[ANN] SpreadCoin | Decentralize Everything (decentralized blockexplorer coming)

[georgem]

I've been reading through georgem's long list of posts these past weeks,
and I agree very much with his philosophy.

That's pretty flattering, thanks for reading through all my posts, lol.

But I warn you, if you find one or more weird posts (especially from the early days) don't complain.

[coins101]

For future reference if Georgem is not in the forum for a while, everyone can begin espousing ideas that lead to centralization. He will magically appear. It's like rubbing a genie's lamp.

At what point do I consider this a "denial of service" attempt on my available time?  

I'm kidding, I will never get tired of teaching you guys a little bit about decentralization.

Now back to work.  

BTW I'm in the BCT forum all the time, but 99% of the time it's because I'm looking up technical bitcoin stuff.

In the interest of bumping the thread and having a bit of discussion, I thought I would ask more about decentralization and how it is best achieved.  

Georgem and others seem to put a heavy emphasis on the miners, as in POW they are bringing the hash power and thus the decision making capabilities.  However, my question is why do you think POW is better for decentralization than POS?  

Decentralization as I understand it has nothing to do with democracy or fairness, but rather accessibility.  Would it not seem that POS is far more accessible, requiring nothing more than a standard laptop or raspberry pi to operate the wallet?  Compared with the expenses of mining equipment the general level of decentralization seems higher (as more people have the capability of accessing and influencing a POS coin).  

However, even taking into consideration the fairness of POS v. POW I do not see demonstrable benefits to POW.  POW is highly wasteful (estimated that by 2020 Bitcoin mining will use as much energy as the country of Denmark) and both POW and POS require initial fiat investments that are proportionally linked to the relative influence you might wield.  The difference seems to be the massive amount of waste POW necessitates.

I have heard various arguments against POS (mostly regarding the potential security issue of a 51% attack, which seems unlikely based on the motivations of anyone holding that many coins) but I would love to hear what the community has to say about POS and the relative merits and demerits?  Right now I see POW as an antiquated protocol that will eventually need to be modified to compete with less wasteful alternatives.

PoS v PoW

Both have good and bad points.

Spreadx11 solves the centralisation problem which, other than wasting electricity, is the main disadvantage of PoW. But wasting electricity is the core security feature of PoW, but only when the level of mining reaches an escape velocity, ie. it would cost someone too much money to attempt an attack. There are very few coins that have reached this escape velocity, Bitcoin being one of them.

If you want a detailed overview of PoS v. PoW:

* Ethereum has a good overview as it is migrating from PoW to PoS https://blog.ethereum.org/2014/11/25/proof-stake-learned-love-weak-subjectivity/

* Cointelegraph on why a new algo is needed https://cointelegraph.com/news/the-inevitable-failure-of-proof-of-stake-blockchains-and-why-a-new-algorithm-is-needed

* Others like Charlie Lee trying to solve this issue https://eprint.iacr.org/2014/452.pdf

The issue with focusing on PoS or PoW is that most people don't really care. You may believe that solving this issue is going to change your world, but it won't. If you get something working, Bitcoin will use it.

Look at x11. When it was launched, it was copied to death. It didn't really add anything to Darkcoin.
Look at Spreadx11. When it was launched, it was seen as innovative, but the price of SPR tanked to $15k.

Miners simply want to earn some steady money and make some profits, but ultimately they are like a lothario, always looking to move on to the next conquest.

For all its internet money promises, Bitcoin is now having an identity crisis in that it can't compete with free services like PayPal. The argument about developing a fee market to pay miners is crippling progress. If it turns to PoS, the value of each coin means it becomes an easy target, Bitcoin value goes to zero.

The one area that is of interest is creating a requirement for miners to also be linked to ServiceNodes - the collateral to mine idea.

Solving the nothing at stake problem for PoS, gets you back to square one: why should anyone bother with xyz coin?

End user features and benefits. That's what people want.

