My preference is for #bitcoin also.

According to freenode admins, there are multiple group registrations in the pile for bitcoin.

I emailed them to try and sort that out, based on http://blog.freenode.net/2010/06/group-registration-form-verifications/

Another point is that BitDNS is essentially an autonomous entity that runs a paid service in a niche market (decentralized, timestamped, notarized data storage).  As such, it seems fundamentally unfair to integrate one service directly into the currency itself, while all other services ("the rest of the world") simply uses the currency itself.  BitDNS becomes a "blessed" provider, elevated above other websites, stores and services due to its direct integration into the currency transactions themselves.

This is certainly uncharted territory when it comes to currencies, but I would not like to speculate on how this changes the economics of bitcoin's value.

Succeed or fail, bitcoin-the-currency should stand on its own.

These experiments are better suited for an alternate network and block chain.  Leave the currency as a currency, and preserve the investments that many have already made in bitcoin.

It could be as simple as a patch that accepts "-datanet" and non-standard transactions, such as
http://yyz.us/bitcoin/patch.bitcoin-datanet-fork

(warning: demonstration patch, do not use; you would want a real genesis block for a production network)

Each individual transaction is immediately relayed to the entire network, by the transaction creator.  As a node on the network, you are typically offered the same transaction multiple times, for redundancy.  Everyone sends transactions to everyone.

So, simply by being a node on the bitcoin P2P network, miners are sent transactions by other nodes on the network.  Miners then try to hash the list of transactions not yet in a block.



Yes, it stores keys, transactions, various program settings and other features such as the new account system.

It needs to be backed up after each transaction due to "change" transactions.  If you receive 1000 BTC, then send me 1 BTC, bitcoin will create a transaction that looks like this:

     input: { 1000 BTC }
     output: { 1 BTC },
               { 999 BTC }     <---- change transaction, from yourself, to yourself

If you lose your latest backup, you might lose those 999 BTC, because you don't have the keypair associated with it.

This is not an opinion; read the source.  Transaction fees vary on total block size, not just transaction size.

Thus, larger blocks == higher fees.

Thus, more data spam, or more overall network traffic (currency or not) == higher fees.

Currency transactions would have to fight harder -- pay more fees -- to make sure they're processed in a timely fashion, due to all the non-currency data in the block chain.  Increasing the block size does not reduce transaction fees.

Rather, it will increase everybody's fees, and incentivize creation of a currency-only chain without all the data spam.

That will disadvantage people who use bitcoins for reasons unrelated to storing data in the block chain -- ie. as cash as intended -- because the "appropriate compensation" will prioritize their non-currency transactions over currency transactions.

Responded, in this new thread.

Jumping over from this excellent post by appamatto...


+1, think this is a fantastic idea.

However, I feel that economically, the mainline bitcoin block chain should be a currency-only block chain.

I don't like how bitDNS ties a single "blessed" market -- distributed data publishing -- so closely with the underlying currency.  It seems like those who use bitcoins for reasons unrelated to the block chain data publishing would be more unduly impacted by the use of currency for distributed data publishing.

Someone really needs to start a new block chain, BitX / GenCoins.  That would relieve the pressure off trying to stuff all these ideas into the world's digital software-fiat currency.

I agree with you and satoshi about "txs after <txid>".  My listtransactions (now xlisttransactions) patch pointedly does not have that feature, and never has.

I never said it would cause a block chain split.  It's more fundamental: a rules split.

Forking the network implied a majority of miners not running mainline bitcoin transaction rules.  theymos appears to be drawing a line in the sand, where he wants to convince most miners to stop paying attention to mainline bitcoin transaction validation rules.  He's free to do that.  And miners are free to validate what they want to.

But this sort of split will make it more difficult to work on the network in the future, and de facto, opens the door to larding down the block chain with all sorts of non-currency-related data as being discussed in other threads.

Please start your own block chain, rather than forking the network like this.

I hope it is clear the havoc that your push to include non-currency data is causing.

"greater", no, it would have a different value.

I think the important point is that these things are unavoidable unsafe after a certain point, even for listreceivedbyaddress.  So I think it's helpful to compare current website behavior under mainline bitcoin, with listtransactions.   Let us call this the confirmation point.  Addressing your queries...


bitcoinmarket and mtgox and other sites seem to consider 6 confirmations their "confirmation point", the moment at which a transaction may be considered "safe." If a past transaction becomes invalid and disappears, the website cannot avoid potential loss, because the user has already received their PayPal-USD or LR-USD or Pecunix GAU and disappeared.

Same for a web store or brick-and-mortar store.  There is a confirmation point at which the customer receives goods.  If a TX becomes invalid after that, the store takes an unavoidable loss, because the customer is already gone with the purchased goods.


Let us assume that confirmation count for txid 0x1234 is bouncing wildly between 0 to 10 to 0 and back and forth, due to a large number of block reorgs.

Whether it is listreceivedbyaddress or listtransactions, you still have a binary confirmation point, a moment in time, at which the transaction crosses the "approved by store" level of confidence.  At that confirmation point, the customer leaves with purchased goods, and store takes a loss regardless of further block chain or TX behavior.

I do agree a programmer may make a mistake, and assume that number of confirmations will always increase.  But that human mistake, too, will cause danger when used with listreceivedbyaddress.


On this point, I agree that listtransactions presents some additional danger here, due to changing txid, if and only if the new double-spend matches destination bitcoin address being sought by the JSON-RPC user.

Nevertheless, in this case too, the user's security rests entirely on their level of confidence:  if the TX is replaced before 6 confirmations, software will likely not notice anything.  If the TX is replaced after 6 confirmations, the customer has already left with purchased goods, and the bitcoin user takes a loss.


This is simply inherent to bitcoin itself.  A block chain reorg might happen after 50 blocks.  But websites do not want to make their users wait 50 blocks before receiving goods.  It is the well-known snack machine problem.  listtransactions does not add anything to this problem, beyond that which is already vulnerable through listreceivedbyaddress.

Transactions can and will be replaced after the binary "confirmation point."  All users of bitcoin must figure this into their business plans, just like they account for credit card chargeback risk or shoplifting risk.

See what nanotube said, earlier in this thread.

The admins on #freenode seem to think the group registration process for #bitcoin can be resolved in a few weeks.

Looks free and available, to me.

The value arises from the need of others to acquire GenCoins, in order to perform a DNS operation / publish some other data into the block chain.



Again, if the alternative coins have a low value, they're not much use to the person who generated them. And if they have a high value, they might replace bitcoin as the general currency. It doesn't work very well either way.
[/quote]

bitcoin's value proposition is simply in its fiat currency and decentralized nature.

GenCoins value would be in the data to which they are associated.

Two very different value propositions, reasons to hold them, and for that reason, two different market values.

At some point, a website or person accepting a transaction must take this risk.  It is unavoidable, whether you use listreceivedbyaddress or listtransactions.  This is why listtransactions reluctance seems so unusual.

Almost every exchange or website accepting bitcoins achieves a binary decisionpoint, where the transaction is accepted, and goods are shipped or money is exchanged.  After that binary decisionpoint, even if the block chain is reorg'd or transactions disappear, there is nothing the website can do but take a loss (or pursue a refund outside of bitcoin).

From the website's point of view, there is zero effective difference between 'listtransactions 6' and 'listreceivedbyaddress 6', because the end result to the website operator is the same:  the goods have been shipped / order accepted / money exchanged.