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Macho
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November 10, 2010, 11:52:51 AM |
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No that is impossible. With a separate genesis block the chains would be separate entities.
I know. But once you have enough people with enough hashing power they can just one day decide to switch to use that power to overtake another similar system as a group. Like if there was a different bitcoin-like currency right now with 100x less hashing power, you could just modify the client to compute hashes for that system 1/100 of the time it is running and you can absorb it if bitcoin users would adopt it. Easy way to knock out competition if you for example see that it is gaining popularity and could surpass ours  Of course that requires enough people willing to do that ... but once they are united under one economy with common interest (and common threats of competing currencies) it's much easier to do that than if you tried to get enough people to overtake bitcoin right now for instance. I'm not saying they would collide "by accident" lol but by conscious action of enough people from different competing crypto-currency |
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Each block is stacked on top of the previous one. Adding another block to the top makes all lower blocks more difficult to remove: there is more "weight" above each block. A transaction in a block 6 blocks deep (6 confirmations) will be very difficult to remove.
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Anonymous
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November 10, 2010, 11:55:19 AM |
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The block chain with its transaction history is unique to each cryptocurrency. You could say it is the block chain dna.
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Macho
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November 10, 2010, 11:59:03 AM |
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The block chain with its transaction history is unique to each cryptocurrency. You could say it is the block chain dna.
See the post above ... if you have cryptocurrency used by 100,000 people and another one is gaining popularity fast with 5,000 members, the 100,000 can easily knock it down if they see it as a threat and can coordinate. All it takes is a simple modification of the client they're using (so it computes hashes for the other blockchain) and enough people adopting it ... which is much easier to do if those people believe the new currency is a threat to their dominance (and therefore their money). |
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grondilu
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November 10, 2010, 12:23:57 PM |
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The block chain with its transaction history is unique to each cryptocurrency. You could say it is the block chain dna.
See the post above ... if you have cryptocurrency used by 100,000 people and another one is gaining popularity fast with 5,000 members, the 100,000 can easily knock it down if they see it as a threat and can coordinate. All it takes is a simple modification of the client they're using (so it computes hashes for the other blockchain) and enough people adopting it ... which is much easier to do if those people believe the new currency is a threat to their dominance (and therefore their money). Doesn't make much sense. Hashing power doesn't hurt a cryptocurrency. On the contrary, it enforces it. I just don't understand what you mean by "dominate" or "surpass". |
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hugolp
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November 10, 2010, 12:24:11 PM |
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The block chain with its transaction history is unique to each cryptocurrency. You could say it is the block chain dna.
See the post above ... if you have cryptocurrency used by 100,000 people and another one is gaining popularity fast with 5,000 members, the 100,000 can easily knock it down if they see it as a threat and can coordinate. All it takes is a simple modification of the client they're using (so it computes hashes for the other blockchain) and enough people adopting it ... which is much easier to do if those people believe the new currency is a threat to their dominance (and therefore their money). The thing is that doing that cost them money (electricity and the lost of oportunity to use the computer in something else). So going from network to network breaking them down is a game that they can not sustain for a long time as it would bankrupt them. I am sure they could not do that very long without a major part of the participants breaking the consensus and thus breaking the group. You are used to see this kind of abusive behaviour in present days, but it is because most corporations are protected by government regulations. Therefore they dont have to suffer strong competition. Bitcoin is a true free-market currency, a voluntary currency and is not subject to regulations, so corporations or any strong player will have a really hard time taking over and loosing a lot of money. And if it has to do it several times it will just give up. The crony capitalists realized long time ago that they need regulations, government help, to avoid competition in the market. |
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Macho
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November 10, 2010, 12:27:17 PM |
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There are all kinds of problems with it ... but it is a possibility and it is feasible. So I think hard to do but certainly not impossible ... if many people's investment is at stake they just might try to do it. If they would succeed is the million dollar question ... I guess we'll have to just wait and see.
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ShadowOfHarbringer
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November 10, 2010, 12:38:02 PM |
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There are all kinds of problems with it ... but it is a possibility and it is feasible. So I think hard to do but certainly not impossible ... if many people's investment is at stake they just might try to do it. If they would succeed is the million dollar question ... I guess we'll have to just wait and see.
