[DVC]DevCoin - Official Thread - Moderated

[Dinkleberg]

I got a reply from Stephen Rowlison from Diamond Circle regarding Devcoin ATM's:

Hi Roy,
 
Diamond Circle would be interested in supporting Devcoin on our ATM and Merchant POS network.
 
Kind regards,
 
Stephen Rowlison
CTO/Founder
Diamond Circle Pty Ltd
5B/2994 Logan Road
UNDERWOOD Q 4119
AUSTRALIA GMT+10
Mobile: +61 (0) 400 82 66 69
Direct: +61 (0)7 31075693
http://www.diamondcircle.net
Media: http://goo.gl/oWWzJj

[hypersire]

Lots of great developments going on here!

I'm just finishing up the new Devcoin web site - it will be ready to launch today! I am really excited as I think it looks amazing and I've gotten great feedback so far. Can't wait to show everyone!

[emfox]

I think we should try to get DVC on BTC38.com, a chinese altcoin exchange.  I hear there is a fee they require for adding a new coin to their exchange, either we could all chip in to pay it or use bounty funds.  Also we need someone to contact them in Chinese explaining the merits of DVC and finding out how much the fee is.

If the fee is small under 5 bitcoins, we'll definitely go for it, over that we'll see. Someone, please find out what the fee is. Whoever does will get four shares.

Edit: Actually, before I promise that we'll pay a high fee, I'd like to see the volume of their altcoins compared to other exchanges like btc-e.

As a native Chinese speaker, I've contacted admin and support of both btc38.com and bter.com (another big altcoin exchange in China) via QQ, they're still not responding yet. I'll post here with any progress.

Since last time, bter has replied that they woundn't add any coins recently, and btc38 just ignored my request.

[smeagol]

Is this bounty still open?

http://www.devtome.com/doku.php?id=devcoin_bounty_now#devcoin_usd_chart

The dvc/usd chart.

I've coded up a webserver that gets the averages from a few different places, but I couldn't find a long term history of DVC.

The chart is here: http://dvcusdchart.blisteringdevelopers.com

It's filling up with data as I just reset it after testing, and it'll log and show data indefinitely. If people want more options etc, say what you like and I'll code it in. I'll make a few more tweaks to make it clearer what's what, but it's up and running now in any case.

EDIT: Obviously it looks a bit silly now but that's because data's just started collecting...it should fill out soon enough

I have a database of prices if you need it.  It goes back for about only a couple of weeks though

[Papacrusher]

How hard would it be for a person to contribute as a writer with no programming skills?  Also, how long before other areas of the arts are supported, such as visual artists or photographers?

[giftculturewriting]

How hard would it be for a person to contribute as a writer with no programming skills?  Also, how long before other areas of the arts are supported, such as visual artists or photographers?

My only programming skills have sat on the shelf since high school. All you need is a basic literacy in web browsers, and to learn a little bit of wiki markup to make your articles look nice (which is pretty simple, and there are cheat sheets).

http://devtome.com/doku.php?id=wiki:syntax&s[]=syntax
http://devtome.com/doku.php?id=devtome_advanced_syntax&s[]=syntax

While the nitty gritty backstage parts of how devtome works are more immediately comprehensible to people with various programming skills, actually contributing as a writer in no way requires that level of understanding.

I think visual and art and photography face a couple of challenges before being integrated into Devtome: One devtome is still organizing and supporting itself, though apparently its been very consistent in payouts despite that. Also, someone needs to come up with a way to measure the reward for submitting that kind of material. With words it's pretty simple. 1000 words = 1 share, with slight fluctuating by pageviews and an admin review.

[giftculturewriting]

Giftculturewriting, I sent you 23 devcoins so you can see if Shakezula's version works completely, please post or message me when you receive them. You get one share for your post:

Got them. I also sent some to the address listed on the dvc countdown, and that seemed to go through fine. So did the faucet, for that matter, so I'm not sure how it correlates to the round ending, unless 'round' is being used differently in that context.

[Papacrusher]

How hard would it be for a person to contribute as a writer with no programming skills?  Also, how long before other areas of the arts are supported, such as visual artists or photographers?

My only programming skills have sat on the shelf since high school. All you need is a basic literacy in web browsers, and to learn a little bit of wiki markup to make your articles look nice (which is pretty simple, and there are cheat sheets).

http://devtome.com/doku.php?id=wiki:syntax&s[]=syntax
http://devtome.com/doku.php?id=devtome_advanced_syntax&s[]=syntax

While the nitty gritty backstage parts of how devtome works are more immediately comprehensible to people with various programming skills, actually contributing as a writer in no way requires that level of understanding.

