Poker and the shared pot at the table in a decentralised network

[Sergio_Demian_Lerner]

The patent was applied to sell the technology to some online casinos.

I would issue a unlimited license for the open source network that solves the p2p poker problem right.
But it can't be GPL because GPL has some issues regarding patents..

The MAVE protocol is unpatented (and, anyway, it's no big deal)

Sorry for the out-of-topic response.

Sergio.

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[Sergio_Demian_Lerner]

A created a new thread for the MAVE paper just published. See https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=76073.0

[HostFat]

Do you think that with current knowledge this is now possible to develop it?

[Mike Hearn]

Lately I've been exploring how to use SCIP/TinyRAM with e-Passports. The idea here is that modern passports have a chip inside them that can be read using an Android smartphone. The data is signed by your government and is thus hard to forge. You could use a modified/improved version of SCIP to create a proof that you have a valid passport that hashes to X (including a public key), thus creating for yourself an anonymous identity that is nevertheless as "bannable" as a real life identity.

It could be applied to poker like so. Your software searches out other people who want to play. They are identified only by their hashes+SCIP proofs (i.e. large opaque numbers) and a nick they chose. If there was a suspicion of cheating, you could choose to add the player to your own personal blacklist. People could share or publish their blacklists of cheaters (assuming they get caught) to make it harder for them to re-offend. People are nevertheless still anonymous.

If you wanted to, you could run games alongside a group video chat to raise the bar for cheating a bit further (i.e. people are not actually sitting next to each other, you can see their hands+keyboard), and you could pay someone independent to randomly audit peoples computers using screen-sharing software to verify they weren't communicating.

All this is a lot of work though.

[Dabs]

I'm doing a related experiment. I have a thread in the games and rounds section for a correspondence style forum based poker with 72 hour time outs.

However, it is not strictly Mental Poker, but an implementation of what I consider as Provably Fair shuffling, with me as a non-playing dealer. Someone mentioned escrow. That's also my function.

I'll try to get the link, but I'm on an iPad now. I didn't want to necro this thread but, someone did it already.

[Sergio_Demian_Lerner]

For an update on the feasibility of online p2p poker, I'm  working on QixCoin.com since half a year ago.
It solves all poker-related problems: collusion, pot, etc.
It does not require a TTP nor an escrow: it's pure P2P.
It's based on my patented (pending) mental poker protocol.

The problem with using an escrow is that, under many regulations, the escrow service is facilitation online gambling so it must have a license to do it.
So nobody would be able to (legally) provide such escrow service.

Since the protocol itself handles all money-related actions, legal responsibility relies solely on players.
And that it the reason why I had to create still another alt-coin, since Bitcoin scripting language could not support game specific verifications.

QixCoin is salable and performant (the block-chain is NOT cluttered with ZNPs). Bet payments are done off-chain instantaneously. Pots (new games) can be created in less than a minute (the block interval is as low as 30 seconds). QixCoin code is not based on Satoshi Bitcoin code (I think it's the first alt-coin built fully from another source tree).
 
If you have a specific question regarding how I solved some of these hard problems, please ask me here on in another forum, since it belongs to an alt-coin.

Best regards,
 Sergio.

[Mike Hearn]

Well, that's interesting! Looking forward to seeing what you come up with Sergio. You might get the honour of making the first alt coin that's actually technically interesting (well, NameCoin was also quite interesting I guess).

That said - a patent? Why? Do you think that's for the best?

Are you planning to implement atomic chain-trades with bitcoins to obtain your new coin?

[Sergio_Demian_Lerner]

Well, that's interesting! Looking forward to seeing what you come up with Sergio. You might get the honour of making the first alt coin that's actually technically interesting (well, NameCoin was also quite interesting I guess).

That said - a patent? Why? Do you think that's for the best?

I patented the protocol before I didn't know Bitcoin existed. I did it back in 2009, because I had to show my thesis to my director and I was developing the first commercial p2p poker security solution for online casinos (Certifiedplay), which was not ready,  but I wanted to publish my thesis anyway...

It's a pity that sooner or later patents will start bitting Bitcoin related companies, like it occurs for any other tech companies in Sillicon Valley. But that's how the business are done in the US, so you must protect your investment.. at least that's was what I was told at that time...

Are you planning to implement atomic chain-trades with bitcoins to obtain your new coin?

Yes, I'm using P2PTradeX, so I'm leveraging on the whole Bitcoin trading infrastructure for Qixcoin trading.

Best regards, Sergio.

PS: Mike: do you happen to have a block-chain blk0000.dat file from the 2009-2010 period? I want to analyze the evolution of orphan rates.

[jl2012]

If you wanted to, you could run games alongside a group video chat to raise the bar for cheating a bit further (i.e. people are not actually sitting next to each other, you can see their hands+keyboard), and you could pay someone independent to randomly audit peoples computers using screen-sharing software to verify they weren't communicating.

In this case, cheaters will tap Morse code with toes.

[Mike Hearn]

I lost my old Bitcoin 0.1 installation+wallet a long time ago, sorry. Otherwise I'd have had some nice 2009-era Bitcoins in my wallet. Oh well.

[Peter Todd]

QixCoin is salable and performant (the block-chain is NOT cluttered with ZNPs). Bet payments are done off-chain instantaneously. Pots (new games) can be created in less than a minute (the block interval is as low as 30 seconds). QixCoin code is not based on Satoshi Bitcoin code (I think it's the first alt-coin built fully from another source tree).