Nah, i still don't think what You're saying is possible. Thousands people will not just jump from one currency to another, because the other one has more hashing power  ? No, this makes no sense. Bitcoin is popular and it has worth, because people trust satoshi, satoshi's implementation of bitcoin. Trust is not something that you can gain overnight... So many people jumping instantly from one currency to another because the other one is getting more popular or something... Nah, not possible. -- Also, i don't think You understand properly how bitcoin works, and this is the source of your hilarious ideas. |
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Macho
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November 10, 2010, 01:25:34 PM |
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No, you are misunderstanding me ... I'm not saying they would "jump the ship" and start using other cryptocurency ... that would not be a bad thing at all anyway.
I mean they could corrupt the block chain because they have the hashing power to do so. Overpowering the hashing power of honest hashers gives them the ability to tamper with block chain, doesn't it? So I'm not sure were exactly are you suggesting I could be mistaken. You could break bitcoin right now if you could get enough people to cooperate and overpower the computing power of honest nodes. The problem with that is that you are not going to convince enough people to do that, why would they do it? There is no incentive ... "let's break things" just doesn't cut it. But if you have other cryptocurrency at competition with bitcoin (or some other) and people invested in it, they have the incentive to protect it and act in tandem as a group against perceived threat aka weaker cryptocurrency.
Is it clearer what I mean? It's the same as someone belligerent having more computing power than all of the bitcoin nodes together and used it to disrupt it. Except nobody has the incentive and means to do it ... more powerful competing cryptocurrency has both. If they decide to use it, they can break weaker currencies (provided they manage to convince its user-base that it is a good idea)
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nelisky
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November 10, 2010, 01:54:43 PM |
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Corrupt the blockchain? Is that possible at all? Or you mean extend it in their own branch?
As long as we are using the default client, I don't see how that could hurt any bitcoin user (unless they exploit some bug, of course). If they use massive power and create the longer hash using the last block hard referenced in the default client and growing from there... why don't they just generate the coins to start with?
To control bitcoins, you don't just need to control the hash, you need to control the client as the rules are coded there and it is distributed in a way each client can say 'aye' or 'ney' to any block. If, however, these entities use some social engineering trick to force upon all of us the use of their client (better, cleaner, not so open sourced) and then change the rules under our noses... that's a different story.
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ShadowOfHarbringer
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November 10, 2010, 02:09:12 PM |
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No, you are misunderstanding me ... I'm not saying they would "jump the ship" and start using other cryptocurency ... that would not be a bad thing at all anyway.
I mean they could corrupt the block chain because they have the hashing power to do so. Overpowering the hashing power of honest hashers gives them the ability to tamper with block chain, doesn't it? So I'm not sure were exactly are you suggesting I could be mistaken. You could break bitcoin right now if you could get enough people to cooperate and overpower the computing power of honest nodes. The problem with that is that you are not going to convince enough people to do that, why would they do it? There is no incentive ... "let's break things" just doesn't cut it. But if you have other cryptocurrency at competition with bitcoin (or some other) and people invested in it, they have the incentive to protect it and act in tandem as a group against perceived threat aka weaker cryptocurrency.
Is it clearer what I mean? It's the same as someone belligerent having more computing power than all of the bitcoin nodes together and used it to disrupt it. Except nobody has the incentive and means to do it ... more powerful competing cryptocurrency has both. If they decide to use it, they can break weaker currencies (provided they manage to convince its user-base that it is a good idea)
I already said that if they would be working on another currency and another block chain, there is no way to use that chain to corrupt our chain. The different chains cannot mix or join or whatever. You do not understand how bitcoin works. EDIT: The only thing that can be done is to use tremendous computing power to produce > 50% blocks in the network, and make those FAKE blocks - this should allow double-spending some transactions under some circumstances. But still, that won't hurt the bitcoins You already have in Your wallet. There is actually no way for now to corrupt the whole current chain, as there are in-code checkpoints/checksums that make sure that only the official satoshi's client is used. |
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Anonymous
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November 10, 2010, 02:25:12 PM |
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No, you are misunderstanding me ... I'm not saying they would "jump the ship" and start using other cryptocurency ... that would not be a bad thing at all anyway.
I mean they could corrupt the block chain because they have the hashing power to do so. Overpowering the hashing power of honest hashers gives them the ability to tamper with block chain, doesn't it? So I'm not sure were exactly are you suggesting I could be mistaken. You could break bitcoin right now if you could get enough people to cooperate and overpower the computing power of honest nodes. The problem with that is that you are not going to convince enough people to do that, why would they do it? There is no incentive ... "let's break things" just doesn't cut it. But if you have other cryptocurrency at competition with bitcoin (or some other) and people invested in it, they have the incentive to protect it and act in tandem as a group against perceived threat aka weaker cryptocurrency.
