Even if BFL is insolvent, and even if the government goes after them personally, it is highly likely that they snuck mining rigs out the back door and setup personal mining farms. Assuming they didn't convert the mined Bitcoins to FIAT any time soon, it would be near impossible to trace, no?

I don't get what you are alluding to in this paragraph, as the entry to owning/mining PoW coins is not free, you have to buy coins or buy mining hardware. Someone investing a lot in an IPO is no different than someone buying a lot of Bitcoins or buying a lot of mining hardware. Someone investing a little into the IPO is no different than someone buying a small amount or Bitcoins or a small amount of mining hardware. The barriers are the same, the important part is that everyone has an equal chance. IPOs are generally announced way ahead of time and everyone has a fair chance to invest or not invest, there no barriers to entry.. none more than exist with Bitcoin. This is like complaining about early adopters to Bitcoin and I don't see how this fits into the PoW vs PoS debate. Just because someone didn't know about Bitcoin in 2011 does not make Bitcoin unfair, the same curtesy in your reasoning should be rewarded to purely PoS coins.


@ The past few posters in this thread, please read this so I don't have to type it multiple times: All PoS implementations do not function in the same ways, in some cases they function drastically different, so you cannot simply form your opinions on the Nxt or Peercoin's form of PoS. Please take the time to educate yourselves on the different variants of PoS before talking about them and spreading misconceptions.

The past few posters ITT, you including, don't understand that PoS has been improved upon recently. You are referring to the Peercoin and Nxt implementations of PoS where you must hold the coins in your wallet for a certain amount of time or a certain number of blocks before minting or forging is possible. Bitshares' Delegated proof of stake doesn't have these issues, you can spend your coins whenever you would like and still receive similar benefits as Nxt or Peercoin. Furthermore, Peercoin's PoS results in monetary inflation, whereas Bitshares' DPoS is deflationary (unlike pretty much any cryptocurrency out there, Bitcoin included.)

In delegated proof of stake that is not the case, as the amount of stake you own is proportional to the amount of voting power you have to select who will secure the network. These people are called Delegates, and are voted into and out of power by stake holders. Whereas Bitcoin prints new Bitcoins to incentivize miners to secure the network, a delegated proof of stake coin pays delegates a portion of the cryptocurrency's fees from transactions (like Bitcoin will way past our lifetimes when all 21 million Bitcoin's are mined.) Furthermore, delegated proof of stake provides more security in less amount of time than with other PoS currencies, Bitcoin included as by the time Bitcoin transactions are considered irreversible (6 confirmations), a DPoS transaction is already confirmed by 100% of the shareholders through their elected delegates.

In BitsharesX, the cryptocurrency that first implemented DPoS, there are 101 delegates who all split each block's transaction fees evenly. Each delegate then decides for themselves what percentage of their portion of the fees they will keep as payment for their services to secure the block chain, and a delegates "pay rate" can affect their campaign to get voted in as a delegate or not as some (a lot?) of voters take it into consideration. The percentage of fees that each delegate has decided they won't keep are destroyed. Every stake holder benefits from this destruction of fees equally proportional to the amount of stake they own, as no more coins will be printed other than what was conceived in the genesis block. This is why BitsharesX is one of the first truly deflationary cryptocurrencies (if not the first.)

Furthermore, it is believed within the Bitshares community that DPoS is immune to the "nothing at stake" attack that people harp on PoS for so often. Anyone feel free to prove us wrong regarding the NaS attack, as you will save me a lot of time supporting something that isn't genuinely secure.

More about DPoS: http://bitshares.org/delegated-proof-of-stake/
Even more about DPoS: http://wiki.bitshares.org/index.php/DPOS
Old discussions on DPoS: https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php?topic=4009.0
Discussions regarding "nothing at stake" attacks: https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php?topic=6584.0
More discussion about NaS attack: https://bitsharestalk.org/index.php?topic=6638.0


No cryptocurrency, FIAT currency, or any currency or commodity for that matter is distributed evenly. It is impossible to distribute ownership of currency in a fair manner, someone will always feel like they got the short end of the stick.

