Anyone with a lot of MH/s want to fork the TerraCoin chain?

[tacotime]

Luke-Jr. said if I asked him nicely enough he'd code us a quick 51% attack client for TerraCoin.

Anyone in?

[tacotime]

...I like how there doesn't even seem to be a sense of moral outrage about this, I guess no one has confidence in TerraCoin anyway. 

[server]

Pffffff

[Liquid]

What would happen if you took control ?

[tacotime]

What would happen if you took control ?

Whoever owns the 51% fork invalidates all the coins that were mined on the opposing fork and also invalidates all transactions that occurred on it.

It's not really like a denial of service attack, it's more like owning a 51% share in a company and thus being able to decide the fate of the chain and its contents.  I'm pretty sure that because of this it's also not illegal to fork a chain with a 51% attack because you're operating within the protocol of the system.

[Garr255]

Why would you ever kill a chain?

Bring it on, kids. *Checks eligius hashrate* Just kidding, don't bring it on.

[tacotime]

TerraCoin doesn't really change anything in the bitcoin chain except for the block rate and diff retarget rate.  I don't think it serves any useful purpose except as a pump n' dump scheme.

It doesn't matter if it gets 51%'d now or not, it'll be dead in a month due to merged mining anyway.

It's a pointless fork.

[fred0]

TerraCoin doesn't really change anything in the bitcoin chain except for the block rate and diff retarget rate.  I don't think it serves any useful purpose except as a pump n' dump scheme.

It doesn't matter if it gets 51%'d now or not, it'll be dead in a month due to merged mining anyway.

It's a pointless fork.

It's actually worse than pointless, since the addresses used start with a 1 the same as bitcoin.  This is something that the creators of the other alternate chains did not mess up!  A terracoin address is not easily identifiable as a terracoin address.

[crazy_rabbit]

It's hardly pointless, leave it alone. It doesn't hurt bitcoin and whats the point? You can fork bitcoin as much as you want- it's open source! So now ever time someone forks it you'll rush in to mess it up? What sense does that make? Bitcoin loses nothing from it, leave it alone.

[crazy_rabbit]

What would happen if you took control ?

Whoever owns the 51% fork invalidates all the coins that were mined on the opposing fork and also invalidates all transactions that occurred on it.

It's not really like a denial of service attack, it's more like owning a 51% share in a company and thus being able to decide the fate of the chain and its contents.  I'm pretty sure that because of this it's also not illegal to fork a chain with a 51% attack because you're operating within the protocol of the system.

Well it's definitely not illegal, but it's also not cool. Let people play around with it- I'm in particular having fun with it. It's not Bitcoin 2.0 it's like 'little bitcoin'.

[Revalin]

It's a pointless fork.

So let it die on its own merits.  The market will take care of it without your help.

[crazy_rabbit]

I think the Terracoin folks do read this thread, or perhaps it's coincidence, but I noticed they added a checkpoint 2 hours ago to the code so if you compile from source the chain is safe from a 51% going back in time and rewriting all that's already been done. Not that a 51% wouldn't still mess things up for us experimenting it. But at least they seem to be on top of things to some degree.

Perhaps it's wise they stay a bit incognito for now- it saves them the trolling!

[Jutarul]

TerraCoin doesn't really change anything in the bitcoin chain except for the block rate and diff retarget rate.  I don't think it serves any useful purpose except as a pump n' dump scheme.

It doesn't matter if it gets 51%'d now or not, it'll be dead in a month due to merged mining anyway.

It's a pointless fork.

As far as I can see, all other coins excluding Bitcoin are flawed even more than Bitcoin itself. Unless something much better emerges,
having "backup" Bitcoin chain is good idea.

It's not a backup if it is subject to the same risks. That's why IMHO ppcoin is the only bitcoin alternative which adds value: It experiments with a different network security model.

What I think is the greatest deal with Terracoin is that developers are unknown. I hope it'll stay that way. Devs, don't go public, ever!
Use all means neccessary to stay anonymous. Don't fall for "fame / glory" bullshits, you'll expose yourself to those you don't wanna meet.

How is anonymity beneficial? People still need to revise code changes, since they never should just trust the developer blindly...

[crazy_rabbit]

TerraCoin doesn't really change anything in the bitcoin chain except for the block rate and diff retarget rate.  I don't think it serves any useful purpose except as a pump n' dump scheme.

It doesn't matter if it gets 51%'d now or not, it'll be dead in a month due to merged mining anyway.

It's a pointless fork.

As far as I can see, all other coins excluding Bitcoin are flawed even more than Bitcoin itself. Unless something much better emerges,
having "backup" Bitcoin chain is good idea.

It's not a backup if it is subject to the same risks. That's why IMHO ppcoin is the only bitcoin alternative which adds value: It experiments with a different network security model.

All chains add value if the people who set them up educate themselves about crypto currency. Just because one set of people have already done it all and told everyone, doesn't mean there isn't educational value for others in redoing their work all over again. I'm a working fashion photographer- my whole incentive to be hanging out on the computer learning code is Cryptocurrency. Otherwise I would be out with the models. Trust me. It might seem like a horribel choice to everyone else, but I'm getting my kicks like this. So be it. That has value.