But even more than that, it's all about profit. You can engage with thousands of people if you can show them a way to make some profits. As shown in the Spread PoBN whitepaper, it doesn't actually have to be a big profit, either. People are quite happy to spend hours on end to make small profits, if there is something else that engages them about a project, like supporting the decentralisation of Bitcoin, or xyz coin.

It is a worthwhile goal to try to solve the PoS vs. PoW or even PoS & PoW problem, but it might not lead to any meaningful profits, if that's the problem your ultimately trying to solve.

[georgem]

Decentralization as I understand it has nothing to do with democracy or fairness, but rather accessibility.

Agreed, I'm not a big fan of democracy, since it's the "original 51% attack". Or mob rule as some like to call it.

Would it not seem that POS is far more accessible, requiring nothing more than a standard laptop or raspberry pi to operate the wallet?

Well, that's what you need to prove. Scientifically.
You need to show that POS will be in every case a better solution than POW.
Buzzwords and assumptions are not doing that.
Yes, I'm aware that a raspberry pi requires less energy than a 2kW ASIC, but that is irrelevant.

What is relevant is whether we achieve true distributed consensus or not.

If this can only be done in an energy intensive way, then so be it.

If you want a detailed overview of PoS v. PoW:

* Ethereum has a good overview as it is migrating from PoW to PoS https://blog.ethereum.org/2014/11/25/proof-stake-learned-love-weak-subjectivity/

* Cointelegraph on why a new algo is needed https://cointelegraph.com/news/the-inevitable-failure-of-proof-of-stake-blockchains-and-why-a-new-algorithm-is-needed

* Others like Charlie Lee trying to solve this issue https://eprint.iacr.org/2014/452.pdf

The problem with all the links you posted (if I may say so) is that all of them have already made up their mind that POW is bad, and that it needs to be replaced with their new favorite: POS.

I find this rather suspicious and unscientific, this certainly won't convince me.

I need a paper where someone unapologetically and mercilessly wants to falsify whether POS or POW is better, without prefering POS from the getgo.
The premise can't be "POS is the solution - don't you see that it requires barely any energy??? - let's find justifications/rationalizations why POS will replace POW",
but rather "let's compare POS and POW and figure out what they actually do regarding distributed consensus".

I think this paper here tries to do that:

https://download.wpsoftware.net/bitcoin/pos.pdf

And here's the reddit discussion about this paper: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/2jwbvr/excellent_paper_on_why_proof_of_stake_is/

If POS is really this super solution then we need to scrutinize it mercilessly. Not cuddle with it.

If POS still stands after such a beating, then you convince me.

[georgem]

We are talking about distributed consensus, that's our holy grail.
POW and POS are examples of how distributed consensus is (pretended to be) achieved.
We have to show which one does a better, more stable and more flawless job in achieving this goal.

The conclusion of the paper I linked:

We showed that by depending only on resources within the system,
proof of stake cannot be used to form a distributed consensus,
since it depends on the very history it is trying to form to enforce loss of value.

Contrast that to the essence of bitcoin's breakthrough achievement (distributed consensus):

It can be mathematically proven that given only a synchronous network it is impossible to achieve distributed consensus in a cryptographically guaranteed way. Bitcoin achieves the impossible by weakening its requirement from cryptographic guarantee to a mere economic one. That is, it introduces an opportunity cost from outside of the system (expenditure on computing time and energy) and provides rewards within the system, but only if consensus on an unbroken transaction history is maintained

I guess that's what I love about POW... that it adds true real world economic incentives to the game.

If POS wants to get rid of this capitalist/economic/meritocratic part of bitcoin, it better damn well make sure that it replaces it with something equally as good or better.

Which I highly doubt exists.  

I don't think that "everybody ogling the stakes of everybody else" can even be considered an economic incentive. What is this anyway... "money creation through book keeping"?  

Therefor:

[coins101]

This looks like a great decentralised exchange:

https://vimeo.com/131086362

If you remove the fiat gateways, this could be epic running off ServiceNodes.

