Ripple: A Distributed Exchange for Bitcoin

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

(with whom I'm not affiliated in any way)

Seriously ? I always thought they pay you for writing these stupid posts.

As I already said: I don't believe Opencoin (...) will issue any more XRP, you're free to suggest a formal bet (in BTC with escrow and whatnot) on that to me.

OMG.
Who cares what you believe ?

The FACT (not belief) is that they can(being centrally controlled & closed source) ISSUE AS MANY XRPs as they want AT ANY TIME they want.

uuuh.. what?
Are you serious or just trolling? honest question.

I'm serious.

Correct - you are seriously working for the scammy opencoin bastards.

[1715260059]

1715260059

[1715260059]

1715260059

[Sukrim]

Repeating what I said (both XRP and BTC can be inflated, BTC risks loosing their miners, Opencoin risks loosing their customer base, both risk loosing trust which is the only thing that keeps both currencies afloat) and re-formatting it in bold doesn't change much.

I'll just ignore the ad-hominem attacks, also if you feel that my posts are stupid or that I lie about working for Opencoin (hm, actually I could contact them if people already think I do work for them...?) you're free to press that ignore button to the left of this post, kthxbye.

Back on topic:
I wonder why there are still so few highly trusted entities for cryptocurrency IOUs in Ripple, the ones I know of are:
TradeFortress(lol!)
Bitstamp
WeExchange (who think of removing Ripple functionality for some time/indefinitely until the server runs more stable)
DividendRippler

That's more or less all I know of, which is a little bit little so to say...
Where are actually the issues besides being trusted by the community when setting up a cryptocoin IOU gateway? Do you absolutely need a server? Is it too hard to code a client for this?

Cryptocurrencies should actually be one of the easiest things to get into Ripple, as there are probably also fewer regulations around them. Why are there so few gateways then? (yes, I know that there will be a handful of "hero members" who will now post again that's clear "because it is a scam"... if you think that there are other reasons besides that, please post them too)

[nameface]

I'm not aware of any kind of transaction in Ripple (probably JoelKatz can shed more light on this) that would even allow issuing more XRP out of the blue.
Anyways, we're quite a bit offtopic here, if you want to continue to argue that XRP are worthless (or worth less...), please open another thread for discussing this.

Is a pseudo-transaction request the only way to upgrade the protocol? Can a super-majority of validators upgrade the protocol to create more XRP?

TradeFortress and co should have better invested their ad money in a usable OpenTransaction client bounty.

His money would have been better invested shooting craps.

how can XRP have any value if it's possible for anyone to run their own Ripple network ie. the software is open source?

Are you trolling?

[bluemeanie1]

how can XRP have any value if it's possible for anyone to run their own Ripple network ie. the software is open source?

Are you trolling?

LOL.  This might work on the clueless kids logged onto this forum, but it's not working on me.

[themusicgod1]

how can XRP have any value if it's possible for anyone to run their own Ripple network ie. the software is open source?

Are you trolling?

LOL.  This might work on the clueless kids logged onto this forum, but it's not working on me.

It will have value if anyone ever wants/needs to make transactions on the vanilla ripple network.  The forked xrp could be valuable, too...just like litecoin has a value.  Since xrp is meant to have minimal value anyway this is not a huge deal either way, except possibly to opencoin shareholders.

[bluemeanie1]

how can XRP have any value if it's possible for anyone to run their own Ripple network ie. the software is open source?

Are you trolling?

LOL.  This might work on the clueless kids logged onto this forum, but it's not working on me.

It will have value if anyone ever wants/needs to make transactions on the vanilla ripple network.  The forked xrp could be valuable, too...just like litecoin has a value.  Since xrp is meant to have minimal value anyway this is not a huge deal either way, except possibly to opencoin shareholders.

what are you basing these statements on?

[JoelKatz]

Couple of interesting reads on Ripple...

http://blog.phauna.org/2013/05/the-trouble-with-ripple_25.html
http://polimedia.us/trilema/2013/ripple-the-definitive-discussion/

I addressed those in the other thread where you posted them: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=142261.msg2399066#msg2399066

Imo the hype of Ripple is due to clever marketing and awarding social media sites with free xpr and for the sake of humanity I hope Opencoin and Ripple die a quick death.

I wish I had seen this before I took your other post seriously.