I found a leaked screenshot of the Monero wallet. 

I fixed ur art for you.

It seems the thread was deleted already "Invalid Thread specified. If you followed a valid link, please notify the administrator"

No worries. I ended up finding that thread. I hope it's true, BFL are crooks.

Proof?

Very good point. 

I guess I'm going to keep spouting off old adages as my arguments to save me the paragraphs it would require to explain it thoroughly. 

One man's trash is another man's treasure.

There's no such thing as a free lunch. 

I agree, and there have been many not so good or not so innovative changes to Bitcoin in recent years. However, there have also been a lot of innovative changes and improvements that improve upon Bitcoin in some way, shape, form, or fashion. If you cannot see this, then you are not doing the proper research into alternative cryptocurrencies to be able to understand this and it is the result of laziness or ignorance. The features I mentioned up thread are either improvements upon Bitcoin or added features, and I don't see how they can be spun as being a bad thing.

Furthermore, all of the things I mentioned do improve the experience of users.. They are not purely back end changes. By removing the need for trusted third parties by adding services to the block chain, it protects the cryptocurrency's users from counterparty risk from tasks they normally perform on a centralized service. Increasing block speeds and reducing the size of the Blockchain makes a Cryptocurrency more convenient for the end user. Increasing privacy protects the end user.s from nefarious people and onerous governments. These are all things that are directly felt by the end users and are improvements upon the original Bitcoin model. These new and improved features will change the way people think about money, just as Bitcoin did but in a different way.

I agree that it will take something extremely innovative and a vast improvement over Bitcoin to replace it, and I think this is unlikely to happen anytime soon. However, certain Alt coins are well on their way towards doing so, and I think if Bitcoin development remains at the same pace it is likely to happen at some point. 2014 has been a huge year for Alt coins in terms of innovation and development, before then they were pretty much all copy and paste coins. They are advancing, innovating, and developing at a fast pace, if Bitcoin doesn't do the same it could find itself behind in the arms race- too far behind to catch up.

I don't get how everything I stated doesn't affect end users in some way or another. I didn't even bring up consensus algorithms, which is mainly the only thing that wouldn't affect end users.

What you call butthurt miners are the people that make Bitcoin work as advertised and maintain the decentralization of the Bitcoin network. Lose them and Bitcoin is no longer a decentralized currency. I see them as very valuable to the ecosystem as centralization can only lead to bad things.



I agree, and certain cryptocurrencies have already emerged that do things for specific markets, such as asset issuance and decentralized exchanges eliminating third party risk. The risk by allowing other cryptocurrencies to perform these tasks is that they can perform these tasks well, along with being a better base currency than Bitcoin at the same time. I will use Bitshares as an example because it is the only Alt coin I really support at the moment.

Bitshares is a family of DACs... Distributed autonomous corporations that looks at cryptocurrencies as a business. The Bitcoin "business" is ran at a huge loss every year due to the amount of coins minted to pay for the security of the network and all the electricity burned in the process. Due to the number of coins minted to pay for the security of the network, it dilutes Bitcoin's value and requires the influx of new money to the tune of millions of dollars a year to retain its spending power. Whereas Bitshares DACs are profitable for its share holders, or in other words people that own the Cryptocurrency. It makes the Cryptocurrency model profitable by adding features that generate revenue in the form of fees which are destroyed, eliminating the wasteful use of electricity required to keep a PoW network secure, and by not printing more Cryptocurrency to pay for others to secure the Blockchain as they are also paid with a percentage of the fees that are generated by use of the Cryptocurrency. The DAC model is truly deflationary and that is how it turns its profit, as no new Cryptocurrency is ever printed and the transaction fees and fees collected by services on the block chain are destroyed. Whereas Bitcoin will be inflationary for the rest of our lives and require the influx of new money in order to maintain or grow its buying power.

