With two US senators alerting the Department of Justice about the situation with Silk Road, I think we will see bank accounts frozen relatively soon a la wikileaks.

This is a great idea! Where can I purchase the device?

I just came accross this quote hostile comment on Slashdot:

Source: http://idle.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2215718&cid=36351892

What's with such hostility? It's one thing to think bitcoin is an unworthy project, but to actually want it to be "stomped out of existence" really crosses the line.

I have been following this project for some time
http://www.theconnective.net/
but I haven't seen much progress on that front yet.

What would be interesting is to see if Software Defined Radio would bring any new possibilities. If we could talk to our neighbors over radio without the intervention of any ISPs that would already be a great step towards a free citizens internet.

Bitcoin just appeared on Al Jazeera:
http://english.aljazeera.net/video/americas/2011/06/20116655012909169.html

In addition to pybitcoin, there is another python implementation of bitcion that you may be interested in:

https://github.com/phantomcircuit/bitcoin-alt

I think it is almost complete. The only thing that it is missing is the verify signature stuff in the scripting language.

What about a MacOS version?

Yes, I've had a similar problem in the past. For me the solution was to purchase MtGox USD directly from somebody who had them in their MtGox account. That way I had the funds available immediately.

That's not the value of bitcoin. That's just sunk cost which is of no use.

Has anybody considered implementing Bitcoin in the browser on top of WebRTC?


Source: http://tech.slashdot.org/story/11/06/02/1541246

I think having something like that would be really cool and very convenient. One wouldn't need to worry about downloading a separate bitcoin client, but could simply load up the application in the browser and be good to go.

Here is another article discussing WebRTC:


Source: http://www.i-programmer.info/news/81-web-general/2402-can-my-browser-speak-to-your-browser.html

You are right it's messy. But the only messy part is how to choose a new time-stamp server.
Revoking transactions will be easy. Only transactions that were placed after the invalid transaction will be revoked - but they should never have been placed in the chain by honest nodes anyway. Once a new time-stamp server is chosen - valid transaction will be placed back into the chain by that server. Even the originally invalid transaction may be placed into the chain eventually if the balance of the account to which it refers becomes sufficiently large.

I think I didn't make myself clear. The chain of transactions must always be in a consistent state, i.e. no address can have a negative balance. Every node can verify the chain is in a consistent state. If the time-stamping server signs a transaction that puts the chain in an inconsistent state, then the server is rejected by the network. So a double-spend isn't really possible without invalidating the chain a copy of which is stored on every node.

Sure, that's a valid criticism. Maybe one could build a hierarchical structure where one could easily reach a consensus of a new time-stamping server across the network once the old one behaves badly.  

The system could be bootstrapped from Bitcoin by assigning balances to each address in accordance with the current wealth distribution of Bitcoin users. The new system will use the same private/public key architecture as Bitcoin, and since users control their private keys, they will be able to spend their coins on both systems. The first (genesis) transaction in the new system will be one that assigns to all current Bitcoin public addresses in existence their respective Bitcoin balance.

The job of the time-stamping server would be to assign order to transactions that is final and immutable. Instead of the current block-chain there will be a chain of transactions signed by the time-stamping server. A copy of the chain of transactions will be stored on every node. If the time-stamping server attempts to double-spend, then it will have to modify the immutable chain of transactions, and that attempt will be rejected by the network of nodes, since each node will be able to see that the server is trying to assign a different order number to a transaction it has previously signed. Once that happens, the community has to choose a new time-stamping server that is trustworthy. Since the job of the time-stamping server is easy, it would be trivial to set one up.

Another problem with a central time-stamping server would be that it will have the power to selectively not include transactions into the chain based on their addresses. But the same problem exists in the current bitcoin implementation. And the solution again would be to chose a new server if the current one starts behaving badly.

CydeWeys, I haven't missed the point of Bitcoin. Even though it may appear that bitcoin is a decentralized system, in the long term it will converge to the centralized system I described as miners become more specialized and control most of the computational power. With the recent case of one of the mining pools surpassing the 50% hashing power, we are already close to having a centralized proof of work system anyway.  So eventually there is little doubt that select few highly-efficient miners will control what transactions get verified and what don't.

Besides, a system based on a centralized time-stamping server would not be yet another centralized system.  All centralized monetary systems are currently able to  inflate their currency, whereas with the centralized time-stamping system the central entity will not be able to create new money. That will be it's only advantage.

I agree with this assertion.

I've been consider an alternative to bitcoin which has no computational proof-of-work, but simply a central timestamping server - which determines in which order transactions will appear in the chain. Whenever a double spending occurs, nodes consult the timestamping server as to which transaction should be in the chain, and discard the other one.

This version of Bitcoin will also be censorship resistant, because the central timestamping server has a very simply job (simply to order transactions), and can be easily replaced if disabled by a central authority.

In this version, all the coins will be issued in the beginning, and then the software will be distributed across all nodes. No subsequent increases in the number of coins will be allowed. An increase would require modification of the software, and that will be rejected by most nodes as it will devalue their currency.

So while in this version coins will not be issuable by anyone, they will be very cheap to issue, and the system will have no inflation. More importantly, no resources will be wasted in proof-of-work. The only drawback is the centralized nature of the timestamping server, but it can be easily replaced if it gets banned.

Most of the comments on slashdot were quite hostile. Either they claimed bitcoin was a scam project, or that a deflationary currency is not viable.

Where is the option for brown?

Do you have a Bitcoin address where we can post donations? I was actually thinking of creating a bounty for a Qt port of the GUI, but you already created one

As far as regulations are concerned, bitcoins are just a bunch of bits, and there should be no limit as to how many can be released daily. Right now you can't withdraw more than ~150 BTC per day, which is ridiculous.