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Its already been leaked before lol, I pointed that out pages ago
I certainly hope its not something like: Govt X will recognize BTC as a currency. If that happens, its game over..... |
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No worries. I have some time this week, but will be out of commission next week for a work trip. I will slowly add to it as I can....but feel free to jump in when / if you can. I need this anyway for a project so will likely continue even if no one else needs Also, as a note to a mod / admin. I just realized we are in "Devel & Tech Discussion" which is probably the wrong place for this....can someone move us to "Project Devel"? Or if not I will just create a new thread there.... Nice work freetx! I'm glad to see someone coordinating an effort. My time is maxed out right now, but since you've set this all up, I might be able to contribute some coding.
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Yep, I know. Was just literally slapping the first bit of code I had up there to get this rolling. I've added a proper rpc interface now. Plan is to offer both REST and JSON-RPC to give widest possible options. RPC can be accessed via (python example): >>import jsonrpc >>s = jsonrpc.ServiceProxy(" http://localhost:8333/rpc") >>s.getAddress() "1F2dx5Bzz5yXksWgddw7bMQLgr9wfrho9L" >>s.listAddresses() ["1F2dx5Bzz5yXksWgddw7bMQLgr9wfrho9L", "13ZC6VnNV4GBNePfcTZcc4Pg52KzPgaeqr"] If it would help I can share the source of http://blockchain.info/api/json_rpc_api. It might be useful as a template to get started. However it does use blockchain.info specific database code which would need convert to BitcoinJ lookups. What is that written in? If its not too much trouble it may be interesting to see. If nothing else it will provide an easy way to maintain consistency of method names. |
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I'll submit my personal project here as a way to help kickstart this off: https://github.com/jposse/PosseWallet/This is nowhere near being ready for this bounty, but the skeleton is there. Its based on bitcoinj-0.5.2 and utilizes Jetty as an embedded Web / JSP / Servlet container. Hopefully, I can entice some other people (Nyhm, etc) into helping. As of now its only minimally functional, but does work. Short list of how to get working: (preface: you need java installed, obviously) 1. git clone https://github.com/jposse/PosseWallet.git2. cd PosseWallet/ 3. ant jar 4. cd dist/ 5. java -jar PosseWallet.jar & 6. tail -f PosseWallet.log At first it will need to download the headers, which normally takes about 15 mins or so. After the chain is downloaded (or actually anytime, since Jetty starts right away), open a web-browser and check the following: http://localhost:8333/getAddress - (will generate a new address, return in JSON format, and save in wallet). http://localhost:8333/listAddresses - (will list all addresses in JSON format) Its fairly easy and straight forward to extend this. To do so, do following: 1. Write a new servlet (look at existing getAddressServlet for idea). 2. Declare your new servlet in JettyWs like the others (ie. context.addServlet(new ServletHolder(new YourNewServlet()), "/yourNewCommand");. I will continue working on this, so please check back at github occasionally to watch for changes. I'm not super worried about the Bounty for this (sure, feel free to contribute if you think its worth something). However, more than anything I would like to entice other devs to use and contribute. I think a lightweight custom wallet webservice is something lots of people need, so instead of us all duplicating so much effort, lets pitch in to build the things we need). For my part, the bits I'm going to be adding is custom triggers. For instance, I want to be able to auto-update database tables based on transaction events that affect my wallet. So if coins come in for an address in my wallet, I want to be able to instantly update a JDBC (or NoSQL) row. This will get away from the need to constantly poll - which is how the traditional bitcoind solution must function. Regards. |
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I fully agree with your view Obsi: Open-transactions is huge and I'm too dim to fully get a handle on it all, but I like it!
It's a great way forward. We now have a distributed trusted currency (btc), but need a way to apply distributed and trusted business logic vis a via this currency.
The problem I see is the full OT vision is a little to large to tackle all at once. It spirals into so many different areas that its mind-boggling. Hence, I think the best way forward is for someone to break off a small chunk and try to make that "simple enough for Grandma". Particularly, by solving a real problem / doing something people want to do.
