by the entire community.

The deal is this. You help support this effort and I will not stop working on it. I will invest my own money, what little I have when not paying for mistakes I made in bitcoin for the past 2 years. You help support with ideas and constructive criticisms, and I will never turn away from you. I will listen and try to resolve problems as they arise. You contribute what you can in the form of transparently spent funds (on CIYAM Open where each and every task is accounted for publicly to avoid even the accusation of mispending), development time, or management, and I will dedicate my life to making this forum a success not only for bitcoins, but for the internet at large.

I need your interest and support, I need your comments, your healthy constructive criticisms, it is what drives my passion, and my passion is clearly one of the strongest in this entire community or else I wouldn't annoy so many people with my occasional misguided words. Message me if you think it's a good idea. Pledge yourself to move to this new forum when it gets done. Message me if you think it will end bad and want to give some advice on how to save it. Comment in here regardless. Your messages are like food and water to me.

It's time for something more, something worth 6000 BTC that never got spent on it. Bitcoin deserves it. We deserve it. The internet deserves it.

I'll post here again when I have demo plans, accounts at CIYAM Open open, and am ready for more than just talk.

---

edit: I have made a spreadsheet to display current objectives as far as features, as well as to show support of pledgers. Pledgers can be people who support with donation pledges towards feature task completion on CIYAM Open, time for development, marketing, branding, hosting, or just general support and a pledge to move to the new software for testing once completed.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Ajtx05YrHtIydGlfTDRzdE5tYldEWDNUZFh5WDk3ZGc&usp=sharing


When the above "pledge" sheet has 100 names on it, I will start producing design and flow demos and add them here.

I'm in. 

I am confused how your proposal will will resolve the funding problems for running a forum. You mention unwanted advertising and giving 6000 BTC to a forum moderator (an incident I am not aware of).

This SMF default installation and domain name alone have somehow warranted over 6,000 BTC donated to Theymos to make it better. 12 months later and nothing has happened. Just more broken and bias corruption and hypocrisy. That is what the reference to that is all about. I have my motivations for doing this, but the reasons behind needing it are far bigger than me and any of my opinions-- we need a "forum" where we do not need to be moderated at all.

I have made a spreadsheet to display current objectives as far as features, as well as to show support of pledgers. Pledgers can be people who support with donation pledges towards feature task completion on CIYAM Open, time for development, marketing, branding, hosting, or just general support and a pledge to move to the new software for testing once completed.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Ajtx05YrHtIydGlfTDRzdE5tYldEWDNUZFh5WDk3ZGc&usp=sharing

When the "Pledges" tab on the above sheet has 100 names on it, I will start producing design and flow demos and add them here.

If you want to see these demos and what is in store, pledge your interest in PM and I'll add you.

I will watch this carefully and see how it goes, and likely contribute in some form or another. Possibly a lot if I think it's going in a good direction!

I don't share all of your complaints about this forum, but there is certainly no harm in competition and innovation. I have been thinking myself about ideas for an improved, more decentralized type of forum for a while.

How are you going to avoid anything but OP moderation? Or am I reading that wrong? Certainly blatantly illegal things will have to be removed.

I haven't had time to read much more than your OP yet, but I didn't read anything about a tipping system there, that's certainly something it needs. This wordpress pluggin (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=237624.0;topicseen) has a lot of good ideas, like unique BTC addresses per post. Users wouldn't need to have funds in a forum web-wallet to tip (although that option could be available as well). Receivers could set up whether to have their tips forwarded to their address (or just tips over a certain amount), or donate them to the forum, or charity.

Also, have you detailed the ownership and director structures?

I have had the idea rolling around of a totally community owned and operated forum (and company), where everyone has voting privileges and shares, that increase or decrease based on factors focused around what you have contributed, your reputation, tips, karma-type ratings, etc. Perhaps create a block-chain (ideally that can be mined along-side Bitcoin like Namecoin) to record everything permanently, or to just have a permanent record of some things, and give some credit for those who run nodes. Everything is decided using this weighted-vote system, from things like forum moderation and escrow conflicts, to making all of the every-day business decisions like hiring employees and electing directors (if needed at all, community would decide). Founders would have no advantage over anyone else.

Basically operating everything on the principle that if one person looks at a big jar of jelly beans and tries to guess how many there are, they won't get anywhere close, but if a million people guess the average will be exact. I suppose it would be run like a fairly typically anarchist-type system. I suppose the big questions that would make or break this are if a corporation really needs a CEO, and if a community can actually self-regulate.