The first feature of the Bitshares DAC family is BitsharesX. It has a decentralized exchange allowing the trade of market pegged assets that resemble the value of their real life values. This allows someone to store their cryptocoins without the volatility that goes along with them, and also allows them to diversify outside of cryptocoins in commodities like gold, silver, or oil. The assets and the Cryptocurrency they are backed by can all be used in the same way Bitcoin can, but with several advantages. Furthermore, these features will be shared by all Bitshares DACs, and you will be able to use bitUSD, bitGOLD, or any Bitshares asset or token as payment for features in other DACs. There are DACS planned for voting, DNS, music, and gambling. It is basically combining the Bitcoin ecosystem into the block chain and eliminating the need for trusted third parties. With Bitcoin trusted third parties are relied on to do a lot of the core services and not so core services (gambling etc), by requiring the use of trusted third parties it subjects the users of Bitcoin to unnecessary counterparty risk.

I already briefly mentioned the volatility and diversification possible, those are a couple of the biggest advantages of the BitsharesX DAC. Along with the advantages building services on top of the block chain will bring, if you ignore the new features that are built on top of DACS, the base cryptocurrency that DACS operate off of is inherently a better currency than Bitcoin. One of these advantages is that it has 10 second block times, which is much better than Bitcoin's 10 minute block times. Even with it being faster, it has been redesigned from the ground up for that 10 second block time to be more secure than 1 Bitcoin confirmation that takes 10 minutes, as one confirmation means it has been confirmed by 60% of the delegate nodes. It also forces people to use "Bitcoin's best practices" by generating a new address for every transaction using deterministic public and private keys, which greatly increases financial privacy whether someone is privy to the best financial privacy practices or not. There is also an optional alias system that allows users to register account names, so the long nonsensical addresses are never seen if someone doesn't want to. You can send the base currency or any asset to "Coinhoarder" and the network automatically generates a new spending and receiving address for both parties behind the scene.

In summary, although the features and improvements thus far may not be enough to overtake Bitcoin, it can and has certainly hurt it by taking away market share, community members, and developers. It is possible that the feature set (more DACS) and improvements to the base currency are expanded upon enough so that it could overtake Bitcoin at some point in the future. It may not be there as of today, but these projects are developing like crazy and constantly improving upon themselves. Even if it doesn't overtake Bitcoin, it still hurts it as I said by taking away market share, community, and developers. If Bitcoin sits back and does nothing, they could see their market share slowly dwindle down to the point that they are no longer the Cryptocurrency to beat. I see innovative cryptocurrencies and the DAC model as potential Bitcoin killers at some point down the road, that is unless Bitcoin gets off its ass and starts improving itself at a quicker rate and criticizing all innovations as gimmicks. And that is the reason I am here discussing these things with you guys, I want you all to wake up and smell the coffee. Projects like this are potential Bitcoin killers, it may make you feel better to call them scam coins, but they are truly revolutionary within the Cryptocurrency ecosystem and many would argue a much better solution than Bitcoin.

I understand the want to prove a transaction took place, and that is why I included multiple technologies in my statement, I am not sure why you picked Zerocoin as the only answer to improve privacy. You can prove in an audit or whatever that certain transactions took place with stealth addresses, ring signatures, and coin join implementations. You can also make them optional features.



You have a point about insecurity/scams, but I think a certain balance can be made there.. For instance along with having an alias having a SHORT string before or after it that is generated automatically and the user cannot control. This would give added security, and I think there are ways to implement it that highlight benefits and limit the negatives.

However, the use of aliases does not contradict my point for the need for more privacy, as stealth addresses, ring signatures, and coin join implementations can still be used.


Quicker block times make the Blockchain less secure... Only in the way Bitcoin has implemented it. So, although it is true the coins that just copy Bitcoin and speed up the block times... Their confirmations are less secure yes.chowever, some alt coins have completely redesigned this and have quicker block times that share the same security of a Bitcoin transaction, in some cases even more.


Bitcoin may not be at the point where it is needed, but as someone that prefers to run a full node on his desktop, I can see how this would be a huge benefit. The Bitcoin block chain takes forever to download and sync, and it will only get worse. There are alternative clients which solve this in various ways, but it should be a built in feature to the official client.