I think the "Smart Contract" feature may be a good place to start because of the obvious practical applications. Moreover, "signing a contract" is something that we all already know...there is a direct analogue to the physical world....whereas issuing digitally signed currencies will seem like outer-space talk to Grandma.
Want to bet $10 with your friends that the Giants are going to win the game....fire up your handy Qik Contract program you downloaded from the App Store and publish a bet against them...etc..
The beauty of this, is that it doesn't even need to involve BTC originally, so no complicated learning curve. Simply an easy, secure, distributed contract app. However, this sets things up perfectly as a gateway into BTC because compensation for a contract is the obvious next step.
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I think this is an interesting idea, however there are going to be some caveats.
One thing to note is that KYC (Know Your Client) regulations are going to mandate that you get all pertinent information on account holders (2 forms of ID, proof of residency, etc).
Anything that touches the "regulated" financial system, will also have to follow all those regulations.
This is going to limit the usefulness of this service: In other words, if a client is already in the regulated system - and he needed to send funds to Mary Sue, why wouldn't he just wire the money from his US account to her account directly? What does going via bitcoin provide?
Moreover, BVI is no longer an OECD "grey list" entity, meaning that full reporting back to the account holders home tax-base is taking place.
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You clearly have never been to Africa. People do send money with their cell phones to the guy two huts over using mpesa. You can go into almost any shop and trade cash to top off your phone or withdraw cash, even for very small amounts of money. Any shopkeeper with cash and a cell phone can provide this service and they do.
The bitcoin model would work wonderfully there. The fact that you can buy USD with bitcoins will allow a consistent basis of exchange rate and a source of trust. This could really take off considering the fees for mpesa are not cheap.
I have been to Africa. Several times. Explain in some detail how you envision this working technically? Why wouldn't you just use an online wallet - or more likely an online wallet that can be interfaced via SMS? |
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The phone could simply hold the private keys and be able to sign transactions that the server generated for it after displaying it to the user for confirmation. This would require very little resources such as CPU or bandwidth.
This is a great idea, I have family in other countries and it is so expensive to send money.
Mpesa is used by millions in everyday transactions, bitcoin could steal that market no problem with its low fees.
Bitcoin as a replacement for Western Union is an awesome idea. But more than likely this is going to spring up because there are service providers (ie. internet cafes) that start offering the community lower rates than Western Union can do. In this case Bitcoin will likely just be the transport mechanism (ie. EUR -> BTC -> THB), not that the end recipient actually desires to hold bitcoin. |
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You have no understanding of the third-world.
A funny thing about the internet is you never really know who you are talking to. I've lived in the third world for a decade, so I would say I have a fairly good understanding of what daily life looks like. Posting Intersango / Bitcoinica blog spam about what they imagine the future to be, isn't going to change the fact that, at present there is little for poor africans to spend their bitcoins on, hence no real market demand for it. I'm not here to rain on your parade, I mean are you actively working on porting the client to work on low-memory / low-cpu devices? Or are you just advocating that "someone else" do it.....because if its the later, my answer is: I'm not interested. |
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When I say poor people, I am talking about third-world, living in slums poor people. Not college student "I only eat Ramen noodles and live in a studio apartment" poor, which really isn't poor at all if people had a grip on reality.
$50 is a monthly salary for most of the world.
Anyways, liteclients can even do without headers with the right node configuration. I don't see any reason why we can't get Bitcoin into the hands of Africans who transact with Nokias as their means of living. The solutions are feasible.