The forum could end up branching out in a million different ways, all consensus-based, as the community decides how to spend funds and all other resources. Either it could end up running the world, or blow up and fail in a week. I wish I had enough resources to develop something like this myself and just launch it on the world, but unfortunately most of my company's time has to be spent on things that actually make money for us, instead of costing us. If your project turns in to (or is already intended as) something resembling what I've been considering, I would put as much time and coin into it as possible.
 
Best of luck with the project Matthew.

I think bitcointalk.org is the absolute worst place to talk about Bitcoin, except for all the other places.

There's something about this place that keeps it relevant in spite of its warts, and I'm not sure that whatever it is would move to a new forum. It's been tried before.

I'm betting a real competitor will force improvements here.  Right now there is no incentive for theymos  to do the right thing.  A moderately successful alternative changes all of that.

From the brief description, I get the impression that data security is going to work a little like http://mega.co.nz

Illegal content can't be easily found/removed because the hosting service is not able to view the contents.

MegaUpload tried to follow the DMCA (despite being based in New Zealand) and were shut-down for their trouble.


The new mega site does not work with my slightly dated browsers though. It also requires client-side scripting that I love to hate.

Time for project "If you don't like it, then GTFO Matthew".

You want to build an OP-only moderated forum?

http://www.manoneileen.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/fear.jpg

We can't post here, this is scam country.

In my opinion Theymos is damned if he does and damned if he doesn't in regards to fixing the forums.  Despite its aging appearance, difficulty of customizations etc the current forum actually works pretty well.  50% of users will hate whatever new forum is built, or simply complain because they dont wont to adjust to the new system.

One neat feature I would like is the ability to focus on posts/topics from other forum users that started around the same time as me.  I enjoy hearing from and communicating with the long time bitcoiners, but it seems more newbies join every day and I hear less and less from people who's opinion I have come to respect over the years. 

[disclaimer: thoughts of a noob, no idea about any of the underlying politics]

bitcointalk is one the first places a noob will find if they want to learn more about bitcoin. It's right up there with bitcoin.org and the bitcoin wiki.

I'm new here but aren't bitcoin and bitcointalk bigger than some of the concerns being expressed? Shouldn't the aim be to promote bitcoin by making this a safer and more user/noob friendly environment? Private, invite only subforums or threads and 100% self-moderation sounds like it would achieve the exact opposite.

I actually think some of the issues - particularly around the borked trust system and the enormous number of scammers/scammer accounts on here - could be addressed by having more active mods. (How difficult is it to mark someone with a "Trade Dispute" tag if there are accusations outstanding, then upgrade it to "Scammer" or removing it when resolved? Clone accounts should also be insta-tagged (I'm guessing the mods just don't have the time at the moment.)

To add to the recent serious complaints, he just said that Garr255 (who shill bid his own auction) didn't do anything wrong (disclaimer: Garr255 is a friend of Theymos and is trusted with 250 BTC of your donated funds). There is just no more incentive for Theymos to have integrity and it is blatantly obvious.

The poster below is correct. The server can't see what the user doesn't allow someone to see by inviting them into the feed. It needs to be tested and tried, but ask yourself the same question about the bitcoin blockchain. If there were something "illegal" there, how would it be "removed"? It doesn't need to, just ignored, which is the default action. When it comes to data and encryption, when no one can see it, it effectively doesn't exist. Since the server would hold no encrypted keys, complying with any and all demands of local law enforcement (hint: not a US hosted site) would still not help them do anything about the content.

You're absolutely right and I totally forgot to add it. I wrote this last night at something like 6am so there will be plenty of time to refine thoughts and add features. I think despite the initial concern that "no one will use tipping" (which I share in concern), there is no reason not to allow bitcoinQT (or another method) to be linked through API to tips and such. Blockchain.info does it with a browser plugin. Anything is possible.

Since moderation would effectively be impossible programmatically except for users the thread OP assigns moderation trust to, the only "censorship" vector is at the domain level. I *need* suggestions on how to make that a distributed control effort, because I don't think I should even hold that domain once things get going but I'm unaware of any registrars that would allow me to demand a split key system of control.