[rhinomonkey]

But I warn you, if you find one or more weird posts (especially from the early days) don't complain.

You got me curious...

lol. I hope this is just scratching the surface so that I have more gems to look forward to.

Darkcoin rises!


I could create gifs like that all day!  

On a more serious note and in regards to the whole protocol discussion, would Spreadcoin be up for a change if there was evidence that another protocol was verifiably better than POW in terms of decentralization (and retained integrity in terms of distributed consensus?)

[georgem]

 

GIFs can't get any better than that!

I would pay good SPR if someone would create similar sexy GIFs for spreadcoin.

I don't have time to create them myself anymore obviously, but I will pay atleast 100 SPR for every GIF created.

Only requirement: it must be high quality, both in animation and choice of model.

I reserve the right to pay less or NOT AT ALL if quality sucks.

Anyone interested?  



You can post GIFs here:

http://spreadcointalk.org/index.php?topic=76.0

lol, this thread was created when the original mr. spread was still around.
How time flies by!

[coins101]

It's coming to life



Still need to see them details of the Spreadwallet

As I already earn some revenues from the provision of cloud hosting to Enterprise customers, I know that these types of organsiations are moving to managed cloud services.

But the key thing is this: They are prepared to pay between $100 to $300 per user per month. This depends on the level of service, additional features, etc.

So, the opportunity for DSDN and service nodes is the potential to charge the cost of hosting, plus a significant premium to manage full nodes for others and provide an encrypted link between SPV and a deployed peer.

For Bitcoin, this means the blockchain can grow and grow knowing that full nodes would actually increase and that there is a mechanism to keep the network decentralised by running them through a decentralised network of ServiceNodes vs a small number of big server farms operated by a small number of organisations.

Managed services also means that there will be an optimal number of full Bitcoin (or any coin) node, running on the optimal bandwidth and hardware. As miners relay their blocks, DSDN nodes will help speed the propagation of blocks around the world.

Or, as Satoshi put it:

The current system where every user is a network node is not the intended configuration for large scale.  That would be like every Usenet user runs their own NNTP server.  The design supports letting users just be users.  The more burden it is to run a node, the fewer nodes there will be.  Those few nodes will be big server farms.  The rest will be client nodes that only do transactions and don't generate.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=532.msg6306#msg6306

Ladies and gentlemen, the DSDN whitepaper is done.

Full Bitcoin or any node managed by ServiceNodes, with SPV to Full node encryption, for a fee.

I thank you.

[rhinomonkey]

Ladies and gentlemen, the DSDN whitepaper is done.

Full Bitcoin or any node managed by ServiceNodes, with SPV to Full node encryption, for a fee.

I thank you.

This is it? Only one sentence?

Can we see the whole thing yet?  

[rhinomonkey]

I don't have time to create them myself anymore obviously, but I will pay atleast 100 SPR for every GIF created.

Only requirement: it must be high quality, both in animation and choice of model.

I reserve the right to pay less or NOT AT ALL if quality sucks.

You can post GIFs here:

http://spreadcointalk.org/index.php?topic=76.0

So everyone knows: Georgem just put up a bounty for sexy GIFs. I hope we have some genius GIF makers here! I can't wait.

[georgem]

Hey everyone,

do you know a free screen recorder software for macs?

I found a good free screen recorder for linux (RecordMyDesktop),
and I have a camtasia license for windows.

But I need something similar for mac, if possible for free.

Any recommendations?

[rhinomonkey]

Hey everyone,

does anyone know a free screen recorder software for macs?

I found a good free ond for linux that I'm using,
and I have a camtasia license for windows.

But I need something similar for mac, if possible for free.

Any recommendations?

Screencastomatic. I've used it before for some of my projects. I believe that's how it's spelled.

http://screencast-o-matic.com/home

Edit: sorry was on my mobile took a while to get the link 

[georgem]

Hey everyone,

does anyone know a free screen recorder software for macs?

I found a good free ond for linux that I'm using,
and I have a camtasia license for windows.