[mmeijeri]

The highly distilled idiocy that is often displayed here is astonishing. In all the years of fiery discussion on nasaspaceflight.com I've only ever put a single person on ignore. In the couple of weeks I've been here I've amassed over 200.

[CurbsideProphet]

The highly distilled idiocy that is often displayed here is astonishing. In all the years of fiery discussion on nasaspaceflight.com I've only ever put a single person on ignore. In the couple of weeks I've been here I've amassed over 200.

“Wait long enough and people will surprise and impress. When you're pissed off at someone and you're angry at them, you just haven't given them enough time. Just give them a little more time and they almost always will impress you.” -Randy Pausch

Zero people on my ignorelist since 2011.

[themusicgod1]

how can XRP have any value if it's possible for anyone to run their own Ripple network ie. the software is open source?

Are you trolling?

LOL.  This might work on the clueless kids logged onto this forum, but it's not working on me.

It will have value if anyone ever wants/needs to make transactions on the vanilla ripple network.  The forked xrp could be valuable, too...just like litecoin has a value.  Since xrp is meant to have minimal value anyway this is not a huge deal either way, except possibly to opencoin shareholders.

what are you basing these statements...

what part is even vaguely controversial? ?

[btcusr]

It is close competition between Bitcoin and Ripple.
I don't think any other alt-coins come  any closer to these two.
I like LTC because of it keeps ASICs away from mining.

I am holding 3 BTC, 40K XRP and 2 Testnet LTCs.
and, I am just watching the game.

[Valerian77]

It is close competition between Bitcoin and Ripple.

No it is not. There are some big differences between Bitcoin and Ripple:
 - Bitcoin does not support the concept of debt (think about it - it is a crucial point)
 - Ripple depends on peer-to-peer trust. If one participant goes mad he will pull down other ones
 - who controls the money supply in Ripple I think this is up to the inbound fiat currencies - nobody wants that

Just to have a distributed ledger on credit and debit like Ripple is not enough ...

[hivewallet]

- Ripple depends on peer-to-peer trust. If one participant goes mad he will pull down other ones

Sensing that this may be at least mildly overblown. Can someone who knows a lot about Ripple explain this scenario, with anecdotes?

[ahbritto]

- Ripple depends on peer-to-peer trust. If one participant goes mad he will pull down other ones

Sensing that this may be at least mildly overblown. Can someone who knows a lot about Ripple explain this scenario, with anecdotes?

If you've ever loaned a person money, you've engaged in peer-to-peer trust.

You should have considered a variety of factors: That they may get hit by a bus and be unable to pay you. That they in engage in risky behavior such as sky diving. That they gamble a lot. That they may have expensive health problems. That they may have a family emergency. That they have no financial sense. That they are too trusting. That they will make good on their obligations even, if other's default on them.

And, whether you will be forced to default on your obligations, if they default.

As such, everyone in the chain is a circuit breaker. Every person loaning money expects the lendee to pay them back regardless of circumstance. In particular, that they will be able to cover their debts, even if people default on them.

The solution is simple: don't loan money.

Ripple Labs does not encourage peer-to-peer loans. The gateway model is far preferable to peer-to-peer loans.

[Valerian77]

Ripple Labs does not encourage peer-to-peer loans. The gateway model is far preferable to peer-to-peer loans.

As far as I understand Ripple (I do not understand Ripple very good) this is exactly what will happen - the concept of debt can pull down whole parts of the network.

The very big advantage of Bitcoin is its simplicity - not debt (at least not as part of Bitcoin) and every payment is irreversible.

[JoelKatz]

As far as I understand Ripple (I do not understand Ripple very good) this is exactly what will happen - the concept of debt can pull down whole parts of the network.

Arthur just explained why it can't. Responsible people don't default on their obligations just because other people default on obligations to them. They act as circuit breakers.

The very big advantage of Bitcoin is its simplicity - not debt (at least not as part of Bitcoin) and every payment is irreversible.

Every payment in Ripple is irreversible as well. And if you only use the internal currency in Ripple, you have that same simplicity. You're essentially arguing that giving people choices is bad because they might make bad choices that can hurt them. If you believe that, then irreversible payments are a bad thing.

[Valerian77]

As far as I understand Ripple (I do not understand Ripple very good) this is exactly what will happen - the concept of debt can pull down whole parts of the network.

Arthur just explained why it can't. Responsible people don't default on their obligations just because other people default on obligations to them. They act as circuit breakers.