The main problems with this forum come with time, just as with civilization itself. Corruption and hypocrisy have ruined it at the administrative level. By allowing *any* users to be more powerful of influential, there system will become agenda-ridden like must of the current community is. Instead, I propose that all users are equal in the only power that matters-- self governance. If you choose to trust someone elses broadcast, then you are agreeing to listen to their ramblings (reverse ignore). If you choose to trust someone for transactions, you are choosing to increase their reputation based on your reputation. Nothing gets shoved in without notice by a moderator who invested into someone. No one gets secretly "whitelisted". It will no longer be profitable to make repeated sockpuppets as everyone will know exactly who made them by who is trusted them so much. This will also reduce scams. Some could argue that "moderation is necessary" at a site-wide level, but I content that site-wide moderation is the site's biggest weakness as it allows a trust-attack vector similar to having dishonest police. You can't fight them, but they make you feel like you need them so you're forced to trust them. I say do away with them altogether.

That's the test, isn't it? We need to prove it once it's up and running. I have faith this community is diverse enough to make it work. I have no faith that moderation will help at all. I do not think the site needs a corporation to run it. Despite loving the concepts of a free market, I see this forum turning to garbage when profits control interests. I think instead, the community should decide with their trust who holds the keys. Initially it would be whomever the first involved decide (I have made no stake in requiring control in this project, only in being the leading passion until others are able to decipher the vision).

3 years ago I started a project called smallpla.net that never actually got finished. It was a project based on a consensus community, Ripple style trust payment network, automatic language simplification engines for everyone to learn each others language easier, and a shared economy with dynamically created miniature governments geared at creating projects and collaborations. It was intended to be a collection of micro-democracies. I am sure some of those ideas will carry through, but at least for the first iteration I have no intention of complicating things much more than they are already.

If you support this project, PM me with your public email and I'll jott you down on the spreadsheet as a pledger of support. People need to see just how many others agree with this initiative because they are going to first be in denial ("We don't really need a new forum, this one isn't really broken" and other logical fallacies). and it will take them some time until they realize how they are being corralled like cattle here and deserve an open field.

It's never been tried by me. It's been tried by others who wanted fame or fortune from their endeavor. I want transparency and to end the hypocrisy. In that, I will succeed no matter who supports this project or not, I just may not succeed in pulling in those who seek out corruption to benefit from it. (i.e. I highly doubt the forum I am designing will be popular with the scammers since they are effectively neutralized).

The reason that this forum is still relevant is because the oldest members in the community are still here, as are the ones who are the smartest, as are the ones who are the richest, as are the ones who talk the most. If you can convince the ones who talk the most to move, the rest will follow. Guess which one I am.

Indeed. Nothing wrong with starting something else. Quite the opposite , competition and having alternatives is a good thing: go for it!

Just don't start new things coming from negative emotions (and communicating them) since people will feel less inclined to work with you. Start something from positive emotions by listing all the new things you want to do instead of attacking these forums.

The way you worded it now (and have articulated yourself in the past few days) I can only agree with Blitz ....

So does the North Korean government, but that doesn't mean you have to stay and put up with everything when there are other countries you can move to. Difference here being the dear leader is just going to use his words instead.


In the new proposed forum model, "focus" is done by your choice alone, and only by what others "broadcast" to you, meaning that you do really have full choice to see what you want to see. There doesn't seem to be anything stopping this system from also having additional parameters of focus like you're requesting. I'll mull over how it could be done effectively, because it seems that people would also want those on their trusted broadcast network to have their threads shown first over random public broadcasted ones that they didn't choose to ignore yet.

Too big to fail eh?

How do you feel about the bitcoin subreddit? Do you think that's distracting and everyone should just use this forum instead?

Please read the spreadsheet. Private, invite-only is not the norm, just an option, just like how there is a VIP only subforum section on this very SMF forum. You would be arguing that this forum is not promoting bitcoin as a result? I'm not sure if I understand correctly but I recommend reading the spreadsheet and spending more time here to fully understand why something like the forum being proposed is truly necessary for the longevity of bitcoin and discussions.

There comes a time (like with current world governments) when replacing a few people doesn't solve anything as the system itself is broken. When that realization comes over you, your first instinct will be to fight it. I did, and nothing is changing because it is far too profitable to be lazy here as an admin/moderator. Your next reaction will be to create something better. This is where we are now.