But I need something similar for mac, if possible for free.

Any recommendations?

Screencastomatic. I've used it before for some of my projects. I believe that's how it's spelled.

Ok, great, I'll take a look at it. http://screencast-o-matic.com/home

[just2laff]

georgem,

  What is your SPR address?   I have signatures and all of that sh*t turned off for the forum.  Id like to send you a few SPR,  Typing on a chilet laptop, so pleases forgive the misspellings

William

[georgem]

georgem,

  What is your SPR address?   I have signatures and all of that sh*t turned off for the forum.  Id like to send you a few SPR,  Typing on a chilet laptop, so pleases forgive the misspellings

William

Hey just2laff where have you been, I missed you. 

If you like to donate SPR please use this address:

ShutUpHxbuLdy22g9NE4afviUr2Cnqd68H

I'm now really close with releasing regular updates.
Much of the groundwork has been done.
Stay tuned and thanks again for your donations.

[sirazimuth]

The 30 minute chart is showing:

Darkcoin rises!


I could create gifs like that all day!  

...my fav thread image compilation..."spreads triple bottom"...

[AnotherNode]

Hey everyone,

does anyone know a free screen recorder software for macs?

I found a good free ond for linux that I'm using,
and I have a camtasia license for windows.

But I need something similar for mac, if possible for free.

Any recommendations?

Screencastomatic. I've used it before for some of my projects. I believe that's how it's spelled.

Ok, great, I'll take a look at it. http://screencast-o-matic.com/home

Very much looking forward to seeing the podcast.

The Bitcoin blockchain is going to grow with or without SegWit and so there is a huge amount of potential for Spreadcoin supporting BTC.  The current price really does not justify or reflect the potential that can be unlocked.

[liquidfunds]

Is there any team to develop this coin?

[sugarfly]

Is there any team to develop this coin?

georgem is currently working on this:

Everybody, thanks for waiting,
sorry, but there was a lot to digest first, and I'm far from finished...  

But lets dive in.

So here are some of the news about the new upcoming wallet, called Spreadwallet that will introduce a few changes.
I will have to split the info over a few posts, so consider this a first preview of what to expect.

I will give a short overview of the function and explain in the next post why I think it's a good idea to advance the wallet this way.

First of all, the spreadwallet is now a multicoin multiwallet that can operate in SPV and Fullnode mode.  

In short, what you'll get is:

- decentralized UTXO blockexplorer that works with the nodes you host locally (on your main computer or spread over your local network)
- multihost capabilities that allow you to run multiple nodes in your local network, remote controlling them with your spreadwallet.
- easy setup and control through SSH of all the raspberry pis in your local network.
- multiwallet support for many coins, immediate use of all those coins in SPV mode.
- support for many different styles of wallets (deterministic, non-deterministic, TREZOR and paperwallets)
- update of the spreadcoin daemon to newest bitcoin core codebase

In more detail:



You can see the main sections in this screen.

We have an explorer, based on the blockexplorer I've been working on for a while now.
It uses my own database engine called spreadDB for fast access to UTXO datastructures.
The explorer only works with full nodes you operate in your local network, be it on the same machine as your wallet, or e.g. a raspberry pi in your local network.

Above that we have a reserved section that will show all the wallets that you load/create,
and in the top right corner we have the section where all the nodes will be listed that the wallet is currently operating and connected to.
(Those can be Fullnodes or representations of SPV-Connections the wallet has with certain coins)

Once you "register" and "setup" a full node (or SPV-Connection) with the spreadwallet the explorer will start "exploring" the blockchain data and build the database that will allow you to quickly search for addresses, hashes, etc..
You will have to wait for the sync process to finish before the explorer can kick in. Although I am working on a mode where the explorer builds its database even while the blockchain is synching.
The explorer doesn't work with data it gets only through SPV-Connections.