Is it clearer what I mean? It's the same as someone belligerent having more computing power than all of the bitcoin nodes together and used it to disrupt it. Except nobody has the incentive and means to do it ... more powerful competing cryptocurrency has both. If they decide to use it, they can break weaker currencies (provided they manage to convince its user-base that it is a good idea)
I already said that if they would be working on another currency and another block chain, there is no way to use that chain to corrupt our chain. The different chains cannot mix or join or whatever. You do not understand how bitcoin works. EDIT: The only thing that can be done is to use tremendous computing power to produce > 50% blocks in the network, and make those FAKE blocks - this should allow double-spending some transactions under some circumstances. But still, that won't hurt the bitcoins You already have in Your wallet. There is actually no way for now to corrupt the whole current chain, as there are in-code checkpoints/checksums that make sure that only the official satoshi's client is used. It would be interesting to get a rough estimate of what it would cost to do that. I imagine the numbers would be so large it would boggle the mind. |
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ShadowOfHarbringer
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November 10, 2010, 02:35:13 PM |
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How do you know someone already hasn't start a new chain with a new genesis block, and are just making sure that they have the first million new coins before they take it public and advertise the shit out of it?
OK, but how does it relate to the topic ? |
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Anonymous
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November 10, 2010, 10:09:03 PM |
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How do you know someone already hasn't start a new chain with a new genesis block, and are just making sure that they have the first million new coins before they take it public and advertise the shit out of it?
So how many coins have you got so far?  If the government creates a block chain no doubt they will inflate the hell out of it. |
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SmokeTooMuch
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November 10, 2010, 10:22:23 PM |
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I'm not much of a money expert, but this guy seems like he has no idea what he's talking about. We talked alot about hoarding and why it isn't that bad for our bitcoin economy, as long as businesses see bitcoin as a (widely accepted) currency and not as a commodity. |
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Macho
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November 11, 2010, 02:40:48 AM |
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I'm not much of a money expert, but this guy seems like he has no idea what he's talking about. We talked alot about hoarding and why it isn't that bad for our bitcoin economy, as long as businesses see bitcoin as a (widely accepted) currency and not as a commodity. Yeah, the guy is clueless ... money as a medium of exchange exists exactly for the purpose of being exchanged for goods and services, that's its purpose, duh. If you hoard it that means you can not buy anything for it ... so tumblr can feel free to live in a cave with 1,000,000 bitcoins being happy that he has cool numbers on his account rather than real things like house, car, computer, food etc. If you do not plan to buy anything for it, what's the point of having it? It is clearly an oxymoron. So if you hoard it and never spend it, nobody cares ... if you do spend it, cool more liquidity into the market ... where is the danger again? |
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kiba (OP)
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November 11, 2010, 03:23:59 AM |
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I'm not much of a money expert, but this guy seems like he has no idea what he's talking about. We talked alot about hoarding and why it isn't that bad for our bitcoin economy, as long as businesses see bitcoin as a (widely accepted) currency and not as a commodity. Yeah, the guy is clueless ... money as a medium of exchange exists exactly for the purpose of being exchanged for goods and services, that's its purpose, duh. If you hoard it that means you can not buy anything for it ... so tumblr can feel free to live in a cave with 1,000,000 bitcoins being happy that he has cool numbers on his account rather than real things like house, car, computer, food etc. If you do not plan to buy anything for it, what's the point of having it? It is clearly an oxymoron. So if you hoard it and never spend it, nobody cares ... if you do spend it, cool more liquidity into the market ... where is the danger again? tumblr is a blogging platform. |
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Macho
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November 11, 2010, 03:35:57 AM |
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I'm not much of a money expert, but this guy seems like he has no idea what he's talking about. We talked alot about hoarding and why it isn't that bad for our bitcoin economy, as long as businesses see bitcoin as a (widely accepted) currency and not as a commodity. Yeah, the guy is clueless ... money as a medium of exchange exists exactly for the purpose of being exchanged for goods and services, that's its purpose, duh. If you hoard it that means you can not buy anything for it ... so tumblr can feel free to live in a cave with 1,000,000 bitcoins being happy that he has cool numbers on his account rather than real things like house, car, computer, food etc. If you do not plan to buy anything for it, what's the point of having it? It is clearly an oxymoron. So if you hoard it and never spend it, nobody cares ... if you do spend it, cool more liquidity into the market ... where is the danger again? tumblr is a blogging platform. haha ... I remembered someone posting here with some similar nick (if I'm not mistaken) so I thought it's his private blog, anyway ... he is still clueless whoever he is |
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