How will chain consensus be determined? (what proof-of-foo algorithm will be used and what are the incentives involved?)

[Sergio_Demian_Lerner]

QixCoin is salable and performant (the block-chain is NOT cluttered with ZNPs). Bet payments are done off-chain instantaneously. Pots (new games) can be created in less than a minute (the block interval is as low as 30 seconds). QixCoin code is not based on Satoshi Bitcoin code (I think it's the first alt-coin built fully from another source tree).

How will chain consensus be determined? (what proof-of-foo algorithm will be used and what are the incentives involved?)

Currently Proof-of-work, plus merged Bitcoin-mining. Possibly allowing both scrypt and SHA-2 mining, with two different dynamically adjusted difficulties. I think scrypt will dominate most 30-secs blocks, while SHA-2 merged mining will ocurr once every 10 minutes. I have many ideas regarding innovations for the block-chain, but I cannot put all the new stuff into the QixCoin since I have to step on some firm grounds! If not, I won't be able to predict how it will work... I will post about how QixCoin works shortly. Now I'm preparing my Ekoparty 2013 talk on Bitcoin.

[agent13]

Under a decentralized poker heads-up scenario, I would imagine that hands could be bound to some sort of contract or lock time. If one player leaves the hand for an extended period of time, the funds would be released to the opponent. However, peers would need to operate via Tor or I2P. Without this additional secure layer, one player could simply DDOS the other if they are heavily invested in a hand they can't win. They could then simply claim the other player left the table.

I would also be interested to know how collusion could be solved in a decentralized setup. Even the large poker sites have not completely solved the issue, and give a false sense of security to some degree.

I could live with pure P2P heads-up NL. However, latency may be an issue with the additional security layer. I love fast HU.

[cunicula]

Under a decentralized poker heads-up scenario, I would imagine that hands could be bound to some sort of contract or lock time. If one player leaves the hand for an extended period of time, the funds would be released to the opponent. However, peers would need to operate via Tor or I2P. Without this additional secure layer, one player could simply DDOS the other if they are heavily invested in a hand they can't win. They could then simply claim the other player left the table.

I would also be interested to know how collusion could be solved in a decentralized setup. Even the large poker sites have not completely solved the issue, and give a false sense of security to some degree.

I could live with pure P2P heads-up NL. However, latency may be an issue with the additional security layer. I love fast HU.

I'd guess that you solve collusion by

a) matching people to tables randomly
b) requiring people to pay an upfront, nonrefundable fee to enter a table

Then you hope that the cost of searching for your buddy's table is higher than the profits from collusion.
Hmm... I suppose you set the fee by targeting some mean number of hands before players switch tables.
If you fall short of the target, bump up the fee.

Of course, if you only have enough players for one table you are shit out of luck. Maybe you bootstrap the system with 1v1 games?

BTW Sergio, great project. Very interested to learn about the details. Is there a white paper?

[Dabs]

In my version (which is semi-centralized) I plan to offer anonymous tables. This means that you don't know who you are playing against in a table of 9 other players. You can't track them, your HUDs won't work, and you can't collude (since your buddy might be on a completely different table and he can't tell you to go there.)

But, dunno if that will work, since some people like to know who they are playing against, or they want a particular set of people they have been playing with for awhile.

And ... my thread is here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=274068.0;all

It's been a really slow game so far. I think people are just lazy to play or something. (It hasn't even started, but the deck is shuffled already and waiting for players.)

[maaku]

Sergio, I'd be interested to hear what changes to the Bitcoin scripting system were required to make it work. I'd be interested in implementing such changes in the p2p Freimarkets, assuming the patent issue could be resolved.

[sacarlson]

We already have a released open sourced P2P poker system that's fully operational and ready to play called pokerth_accounting as seen here https://github.com/sacarlson/pokerth_accounting/wiki. It's based on the fast Stellar.org system for uncentralized real asset transactions that enable real time play, and all for free.  You can also check out the demo video's https://github.com/sacarlson/pokerth_accounting/wiki/Demonstration-Videos-of-Pokerth_Accounting

[HostFat]

Another project related to this topic:

Cypherpoker
Code: https://github.com/monicanagent/cypherpoker
Blog: http://patrickbay.ca/blog/?p=650
Blog2: http://www.torontocitylife.com/2015/09/19/totally-mental-poker/
Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/cypherpoker/

[jordanovmkd]

I play poker online sometimes and most of it on Poker Stars and i notice that there are so much unlogical set up games that are not fair and confused me about how that can happend and makes me thing again about wasting my money although its fucking addictible. Your idea about decentralised network is interesting and i am with you about changing something in controling this games because it would be great step for better games and chances about the players. The truth is that we can only elaborating that here and no one will make a move about that because it is with plan and strategy predicted bussines for stealing money from fools. No one will agree with changing somenthing that can make them disfigured and unsecure, belive me.

[HostFat]

It took me a little longer than I'd expected but here is the video describing how the early CypherPoker beta can be compiled to support "private" games over the internet:
https://youtu.be/KfeI7f2PD5w
This is not an ideal approach and isn't suitable for any sort of generic "public" gaming, but it will allow you to give the software a whirl using the internet to communicate rather than LAN/WLAN (the current default).

https://www.reddit.com/r/cypherpoker/comments/3o8swq/cypherpoker_building_a_custom_version_for_private/