BTW as you see in the top right corner the Nodes always inform you about how many connections they have and what percentage they are synched and explored.
Basically what was at the bottom of the old wallet (the statusbar) has now disappeared and all info about Nodes will be visualized directly in the respective Node-Box.
The "SPV nodes" look a little different than the Full Nodes to make them easily distinguishable.



When it's finished, the "Chains" sidebar menu will give you general information of all the chains/coins you are connected to.
This will list a few coin parameters a difficulty graph and a hashrate graph. Similar to what the old wallet shows in the overview screen of the mining menu.
This chain-list will include SPV connections, since all this data can be derived from header data alone, so that's good!

So how exactly will you add Nodes?



Remember that Genesis-Extractor experiment we started some time ago?
Here's the link to refresh your memory: http://spreadcointalk.org/index.php?board=21.0

We will continue to build on this information to provide useable data for the spreadwallet, so that we have all the necessary information to handle multiple coins.
I will start with a list of a few coins that I will personally test, we can then continue from there and add coins as the community sees fit.
But generally speaking ... you can customize this list anyway you want since it will be comprised of external files that are human readable.

Furthermore, some coins will not work with the wallet rightaway, so we will have to find different solutions later.
For example, AFAIK etherium doesn't use UTXO format, so it can't be scanned by the current version of the blockexplorer.
But coins that are very similar to spreadcoin will work rightaway.

So based on this external coinlist the Spreadwallet will present to you a few coins that you can activate/deactivate.
The three states of "coin connection" (or "Node state" if you will) are

Off
SPV
Full

Once a node is in SPV mode, you can basically use it rightaway. The Spreadwallet does everything automatically. It's like a multi-headed SPV-Monster.

If you put a node in Full mode, you will need to set it up first. (More about it later in more detail). This means you have to download the official daemon from the coins site and tell spreadwallet where you installed it, etc...

Now, there are 2 cool things about the way you can run full nodes here:

1) you can quickly setup raspberry pi's that will act as 24/7 full nodes that communicate with the spreadwallet over SSH. Everything is done through the wallet.
(Just to emphasize: I'm currently running my spreadwallet with only a raspberry pi as main full spreadcoin node.   And, as you would expect, the raspberry node keeps on running 24/7, even if I shut down my main computer!   )

2) you can quickly switch between Full and SPV mode depending on your needs. (ever waited for a full bitcoin node to synch to make a quick payment? Well, you can choose to temporarily switch to a SPV connection for BTC and afterwards switch back)

You will be able to scan your local network and figure out which computers and raspberries are available, and what IP they have, etc...
There are still many things missing here, I will inform you about progress.

I'm currently using a few Raspberry Pi 3, but am also exploring if it would be possible to use earlier versions of Raspberry Pi to do "some kind" of other non-node work. I do have a few ideas....



Next screen:



The spreadwallet does not contain a full node in its code, instead you will connect with a spreadcoin deamon that will be included in the package.
I repeat: Spreadwallet and spreadcoin daemon/CLI (based on newest bitcoin CORE) are now two different repositories.

Ok, continuing: The spreadwallet will be centered around ... well.... WALLETS! what else.

The details here are pretty extensive and there are lots of things I am still fleshing out, so I will have to inform you over the next days how the internals of the multi-wallet behaviour will look like and operate.

Here's another screen, with multiple coins simultaneously



BTW, it's entirely possible to run the wallet offline, just to create wallets (especially paperwallets) in a more secure fashion.
And vice versa, you can run Spreadwallet without having any wallet imported, just hosting a few full nodes to operate the blockexplorer.
Fully customizable.

You can even run spreadwallet completely without spreadcoin if you want!  

I don't care, the user decides! But that's how you create standards everyone likes to use.

So, to sum it up, this is the progress about the first of the three main things that keep me occupied right now:

1) Spreadwallet
2) Spreadminer (more info soon)
3) Servicenodes (more info about P2P and overlay research soon)

[coins101]

Running full nodes seems to be the focal point of the scaling issue.

https://letstalkbitcoin.com/blog/post/lets-talk-bitcoin-315-biting-through