eureka: No, the balance sheet is very lightweight and only stores balance, not actual coin ownership.  Though, that would be one way to solve that, is to store all 21,000,000 coins (identified by the hash of the block they were generated in) under the address they're "owned" by.  It'd be bigger than the chain is now, but it'd still be significantly smaller than the entirety of the block chain.

We're located in Florida, currently at a residential address with a business class data connection and 2 dedicated hosts that are always on.  Once our customer base is large enough to warrant it, we'll invest in a T-1 line or better.

All we require is a single written/signed letter that says you're not planning on doing anything illegal, and we're not responsible for anything you do or host.  Doesn't even have to be written by you, just someone who's willing to take responsibility if you DO do something illegal (host childporn or something crazy like that).

Also, we'll provide proxy domain names, or you can register domain names with us (we'll just go to another service, but we'll get it under our own name to maintain your anonymity).

One thing I mentioned to noagendamarket in a PM was that we're working towards being a Green hosting company.  We're keeping our carbon footprint as low as possible.  Once we have an established user-base (and thus can afford to run a promotion like this), one thing we've considered doing is measuring our carbon footprint regularly, and giving all our users a discounted price proportional to our carbon footprint.  This will incentivize US to keep our impact on the environment as minimal as possible. =)

This is a very good solution.  I was looking around on random.org, but I hadn't thought it all the way through.  Would you be interested in buying into a lottery like this?  It's interesting, because it doesn't reward buying a bunch of guesses at once (each one gives diminishing returns, because you're putting more money into the pot) and the longer it goes on (maybe capped to a week, and whoever's closest after a week wins) the more profitable it would be, because there'd be less choices, thus more chances for winning.  It's almost like a Bingo lottery. =P

Wow, that tweaked one... I'm getting stunning rates.  I have a quad core Intel laptop.

I have two different number sets, 1 while operating as usual, with other programs running, and one while everything but bitcoin (including explorer.exe) is shut down.

	Stock:	x64 v1	x64 v2	x64 v2 Tweaked
Standard Usage:	500-1200	1000-1800	750-1500	2200-2700
Optimized Usage:	1500-1800	2000-2500	1500-2000	2700-3400

O_O

gavin: The balance sheets are meant for more lightweight things.  If you run in "balance sheet only" mode, it allows you to get a quick glance at it, and operate with people you trust.  You trade at your own risk while in this mode.  If you're distrustful, make sure you're checking the whole block chain.  The balance sheets AUGMENT, not REPLACE the core functionality.

I was thinking of writing a REAL android client, not just an interface.  One that's actually crunching hashes for you.

That gets me thinking... the client should be written so that it can "offload" some of the hash work.  Meaning, accepting possible solutions over the RPC.  So, every time it gets another transaction or starts a new block, it broadcasts it to anyone listening, then whoever's listening can crunch numbers and submit possible solutions.  The only difference being that when the "person listening" is crunching numbers, it's doing so under the original server's identity, so the original server receives the coin, instead of some new client.  This would make running it as a cluster a bit easier, as well as things like "let your phone crunch hashes too!" etc.

Perhaps.  If it was a whole-nother "layer" on top of the existing algorithm, it'd definitely work.  And, you wouldn't have to worry as MUCH about the security of each balance sheet, because it's more of a shortcut anyway.  Anyone really worried can always fall back on the block chain.  Likewise, if someone every once in a while double checks the sheets vs the block chain, they can start "blacklisting" them, letting everyone know they're bad.  Or something.

Yes, generating a block right now includes a "proxy transaction", which pulls bitcoins out of thin air.  In time, this will pull coins out of the other transactions instead to incentivize continued block generation.

How would I do this though?  The whole idea is that instead of a bunch of people guessing, then the numbers picked, a bunch of people pick and the first one to guess the number wins.  Otherwise it becomes a regular lottery, and the point is to be a bit different, so as not to tread on the other lottery's feet.

I was considering starting something like a "real time lotto", but wanted to probe the community first.

How would everyone here feel about a lotto that works as following:

I, or some third party, would choose a random number and keep it a secret, and put several bitcoins into the pot to get things going.
People begin to guess numbers at 1btc each guess.  Each bitcoin goes into the pot.
This continues until someone guesses the number, at which point 3 things happen:
80% (or some other number, it's up to how people react) of the pot goes to the winner.
1% goes to me (very modest, I should say)
19% stays in the pot to get it started for the next one, and a random number is chosen again.

This could be automated, as a (potentially) very fast paced lottery.

So: 
What numbers should I use above, or are the values I've chosen reasonable?
Would you prefer the "already guessed" numbers be shown?  Hidden?  Shown after they've been guessed multiple times?
Any other ideas/suggestions?

So you're starting a new lotto, with new tickets?  Or just continuing on until a number gets drawn, with people keeping their numbers?

But it'd still continue to grow after the 21 million coins.

Depending on CPU usage and such, between 5 and 15 dollars a month.

Hehe, I already offered my hosting. =)  (We've only got one customer so far, and they're pleased with there service, so no official business license until we can get a stronger customer base).

I don't see 680 on that list, does that mean the lotto will continue into next week?

I've got 140 bitcoins... Can you hold one until I generate another block or two? (or win a lottery tonight!)

Well, a single person can have multiple addresses, so you don't neccesarily know if two transactions go to the same person, as different addresses could be either the same person or different people.

knightmb: Blocks continue to get generated even after all the coins have been "minted".  Also, each block varies in size based on how many transactions occur in that span of time, so yours would only be a rough estimate.

I like this idea, though I can't figure out how to work it in without making it a breaking change... It could be incorporated pretty easily as a breaking change, but breaking changes are difficult in a distributed system... The "new" software would look like a vagrant and be pretty much inoperable (it would see everyone else as "hackers") until over half the people updated.  Until then, everyone else would see the newer software as a "hacker", and both groups would reject eachother's blocks, resulting in a bifurcation of the block chain.  Then, old->old transactions would be lost. to the "newer" split blockchain.

Fix'd.