What I think is the greatest deal with Terracoin is that developers are unknown. I hope it'll stay that way. Devs, don't go public, ever!
Use all means neccessary to stay anonymous. Don't fall for "fame / glory" bullshits, you'll expose yourself to those you don't wanna meet.

How is anonymity beneficial? People still need to revise code changes, since they never should just trust the developer blindly...

But that's the wonderful thing about open source- and Github. We see all the changes whenever they are made. I just went and checked the code myself to see the Checkpoint added. They can't "sneak" something in- it's all public and you're notified when a change is made and you can check it out yourself. I'm not downloading precompiled clients, i'm building from the Git Source. Something I didn't know how to do until the end of last week when I heard about terracoin and thought "I want to be first to start mining this! But I don't trust that the GUI isn't a wallet stealing trojan" So I spend a LONG weekend learning and built it from source. My first time. :-) So yeah- pointless chain? It's got value to me. Doesn't mean I will slave over it forever or make it my personal "BITCOIN" but I can take what I learn from this to my next project: perhaps a bitcoin one.

[Jutarul]

TerraCoin doesn't really change anything in the bitcoin chain except for the block rate and diff retarget rate.  I don't think it serves any useful purpose except as a pump n' dump scheme.

It doesn't matter if it gets 51%'d now or not, it'll be dead in a month due to merged mining anyway.

It's a pointless fork.

As far as I can see, all other coins excluding Bitcoin are flawed even more than Bitcoin itself. Unless something much better emerges,
having "backup" Bitcoin chain is good idea.

It's not a backup if it is subject to the same risks. That's why IMHO ppcoin is the only bitcoin alternative which adds value: It experiments with a different network security model.

All chains add value if the people who set them up educate themselves about crypto currency. Just because one set of people have already done it all and told everyone, doesn't mean there isn't educational value for others in redoing their work all over again. I'm a working fashion photographer- my whole incentive to be hanging out on the computer learning code is Cryptocurrency. Otherwise I would be out with the models. Trust me. It might seem like a horribel choice to everyone else, but I'm getting my kicks like this. So be it. That has value.

The only point I can agree upon is that you have more people developing and revising code. But there is no need to start a separate blockchain for that. IMHO the reason why people start a separate blockchain is because of the lack of funding. Pump'n'dump is currently the only feasible way to get a return on your coding (which is minimal if you just copy the chain). Right now I don't see it justified to buy into this blockchain. There is no proof of significant development other than keeping in sync with the bitcoin code.

Now it would be a different story if they had started development a while ago and would have augmented the code base significantly.

[crazy_rabbit]

TerraCoin doesn't really change anything in the bitcoin chain except for the block rate and diff retarget rate.  I don't think it serves any useful purpose except as a pump n' dump scheme.

It doesn't matter if it gets 51%'d now or not, it'll be dead in a month due to merged mining anyway.

It's a pointless fork.

As far as I can see, all other coins excluding Bitcoin are flawed even more than Bitcoin itself. Unless something much better emerges,
having "backup" Bitcoin chain is good idea.

It's not a backup if it is subject to the same risks. That's why IMHO ppcoin is the only bitcoin alternative which adds value: It experiments with a different network security model.

All chains add value if the people who set them up educate themselves about crypto currency. Just because one set of people have already done it all and told everyone, doesn't mean there isn't educational value for others in redoing their work all over again. I'm a working fashion photographer- my whole incentive to be hanging out on the computer learning code is Cryptocurrency. Otherwise I would be out with the models. Trust me. It might seem like a horribel choice to everyone else, but I'm getting my kicks like this. So be it. That has value.

The only point I can agree upon is that you have more people developing and revising code. But there is no need to start a separate blockchain for that. IMHO the reason why people start a separate blockchain is because of the lack of funding. Pump'n'dump is currently the only feasible way to get a return on your coding (which is minimal if you just copy the chain). Right now I don't see it justified to buy into this blockchain. There is no proof of significant development other than keeping in sync with the bitcoin code.

Now it would be a different story if they had started development a while ago and would have augmented the code base significantly.

Maybe they are just tinkering around? They don't have to be doing it for outright profit no? And any of us can also go tinker with it as well. I think it hardly unlikely the bitcoin developers would pay someone like me much head, but with other codes and chains less experienced programers can feel free to experiment.

I think you could also agree though that it doesn't hurt anyone else- terracoin wasn't even announced here, we found it and hopped on. It's fair that they could be working on their own project, and we find out about it. It's not so fair if we see them building their own club house and we just go burn it down. :-(

[DiCE1904]

I only have 3Gh but im down. Hit me up in IRC

[Liquid]

Why would anyone destroy an alt coin it seems stupid to me, leave it simulate itself i want to see how this plays out without manipulation  

Nobody should have the power or control over any coin that's what Bitcoin is all about no control and full decentralization

[crazy_rabbit]

I only have 3Gh but im down. Hit me up in IRC

Current difficulty is 2373 which means network hashing is at ~85 Ghash. You better join the train, else you'll be overrun big time. 

I'm definitely already over-run!

[cunicula]

Why would anyone destroy an alt coin it seems stupid to me, leave it simulate itself i want to see how this plays out without manipulation  

Nobody should have the power or control over any coin that's what Bitcoin is all about no control and full decentralization

I don't agree. Anything that can be cheaply destroyed should be destroyed. If no one tries to lay waste to these chains, there will be no empirical evidence of security differences across chains.