I agree with you and have thought about that while typing what I said. Bitcoin itself is supposedly a "replacement" of fiat, and it is very hard for bitcoiners to not be emotional when talking about using bitcoin over fiat. There are very few people in this community who can say "I use bitcoin just because it's neat and have no interest in shaking things up". In fact, we have public psuedo-leaders (and false prophet cultists) constantly plastering the news with their libertarian aqendas to "dissolve the governments of the world by first using bitcoin" etc. I in fact argue that that is the wrong way to go too, so I commend you for reminding me of how it sounds listening to someone overly passionate.

Be that as it may, this is better for everyone. The inspiration comes from disgust of the current system, but the results will come from a love for freedom and integrity.

Matt, you're getting dangerously close to Atlas-speak again. You should go do some breathing exercises or scream at the forest or take a nice relaxing juniper berry bath or something.

Take a look at http://www.discourse.org/
May be you can fork them instead of doing yet another same forum.

I am guilty of that myself. There are two reasons I like Bitcoin, the system itself (economically, mathematically and because of the computer science aspects), but at the same time I really hate the system it will replace. Everyone is a bit of a hypocrite ;)

Thank you, I just checked them out and although there were some really good features, it has moderation embedded at the core and thus contradicts with the intention of this project so I'll see what I can borrow if anything! Cheers

Someone privately told me "Settle down or Theymos 'gonna ban ya!". Yea, it's true I don't always understand how I come across (I'm a ball of energy and am able to have an equal amount of fun alone as with others) but I do not think my intentions here are flawed.

fake edit: Can you drink the Juniper Berry Bath when you're done?

WARNING: Please rewiew and be aware of this user's previous scamming history before sending it any bitcoins/time/money.

Theoretically, if it's only made from the berries, yes. Except if you've got kidney problems. Wouldn't recommend it then.

I wouldn't recommend it even if you don't.

Meh, juniper berry tea and/or syrup is an old timey cure for acute bronchitis and bacterially induced digestion problems.

The thing you are looking for is "the network effect". This community thrives because this is where the people are. I tried to use some other forums in the past, but since there were few other users it quickly devolved into interesting links back to this forum.

I am not sure having a standalone application is the best way to go. I find it convenient that I can log into the forum from any computer. Having to install software is a big turn-off for many of the less-technically inclined.

Exactly which shows how much MNW (I like the name never right, hehehe) knows.

Yep. It will come, and it will happen without any advertising at all as the corruption and hypocrisy here continues to grow.


No one said anything about a stand alone client application. The application on the *server* is intended to be a stand alone application in that it doesn't need a bunch of plugins installed or even an httpd server.

Let's keep this thread on topic.... don't want to have to come back and delete more completely off-topic stuff.

Why is this in bitcoin discussion? It should be moved to offtopic, it's about a forum!

+1 Or at least put it over in "project developement", but it definitely should be out of "general bitcoin"


Oh, I guess that was not clearly laid out in the OP. So you will still access this through a web browser?

No, it's about innovation and taking the noise down.


This is not a bitcoin related service, it is a discussion of solving the noise and integrity issues in bitcoin discussion.


Yessir, there is no need for browser plugins (although some features will be enabled through such) but the gist would be that on the server side, it would be more fast and secure and allow for encryption that this current forum just can't support. (I updated the spreadsheet to make that more clear! Thanks for bringing that up.)

Then that's meta.

Maybe, but after someone has bathed in it, I think it would lose its appeal.


Back on topic:

Matthew, a competitive forum that approaches the issues this one has in a new way is a great idea. I pledge to keep an open mind and offer my constructive criticism whenever possible. I'll probably even throw a bitcoin or two into the mix.

I've registered and attempted to participate in many of the other, more reputable, bitcoin oriented forums and I think the reason none of them got off the ground is because they didn't offer anything new other than a "Let's really, really try to keep the noise down here!" attitude. If you can provide a truly unique place to discuss Bitcoin and its related topics it should fare better than those.

Honestly, though, I don't envision it replacing bitcointalk.org any time in the near future simply because so many movers and shakers of the bitcoin world use it as their sounding board, testing ground, etc. Even if your project becomes everything you hope for, I'll probably still post here at least as much as there, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.

Good luck.

No it's not because we're not talking about improving *this forum* which is what Meta is strictly about.

Thank you for the words of support and enthusiasm, I understand the scale of the undertaking and how it looks to the outside world ("He's crazy!") but it's genuine and I'm not giving up just because the rich boys club of Bitcoin doesn't put a foundation seal on it. As for posting here, I don't know about you, but I'd have no reason to ever post here again.