I doubt you're familiar with BitsharesX, but you should look into how they've implemented it in a trustless manner. FIAT and commodity side chains are built into the client and you can trade them on a decentralized market in the client. The FIAT and commodities are backed by the Cryptocurrency as collateral is held. The price is determined on the free market by people going short and long on assets. This is IMO one of the biggest innovations in the cryptocoin space in quite some time.


You don't understand it, but you assume it's a bad idea. Mmmmk lol. How about you educate yourself before judging an idea. Research BitSharesX.



This is assuming that we need governments to hold our hands while investing, and it cannot be done any other way. Whenever you put the government in control of anything they always find ways to screw it up . In this case through convoluted application processes, expensive paperwork and legal fees, and onerous taxes. Go see how expensive it is to start a security and get investors on your own... I guess you prefer the rich get richer and the middle class and lower class stay where they are at indefintely?


Deflation is a good thing when it comes to a store of value. The fact it can double as a checking account is just the icing on top.


I can't believe someone in Bitcoinland is promoting the use of trusted third parties. I guess you will learn your lesson one day...

I'm not sure what you mean about "make changes based on the environment."

I deleted your second comment as it was ignorant, but this is exactly my point. Old school Bitcoiners are so terribly hard to impress and think Bitcoin is fine the way it is. All innovations and improvements are considered as unnecessary or gimmicks. It is ridiculous, you guys need to learn to embrace innovation or else you could find yourselves dethroned as he king of cryptos. No matter how small or little an innovation can be any improvement is a step forward, it may not be a leap forward or a mile, but it is a step in the right direction.

I know a lot of you old school Bitcoiners feel this way, but there are a lot of people that do want these things, as is evidenced by the amounts of money Alt coin projects have raised and the current valuations of some of the alt coin projects as well. If you don't want to use a feature, then you do not have to use it.

I think this statement is laughable as if you ignore everything else, faster block times, less Blockchain bloat, and more anonymity are much needed features. If you don't think these things are truly innovative, then it is very hard to impress you and I'm afraid you might not ever be impressed by anything. So in that sense, we should just stop dating Bitcoin, right?

It makes no sense... This goes along my line of reasoning of why Bitcoin is doomed, because sadly most of the old time Bitcoin supporters think like this. The general public loves things that are quicker, easier to use, and things that have more features. Why do you think smart phones replaced regular phones, why iPod touch replaced the original iPod, and vehicles come with more features today than ever before?

I'm not an alt coin pumper, I am trying to get you guys to wake up and smell the coffee. I want Bitcoiners to put aside the ignorance and bias and realize Bitcoin is not perfect, and other cryptos are advancing in technology at a much quicker pace. A pace fast enough that Bitcoin could be supplanted. I would love nothing more if Bitcoin would want to innovate on top of Satoshi original innovation and stop being so set in your ways. In order for Bitcoin to remain competitive over the long run it will need to be innovative, improve upon its original features, and add new ones.

@Danny

You are ignorant, bias, or stupid. I am not sure which as it is impossible for me to tell. I don't say that about people until they give me reasons to believe that, as you have.

It is not my job to educate you, and I find it offensive you speak of things that you don't know anything about as.if you've done a.ton of research on the topic. Either you haven't done the research, or you are lying through your teeth.

I agree marginal or slight innovations will not be enough to overtake Bitcoin, but Aly coins as they exist are mostly making marginal innovations nonetheless. Those marginal innovations make them technically better than Bitcoin as they either fix a problem with Bitcoin or add a feature that Bitcoin doesn't have. Yet, some of these at coins are focused on improving upon the Bitcoin model in multiple innovative ways, it is these.cryptos that Bitcoin should be worried about as they are well on their way.to being revolutionary to the point they could dethrone it.

