[Macroverse]

Hello, everyone,

I wanted to announce here a project I have been working on, combining procedural world generation and blockchain-based smart contract technology.

Macroverse
Macroverse is a procedurally generated universe, available to be used by blockchain-based games. Rather than paying expensive gas costs to store environment and level data on the blockchain, or spending large amounts of developer effort on custom world generation algorithms, game developers will be able to use Macroverse as a piece of game development middleware, and to find settings for their games by exploring the single, shared Macroverse universe.

The Macroverse world is generated by the Macroverse Generator (MG), a system of smart contracts. The Macroverse Star Generator, which produces a galaxy of over 200 billion stars of various classes, is deployed at address 0x56D96b6a5F33E2efE5BE66065D5b9C230B1f4e0e using this source code. Addresses with a balance of (currently) 100 MRV or more may query the generator's various constant functions and receive information about the Macroverse world.

Virtual Real Estate
Players exploring the Macroverse world will be able to discover, claim, and trade virtual real estate. If you find a particularly compelling star, planet, or geographical feature, you will be able to purchase it and make it yours. Ownership of real estate may confer beneficial effects or advantages in supported games.

Virtual real estate claims are manged by the Macroverse Registry, a system of smart contracts. Currently, the only contract is the Macroverse Star Registry, at address 0x6C00556F471cbe518007D62bc4ACEd6d8e537c9D using this source code, which allows players to claim (transferable, releasable) ownership of star systems, by putting up a deposit of (currently) 1000 MRV.

MRV Token
The Macroverse token, MRV, is an ERC20-compatible token on the Ethereum blockchain. Players must hold a minimum balance in the MRV token to query the Macroverse system, and deposits denominated in MRV must be put up in order to claim virtual real estate. The MRV token will be distributed in a crowdsale beginning July 1st at approximately 10 AM PST.

Token Facts
Name: Macroverse Token
Symbol: MRV
Decimals: 18
Token Contract: 0xAB6CF87a50F17d7F5E1FEaf81B6fE9FfBe8EBF84
Total Supply: Up to 100,005,000 MRV
Available for Sale: 100,000,000 MRV
Crowdsale Price: 5,000 MRV per ETH
Crowdsale Start Scheduled: 10:02 AM PST on July 1
Crowdsale Duration: 90 days
Crowdsale Contract (same as token contract): 0xAB6CF87a50F17d7F5E1FEaf81B6fE9FfBe8EBF84
Crowdsale/Token Contract Source: Here
More details are available here.

The MRV token is intended to function like a software license, enabling people to use the Macroverse system. It is not indented to represent a stake in the Macroverse project, and is not designed to increase in value over time.

In addition to trying to sell tokens, I'm posting here to gauge developer interest in building atop a platform like this, and to gather suggestions as to what features would be good to have when extending the system from just generating stars down to generating planets, terrain, weather, and other world features described in the whitepaper. Feedback is appreciated!

Additional Resources
Code on Github
Official Website including e-mail list signup
Whitepaper
Twitter: @MacroverseMRV
E-mail: macroverse@protonmail.com

I've released version 0.2 of the PyBC generic blockchain module on PyPI. This library has everything you need to write your own altcoin in Python. It comes with an example coin (1 minute block time, SHA512 hashing, 50 indivisible coins per block forever). That coin now comes with a GUI, so people can actually use it.

To install PyBC for yourself:

Code:

pip install --user pybc

If you installed version 0.1 and want the new version 0.2:

Code:

pip install --user --upgrade pybc

The executables all go in ~/.local/bin. If you want the GUI, run:

Code:

~/.local/bin/pybc_cointk test.blocks test.keys --generate

This will start up a node listening on port 8008, storing block data in test.blocks, and encryption keys in test.keys (think wallet.dat). It also sets it generating blocks.

You can start up another node and tell it to talk to the first node:

Code:

~/.local/bin/pybc_cointk test2.blocks test2.keys --generate --peer_host localhost --peer_port 8008 --port 8009

This will start a second node with a different block store, a different set of keys, and a different listen port, and tell it to connect to the first node. They may fight over which blockchain is longer for a bit until they finally settle on one.

Once you have this all running, you can use the GUIs to send coins between the two instances. There's no transaction listing yet, but you can see your balance change. Note that you won't see your balance update until the next block (and your client won't know which of its unspent outputs it has used until the next block, and will cheerily generate double-spend transactions that miners will reject).

There's only UI for a single receiving address per node, and anonymizing transactions with new change addresses has not been implemented, but neither would be particularly difficult to add.

The whole thing works on Windows if you install:

• Python
• Visual C++ 2008 Runtime (an OpenSSL dependency)
• OpenSSL (a pyelliptic dependency)
• setuptools (a pip dependency)
• pip (to install pyelliptic, which is a pure Python module with no Windows installer)
• pyelliptic
• Twisted

All of the appropriate architecture and Python version.