So it is off topic. I have no interest in this, I want to hear about bitcoin, not a scammer's scam forum.

And yet you, admittedly thinking this is a scam (which is ridiculous as no funds will ever come to me), continue to post here, increasing its popularity. If it were a scam, you'd be facilitating it.

No, I am not. Calling something out is not fascinating it.

Here, you have the untrustworthy tag. On your forum, you will not. So it will help you scam.

I'm not sure that's a complete explanation because as far as I know r/bitcoin has a comparable amount of readers but not a comparable level of discussion.

The forum being proposed would require users to trust me in order to scam. Your point is illogical.

The requirement that the server be a monolithic C++ application illustrates that you are an ideas man using the world's most popular Operating System. Nothing wrong with that, but I believe such a requirement will kill the project. Many OS's have a decent package manager that makes installing dependencies not that big a deal. Why do you want dependencies? -- Because saves you from reinventing the wheel; improving security and scalability for everyone. I know you were trying to use Bitcoin as a model, but it is not perfect. The database chosen did not scale well and was recently replaced. I would argue that the Bitcoin project is actually simpler than what you propose.

Here is a list a third-party libraries and utilities you may want to consider:

• HTTP server. I know the HTTP protocol is not that complex: but I don't know why you insist on rolling your own.
• Database such as Postgre SQL or MySQL. If you are rolling your own, you programmer better be good with data-structures or else it won't scale well.
• OpenPGP library such as GPG.

I am also not aware of any web-browsers with will run C++ code directly. Maybe you can translate it to JavaScript, but that may be slow. I actually liked the concept of Java Applets back in the day: programs designed to run in a browser sand-box; and ask for permission if they want extra access to the computer (such as reading and writing files).

Totally agree Matthew.


Sounds great, I'll be watching with interest.

Okay, so, node.js.  You stated in your OP that you wanted to create the server software in c++, that cool and all, but I think you will find node.js to be an easier beast to tame for this type of project.

- https is a default library, with webserver modules a plenty if your too lazy to do your own custom routing (express, flatiron, etc).
- bitcoinjs is easily implemented for generating wallets, tipping, etc.
- mongodb provides an easy data model and storage for all your data needs.
- crypto libraries are provided by default
- easily scale-able with the cluster and child libraries.

Not saying the performance will match that of a c++ binary, but will more than likely surpassed the PHP based model we have here, and would be my go-to if I was making this project.

Good luck.

Although I'm a big fan of Node.js, it is cetainly a wrong tool for this project. Better pick Java, Ruby or Python.

I wonder if the forum can include tools that make the economics of bit coin easier.  Things like 2 of 3 key generation for escrow so noobs can easily do escrow.

What do you think MNW?

Should the forum software be a distributed p2p network in itself, like Diaspora, so it wouldn't be as easy to take down / manipulate?

I completely forgot about Diaspora*. They might have some good ideas worth stealing.

Seems like a solid idea, some sort of escrow system (if built correctly) would be nice to have integrated.


I definitely like that as well.  It would make it a lot harder to take down.


Also, I know MNW is banned though not sure for how long.  I wouldn't expect him to be responding to stuff here anytime soon.

Sigh. With MNW it's always two steps forward, two steps back.

Matthew, I think it's time to admit you have a problem and enroll in Trollers Anonymous.

What was he banned for?

Trolling was the reason, though I don't know specifically what he was doing to get it.

I've been around this forum for long enough to say, the reason MNW has a high ignore count is unknown to me and is puzzling.

Granted He has a a loud mouth and often make bold statement to generate attention but overall the large majority of his posts were made with genuine, forward looking and good intentions.


The ratio of Bitcoin's complexity and potential VS. popularity and noise is getting out of hands.
I will support any initiative that try to improve the effectiveness of communications on the Internet.

Fun fact : The ignore color feature of this forum was funded as a bounty by me and MNW to the tune of 5 BTC each.

Please note that CIYAM Open will only support this effort *after* MNW has returned the BTC that he has promised to (private info so will not go into more details here or on any other topic).

Fascinating! So you're agreeing to support his latest brain fart vaporware as a sort of scammed funds return insurance. Very clever indeed.

Matt, why don't you try building something we can use before you announce it next time as kind of a "refreshing change of pace" sort of thing. With that said, I like the idea in concept. If you can actually make it happen I'll be there.