Since you are too lazy to do the research, I will outline the alt cryptocoins which have made improvements upon Bitcoin core feature set, and expanded upon the uses of block chain technology via adding adding features. I think some of the biggest innovations involve changing the way people think about money. Just as Bitcoin changed the way people think about money, some of these alternative uses for block chain technology will do the same. To be clear, I don't necessarily think these alt coins will overtake bitcoin due to its network effect and infastructure, nor do I think they are all or mostly good investments, but they are improvements upon Bitcoin nonetheless.

Crypto note coins, built in decentralized coin join implementations, stealth addresses implementations, and Zerocoin - Improve financial privacy and protect the end users from the dangers of poor financial privacy practices. Sure, Bitcoin can do some of the things I mentioned but they are not done by default and built into the client. Some people will never fully understand the dangers of poor financial privacy practices, so it is best that the protocol forces them to do it. Most Bitcoin implementations of these technologies require trusted third parties since they are not built directly into the protocol, and/or are not done automatically.

Aliases - making it easy to send and receive currency without the need for long nonsensical addresses. Again, it is possible for Bitcoin to implement this but most solutions I've seen rely on trusted third parties and.are not automatically done within the client.

Confirmation speeds - Some alts have been redesigned from the ground up to incur quicker block times faster than Bitcoin could without being completely redesigned. Some go much further than simply changing a line of code like Litecoin did.

Block chain bloat - By using ledgers and truncating the block chain after it reaches a certain size, some crypto have dramatically reduced the amount of data one would need.to download to run a full node, making it more likely people will do so.

Reducing exposure to volatility - Through the use.of decentralized assets that are market pegged to more stable currencies through a decentralized free market, allowing people to hedge against bubbles in a decentralized manner without trusted third parties and allowing the the benefits of cryptocurrency in the former of a stable currency.

The decentralized exchange of commodities which are also market pegged to the value of those commodities through a decentralized exchange without the need.of trusted.third parties

Decentralized asset exchanges which make it easy to receive funding for ideas and businesses without the regulations, taxes, and paperwork the legacy security system requires.

Truly deflationary cryptocoins - Whereas Bitcoin will be inflationary well past our entire lives, and the value of which is sustained through the inflow of new money into the ecosystem

Decentralized data storage - protecting our data and privacy better than trusted third parties can.

Decentralized programming languages - making it easier to program decentralized programs and services, lessening humanity's need to trust third parties.

A lot of things can be decentralized through the use.of block chain technologies and I'm not going to list them all.

Again, if you don't see at least some of these things as being improvements to Bitcoin or innovative, then it is because.of your own personal bias.or.stupidity. you can no longer claim ignorance now that I have lined it all out for you. I am only referencing a small portion of innovation that is happening within the alt coin space as well.

As if you know what I have invested in and not invested in.

We are discussing Bitcoin as it relates to Alt coins, so this is technically a "Bitcoin Discussion". If you don't like it, get bent.

The joke is on you.

@Danny

I can tell by the things you say that you are not very knowledgable on what is happening in the alt coin scene in terms of technical innovation and improvements to the Bitcoin protocol, as there are many cryptos that are more technically advanced and better than Bitcoin. If you were then you would be able to admit that there are better options to Bitcoin, and the network effect and infrastructure is what is propping Bitcoin up at this moment in time. It is not that I am confident in the opinion of myself, it is that I am confident your opinion is heavily laced with ignorance and bias. If your opinion is not formed on ignorance and bias, then it is formed on stupidity... I would like to believe you are a smart guy as I generally try to think the best of people. What you refer to as ALT coin FUD is exactly what you are doing in terms of Alt coins, spreading Alt coin FUD, and you seem to have no interest in educating yourself.

@danny

I guarantee you I am more of a expert on Alt coins than you are. I have spent countless hours researching them. I spend most of my time in the alt crypto subforum. You sit here repeating the same old arguments over and over, with no will to educate yourself, meanwhile remaining oblivious to what is actually happening in the real world. To you the only answer is Bitcoin, but luckily most people don't see it that way. Your huge pile of Bitcoins is affecting your ability to rationalize reality objectively. I own less than 1 Bitcoin worth of cryptocurrencies and can judge each Cryptocurrency on their own merits much more objectively than people like you.