You just defined bitcoin out of the equation. Someone that lives on $50 a month doesnt have enough money for bitcoin. Who is he going to pay with it? You think the goat farmer two huts down accepts it? Its cash only at those levels by necessity. You are trying to design a solution for a problem that doesn't really exist. If and when bitcoin ever gets so pervasive that its used in those types of areas, it will be down on hand-me-down $10 androids. Or more likely from the "internet cafe's" computer which runs a community wallet service for a fee....Not some bitcoin over SMS on 16k micros..... |
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Poor people don't use Android. They need what the OP is advocating. That's the whole point. Its actually a fairly ill conceived idea. Even downloading just headers for a lite client requires 20MB of download at current....how do you expect "poor people" to do that on their Nokia? This doesn't mention the CPU power needed to do the crypto stuff (will probably require 32-bit for pub-priv key) Anyway, the prices for a no-contract Android at Walmart are just $50. No doubt these prices will fall faster than engineering effort into getting pub-priv key cryptography running on a 8bit micro. |
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Then again, how many "traditional" IPOs pay out ALL net revenues in dividends? While I agree that the P/E needs to be discounted from 10 because the risks are understated, it is also fair to say that some credit is to be granted for paying out the revenues.
That's a fair point. But it calls into question what is the plan for growing the site?. I mean, the only way this deal makes sense is for share price to rise, the dividends alone are not very attractive. So, if he is *not* reinvesting money into growth, then what? Anyway, I agree with your larger point. Priced at about a 4x multiple, this deal would be very attractive. Personally I think he is doing himself a big disservice. Its a strategic mistake to sell a paltry 10% non-voting shares with such lackluster terms. If he made his first tranche of investors a good deal - something that was clear would at least hold the share price - it would set him up get his 10x multiple on the next bigger 20-30% chunks he wanted to sell. As it stands now, the next time he wants to cash out a portion he is going to be adding lots more shares to the market and people will be still underwater from the first release. Its all ass-backwards. |
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Yeah, but why tempting the fate by precomputing the winning numbers for 10 years ahead? Nevada Gaming Control Board wouldn't be impressed.
Shhh....you've just leaked his secret. The occasional "less than 1" bet placed at just the right time to suck out excess profits so he doesn't have to dividend them out. |
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It would help if you watched the original video. His concern is that the lending halves the value of the gold. My correction is that the bank has acted as a middleman so whatever else you worry about, having the value of gold halved is not one of them.
As you say, this is elemental stuff.
When the bank issues certificates that have no backing, they are in effect counterfeiting the gold. This "lowers the value of money" (ie. causes inflation) since suddenly the market thinks there is more gold available than there really is. Your characterization of banking (ie. being the middleman between savers and borrowers) is the ideal of how banking *should* be in an honest system.....but it has little relation to how banking actually works today. A bank today is not really a middleman, its simply a money printing machine that creates money upon signature obligation. Even the money that make deposits, are actually just money created from some previous loan. |
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Thanks - your Chicago quote says exactly what I told you. The $100 you deposited was not put in a special box called "freetx money" it was added to the funds of the bank. The $20 you withdrew was not taken from a box called "freetx money" it comes from the banks funds.
I never even implied that was the case. You are largely off on a tangent agruging against yourself on that. So if I go to that bank and borrow $100, I am not borrowing your money. I am entering a contract to make payments in return for access to cash that comes from the banks funds. Or as they so elegantly put it "What they do when they make loans is to accept promissory notes in exchange for credits to the borrowers’ transaction accounts..."
The funny thing is that we both already know this. I'm not sure what point you want to make.
It doesn't come from "bank funds" and that is the whole reason why Fractional Reserve banking leads to money supply creation. When you sign you name on the dotted line, that new $100 is created into existence. Its known as "balance sheet expansion" as a nice name, but in reality its just money printing. This is really elemental stuff. Maybe you should take a look at this wikipedia page as it gives a basic overview of how the money creation process works ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fractional-reserve_banking#Money_creation) |
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False question as you assume the money you have deposited is put into a drawer called "freetx cash" and then lent out again as a lump sum with your name on it. But in real life, you know that's not how banks work. The $20 you take back for lunch is just cash from the pool of funds the bank works with. Its not part of the $100 cash you deposited.