Thoughts and feature requests?

[New in 0.4: not locking up while downloading blocks, and much more efficient fork switching.]

New in 0.4: not locking up while downloading blocks, and much more efficient fork switching.


This new release is compatible with old blockchain data and peers, but not the stored wallet or blockchain files.

To update to 0.4:

Code:

pip install --upgrade --user pybc

If you want to keep your private key(s) from 0.2 or earlier, you can (probably) use this script to import them:

Code:

#!/usr/bin/env python2.7
"""
Script to import a Wallet to the 0.3+ format.

PyBC must be installed in a place where it can be imported.
The old wallet should be named keys.wallet.old.
The new wallet should be named keys.wallet.new.

"""

import shelve
from pybc.sqliteshelf import SQLiteShelf

old_wallet = shelve.open("keys.wallet.old")

new_wallet = SQLiteShelf("keys.wallet.new", table="wallet")

for key, value in old_wallet:
    new_wallet[key] = value
    
old_wallet.close()
new_wallet.close()

What is this?

I've been working on a Python module, PyBC, that implements a peer-to-peer distributed blockchain (as in Bitcoin or any altcoin) with easily definable rules for block validity. On top of this library, I have implemented a (very simple) altcoin: PyBC Coin. To my knowledge, this toy coin is the first altcoin not based on the Bitcoin source (if we don't count Ripple), and the only SHA-512-based altcoin.

The library is available from a couple of places:

PyPI

BitBucket

To play around with PyBC Coin, assuming you have pip and .local/bin is in your PATH, run:

Code:

pip install --user pybc

pybc_cointk blockchain.blocks keys.wallet seen.peers

You can use the GUI to get a base64 receiving address and your current balance, and send and receive (indivisible) coins. If you want to generate blocks, use the --generate option. Specify another peer to connect to with the --peer_host and --peer_port options. The default port is 8008, and can be changed with the --port option. If you specify a host name or IP with the --host option, you will announce yourself to your peers.

The toy currency is currently set to retarget every 10 blocks to a generation rate of a minute per block. The generation reward is 50 indivisible coins forever, and the transaction fee that all the miners charge by default is 1 coin. Naturally, this can all be changed around fairly easily.

Hopefully this library will eventually be useful for the rapid development and prototyping of altcoins. Make your own currency, no compiling needed! It's also intended to be useful for non-currency blockchains.

Does anyone have any design suggestions, or ideas on how to mitigate the fairly obvious opportunities for low-difficulty-block or transaction or peer flooding attacks that the library currently has?

Would anyone be kind enough to run a publicly-accessible pybc_coinserver node for larger-scale testing? If so, please post here. The UI code needs substantial revisions, but what constitutes a valid block is unlikely to change in a backwards-incompatible way, so if you think my test currency is going to be the next Bictoin you can get a head start on mining.

I'm very excited to see the first serious altcoin based on this library. Also, please send BitBucket pull requests; the whole thing is MIT licensed, and contributions are accepted under the same license.

I'm working on my own generic blockchain implementation, and I have a question about how Bitcoin ensures that everyone doesn't need to remember every fork that ever happened.

The longest chain always wins out, in the sense that that's the chain that the client looks at to see who has how many Bitcoins. But if I start getting blocks that fork off my current longest chain several blocks back, I need to keep those blocks around in case they end up forming a chain longer than the one I'm on. And there's no guarantee that I won't get half the blocks in this new longest chain today, and half tomorrow, so when I shut down my client, those blocks in the currently-shorter chain need to be saved to disk.

What stops those blocks from needing to be kept around indefinitely?

If the blocks do need to be kept around indefinitely in case their fork becomes the longest chain, what stops someone from solving a large number of blocks forking off some early, low-difficulty point in the chain, and taking up lots of disk space with all these forks?

I'm looking for a blockchain library: specify how to create transactions, how to collect transactions into blocks, and how to validate blocks, and get an instant working blockchain system to keep a distributed, proof-of-work-powered record of whatever you want. Something like BitcoinJ, but with the Bitcoin-specific parts abstracted out.

Obviously this would be really useful for making altcoins, so I figured this was the place to go hunting. Are any altcoins currently implemented on top of a generic library like this? Or are they all based on independent forks of the Satoshi client?

I'm conducting market research for a Bitcoin-funded game project. If you were to buy a game, what platform would it be for?

Does anyone know of an exchange that lets me issue an asset with no fee? Or a fee on the order of $20 instead of >1BTC? I realize many of these fees were set when BTC were not this absurdly expensive, and having a fairly substantial fee discourages scammers (or at least scammers who aren't confident in their scams) but seriously, I'm not paying $400 to an exchange so that they can make charts and run shareholder polls, which cost them roughly nil.