This might be a joke. I do not remember how much money I lost in this life just because people have not payed back what I gave them. And finally I must say - considering the debt system - it is OK because I decided to give that loan the money without any guaranty for payback. People are not responsible. And it is time to overcome disruptive concepts like debt.

Apart from that Ripple as far as I got Ripples concept it finally goes to the same direction as Bitcoin. When it will be connected to all payment systems with interest Ripple will be the only one without interest (not to talk about cryptocurrencies). This would simply result in XRP being the only money which preserves its value while all others will loose. This in mind Ripple has the same end state like any other cryptocurrency - just with the little difference that
1. someone must distribute the initial 1E8 XRPs - who will get them ??
2. the disruptive concept of debt is part of the system

Everything else seems to be comparative. From my point of view Ripple might be a good money exchange between cryptocurrencies if it works without XRPs. But I see a big mismatch between fiat currencies and Ripple.

[justusranvier]

At one time I was considering using Ripple as an accounting system needed to build a peer-to-peer currency exchange, but unfortunately it is wholly unsuitable for this task.

Their debt/trust model only has one type of primitive: an indefinite duration revolving credit line.

Because of this, there is no way to implement a reliable interface with meatspace.

Assume I want to recreate the classic origin-of-currency example of letting the goldsmith store my gold for me and trade with tokens, but in this case instead of paper money I want Ripple:Au.

As the client exist now everything appears to work find, but there's a fatal flaw in the system.

Assume I can find a person willing to store 1 physical ounce of gold, issue me Gold units in Ripple, and redeem those units for the physical ounce to whomever ends up with the Ripple units.

Here's the sequence of events.

I trust the goldsmith for 1 oz. (in Ripple)
I hand the goldsmith 1 ounce of gold (in meatspace)
The goldsmith transfers 1 oz. of Au to me (in Ripple)
I spend those Ripple units somewhere. (Online)
The merchant I bought from wants the physical gold.
He goes to visit the goldsmith (in meatspace)
Merchants transfers 1 oz to the goldsmith (in Ripple)
Goldsmith hands the merchant 1 oz gold (in meatspace).

So far so good, right?

Wrong.

I still trust the goldsmith for 1 oz, but he doesn't have any gold. Unless I am constantly checking my open trust lines I haven't noticed that the balance on that line has dropped to 0. The goldsmith can issue another oz. of Ripple gold units, but he has no way at all to redeem them.

In order to support exchange functionality between Ripple currencies and real-world currencies, Ripple needs the a non-revolving credit line, but it doesn't have one. Nobody is going to be able to implement a successful P2P currency exchange on Ripple, because of this infinite inflation feature.

[JoelKatz]

I trust the goldsmith for 1 oz. (in Ripple)
I hand the goldsmith 1 ounce of gold (in meatspace)
The goldsmith transfers 1 oz. of Au to me (in Ripple)
I spend those Ripple units somewhere. (Online)
The merchant I bought from wants the physical gold.
He goes to visit the goldsmith (in meatspace)
Merchants transfers 1 oz to the goldsmith (in Ripple)
Goldsmith hands the merchant 1 oz gold (in meatspace).

So far so good, right?

Wrong.

I still trust the goldsmith for 1 oz, but he doesn't have any gold. Unless I am constantly checking my open trust lines I haven't noticed that the balance on that line has dropped to 0.

No harm done, since nobody has any gold issued by the goldsmith to give you. So you trust the goldsmith for gold he doesn't have, but because he doesn't have the gold, nobody can give it to you anyway. No problem.

The goldsmith can issue another oz. of Ripple gold units, but he has no way at all to redeem them.

Of course. You agreed to trust him. He can betray that trust, in which case you lose. That's how trust works.

Unless I am constantly checking my open trust lines I haven't noticed that the balance on that line has dropped to 0. The goldsmith can issue another oz. of Ripple gold units, but he has no way at all to redeem them.

Do you trust him or not? You are trying to create some case where you both trust him and don't trust him. It has to be one or the other.

This scenario doesn't make sense in the case of using a trust line to receive a payment. And if you just want a trust line so you can receive a balance from the issuer, you can drop the trust to zero immediately -- as soon as a balance is issued.

[markm]

Still it could be a nice feature of some types of client or clients for some types of people to have the client watch such things and point them out to you.

-MarkM-