I suggest you read "Modern Money Mechanics" published by no other than the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. Pay attention to page 6: "...Banks do not really pay out loans from the money they receive as deposits. If they did this, no additional money would be created. What they do when they make loans is to accept promissory notes in exchange for credits to the borrowers’ transaction accounts. Loans (assets) and deposits (liabilities) both rise [by the same amount].” |
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Thats not how banking works. The bank acts as a middleman between the borrower and the lender and the bank's profit is the spread between the two.
If you deposit $100 into the bank and they lend it out....how come you can go withdraw $20 to buy some lunch? Because the money lent is largely 'created' on the borrowers signature. |
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You seem to have got this exactly backwards. Remember that money itself isn't intrinsicly worth anything, it's just a way of allocating resources. So someone that stuffs $1 million under the mattress for future use actually benefits the ecomomy far less than someone that goes $1 million into debt in order to start up a new business.
The problem with imposing such value judgements is that you inevitably wind up supporting the Broken Window fallacy. Moreover, its probably easily proved false without resorting to that. Simply put, that millionaire got that money in his mattress from offering some type of product / service that was *successful*. Obviously the market wanted / needed his service....whereas your potential entrepreneur who goes into debt, its pure speculation as to whether he will offer the market anything that it wants / needs. So to say its "better" for the economy to have someone borrow $1M to build the biggest ball of string vs to have someone who successfully is running an ongoing business is just plain wrong.
OK, this is where things get nasty. You talk about productivity gains, but so far they've mostly happened through decreases in the amount of labour required to manufacture items; the raw materials and capital costs have remained substantial and often even increased. This means that wages have generally decreased far faster than the costs of items have - this is a problem even without deflation. So an increasing amount of the cost of goods and services is going to a handful of very wealthy individuals that control the resources required to produce them. While we might end up with ridiculous amounts of abundance, the vast majority of the population isn't going to see it. What's more, the gains don't happen evenly: the cost of producing shiny technological items has decreased massively, but the cost of essentials like food and homes hasn't.
The other catch is that not all sectors of the economy benefit equally from this increase in productivity: in particular, for the most part service sector jobs haven't changed very much at all.
I would posit that deflationary environments favor more wealth decentralization. Consider two points: 1. The person that spends $1M to buy a widget factory that is producing widgets he can sell for $100 each. In 10 years, the deflationary pressures push down the price of his widget to $10 each.....Now he is ready to sell his factory and lets assume all things being equal he can only fetch $100K for it now. Suddenly its within the grasp of someone how had saved $100K a decade earlier, but was "too small of a fish" back then to compete -- now that person has a chance to buy this resource. Savers are rewarded. 2. Alternatively, someone spends $1M to buy a widget factors that is producing widgets for $100. Thanks to inflation, in 10 years the widgets are selling for $1000 each. He is ready to sell now and prices the factory at $10M. Without considering considering all the debt-finance scenarios, his potential buyers are now from an even more rarified wealth stratum. Namely, those that were a level "above" the factory owner a decade earlier. And if you look at the real world today, you see consolidation happens exactly like scenario #2. A business that is sold for $10M this decade is sold for $100M the next, and a $1B the next. Eventually ownership moves from local investors, to regional investment fund, to finally one of the major investment banks (JPM, Goldman, etc) that are directly connected to the money printing machine. |
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This is not entirely true.
Gresham's Law states that bad money drives out good only as long as there is a law requiring people to use the "bad" money.
Since the Bitcoin is decentralized and independent, and therefore by its very nature "lawless", it should drive out all the bad (fiat) currencies. So states Gresham's Law.
I think you reversed things mid-stream....yes, BTC is not being forced on anyone....but USD / EUR / etc *are* being forced on people (via Legal Tender laws). Therefore this is why good money (like bitcoin / gold / silver) is being driven out of the market. People will naturally choose to first spend all their 'bad money' in such situations and hoard the 'good' money. This is exactly what we see with regards to BTC. |
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