Asset issuer fees of exchanges that I know about:
CryptoStocks: 2BTC
BitFunder: 5BTC
MPEx: 30BTC just to sign up. I didn't look further than that.
PicoStocks: 50BTC
Havelock: I don't think they let you issue anything without a lot of discussions with them first.
EDIT: I forgot BTC-TC: 5BTC

Are there other asset exchanges I haven't found? Do any of them have low/no fees for asset issuers? Transaction fees are just fine. Do we have distributed asset exchanges/colored coins yet? Is Open Transactions where I want to be looking?

Should I just open up a forum post that says "Hey guys, give me all your BTC for my project and I'll just remember who you are"?

I wrote a game a while back: Splatform, the infinite vertical platformer. Thanks to the awesome Bitcoin Payments for WooCommerce plugin (http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/bitcoin-payments-for-woocommerce/), my game is now available for sale.

The game is in Python, and is distributed as Python source. It requires Python and Pygame to run.

Buy it here: http://sphericalsky.com/wordpress/product/splatform/

I think this sort of post is allowed.

The Ripple bot has neglected to credit me my initial allotment of XRP for like a whole hour now at least, and I'm getting bored. Does anyone want to spot me?

raMw9ktfS2dyRx9Cf75Wfrbjwrsd3yvHxy

So the United States is about to hit its debt ceiling. It has a few options:

• Raise the debt ceiling, as it has done in the past, and continue financing the deficit by taking on debt.
• Do something silly like http://www.correntewire.com/coin_seigniorage_and_irrelevance_debt_limit.
• Eliminate large social programs and/or defense spending, thus eliminating the deficit.
• Default on the debt.

What would a U.S. debt default do to the price of Bitcoin? What would it do to the value of Bitcoin (not denominated in USD)? Is the risk of a U.S. debt default already priced into the market? Or are Bitcoin traders not thinking about it?

Someone on Reddit had the idea of digging out an old VX and configuring it for Bitcoin mining. The people over there seem to think it may or may not be capable of pulling a few Ghash/s.

Has anyone tried this before? What hash rate might be expected from the different models (old VX 2s and 3s vs. the new VX 7)? Might it be more cost effective to just buy a new 7 and use that?

I think that Bitcoin trading is a great way to get into investment and day trading in general. The barriers to entry are low (have a GPU, or a friend in the know, or set up Dwolla), the market is small (so you can sometimes visibly see how your transactions affect price), and the market data is freely available from major exchanges. No 15-minute-delayed, pay-for-"Level 3" bullshit. You can see exactly what's going on in the market, and this lets you understand what things like market depth actually are before shelling out real money to access them.

On top of all that, Bitcoin is a great model market because Bitcoins themselves don't do anything. They're not going to report quarterly earnings or hire a new CEO. If the price changes, there's a relatively short list of things that could have caused it.

Thoughts? Any middle school teachers want to replace the Stock Market Game with Bitcoin trading?

How much of the current hashing power of the network could be lost overnight without compromising the usability of Bitcoin for transactions? If everyone but me left, for example, it would probably take me months to find each block, and many years to find enough blocks for the difficulty to update to a more reasonable level. In the interim, transactions would go unconfirmed for months on end.

The network would probably get by OK with half the current hash rate, with blocks coming about every 20 minutes. But would a block an hour be acceptable? It would take almost a business day for transactions to confirm.

I've seen quite a few articles around lately to the effect of "This is Bitcoin, it is going to be the future of money, I invested all my money in it, and you should too." As far as I know, the U.S. has some laws to the effect of "you can't buy something, tell everyone it's awesome in order to drive up the price, and then sell it". To what extent might individuals writing these articles, or the Bitcoin community as a whole, be guilty of this practice?

Any news on when the fancy transaction scripting features that Bitcoin is supposed to have will be coming online?

Right now miners get 50 BTC per block. Eventually, when all the Bitcoins are mined, people generating blocks will get 0 generated BTC per block. At some point, the 50 BTC per block reward will have to go down.

Does anyone know when this is scheduled to happen?

Hey All!

I just set up my shiny new Bitcoin-accepting store! I'm selling my tiny vertical platformer game, Splatform, for 0.05BTC. It comes with Python source code and awesome chiptunes, and should run on anything with Python and PyGame. After you send the payment, you should be able to download the game immediately. If you somehow exhaust the 9,999 download limit, PM me and I'll top you up.

You can buy it here:
http://sphericalsky.com/store/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=49

Hey,

Does anyone know if there is a miner available for the Arduino already? I know it probably wouldn't be cost- or power-effective to mine on an Arduino, but if nobody else has done it yet I was thinking of attempting it.

On that note, is there documentation on the mining algorithm? What do I need to do with what I get from getwork?