I think visual and art and photography face a couple of challenges before being integrated into Devtome: One devtome is still organizing and supporting itself, though apparently its been very consistent in payouts despite that. Also, someone needs to come up with a way to measure the reward for submitting that kind of material. With words it's pretty simple. 1000 words = 1 share, with slight fluctuating by pageviews and an admin review.

Thank you so much for your reply.  It helped ease some of my fears.  I previously read some of the instructions on devtome and panicked when I saw the brackets/formatting and such. 

[giftculturewriting]

Lots of great developments going on here!

I'm just finishing up the new Devcoin web site - it will be ready to launch today! I am really excited as I think it looks amazing and I've gotten great feedback so far. Can't wait to show everyone!

I'm curious, how have you/are you going to port all the articles/organization over?

[giftculturewriting]

Thank you so much for your reply.  It helped ease some of my fears.  I previously read some of the instructions on devtome and panicked when I saw the brackets/formatting and such. 

Glad it helped. It can be a little intimidating at first, but is pretty simple once you just sit down with it.

[eeh]

This month there are 3 writers earning 46% of all devtome earnings (of ~30 writers). One of them is 120 shares! If your rating method is going to bound between <1 and >1 doesn't the max round share need to be cut. Not just because of the absolute number and absolute equivalent fiat but because the larger shares also serve to undermine all others.

1. Yes, that is me. 120 shares. Does it reduce anyone else's shares when I max out that round?

They still receive the same amount, correct? So what is the *purpose* in limiting the number of shares in a round? Last month I had zero shares. It's very, very difficult to produce that much material consistently. Someone was kind enough recently to point out one project that I had neglected to fine tune. And now I'm about 8000 words in and loving it. No hard feelings, just a better project when I finally finish it.

2. Does that mean that shares are going to be excess every round or are 180m still distributed monthly?

If so, will we be expanding then number of bounties for visibility and refinement of Devtome and DVC in general?

3. The addition of ratings, categorization and page views has made me relook some of my contributions. I've been forced to clean up even what I thought was my most well prepared material.

So what is the point of reducing it? Just so someone like myself or Raptorak can't max it out at the high end? I don't see the purpose.

Which is what markm asked in his post: Markm: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=233997.msg3782966#msg3782966. What's the purpose? He didn't say he approved of the change, just that he wasn't necessarily opposed, but his question is a good one: What's the point?

[hypersire]

Hi all, I am happy to report that I have finished the devcoin.org site redesign:

http://devcoin.org/

Thanks to Weisoq for his wiki page and whoever created the Devcoin press release that went out a couple of weeks ago - really saved me a lot of time compiling the content.

Let me know what you guys think - I will be sticking around as the new Devcoin web guy so I can certainly make edits and additions going forward.

[matt608]

This month there are 3 writers earning 46% of all devtome earnings (of ~30 writers). One of them is 120 shares! If your rating method is going to bound between <1 and >1 doesn't the max round share need to be cut. Not just because of the absolute number and absolute equivalent fiat but because the larger shares also serve to undermine all others.

So what is the point of reducing it? Just so someone like myself or Raptorak can't max it out? I don't see the purpose.

Which is what markm asked in his post: Markm: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=233997.msg3782966#msg3782966. What's the purpose? He didn't say he approved of the change, just that he wasn't necessarily opposed, but his question is a good one: What's the point?

I'm thinking the same thing.  A better way to spread the shares out would be to have more active writers join Devtome so compete for the shares, rather than limiting the payout. 

[eeh]

I'm thinking the same thing.  A better way to spread the shares out would be to have more active writers join Devtome so compete for the shares, rather than limiting the payout. 

I'm a writer and a researcher. Professionally and as a hobby. Devtome remains enticing because I see the direct fruits of my labor within a month. But I've been writing for almost 20 years. Of course I'm going to have times where I max out the earnings. I think I've done it twice this year so far.

1. The material is peered review (ratings, other writers challenging content, categories, views, etc.).
2. I can't just spin an existing article to receive credit.
3. Devtome forces me to be creative in my contributions.

And although I have held back some original material since it's earning royalties elsewhere, I've been very pleased to release some of my successful content here, just to be open source and support this effort. It's not about greed or maxing out the monthly round. I think the more attractive Devtome is to hardcore writers, the more attention it will draw, the more it will grow and the more word is spread to other contributors, whether they are writers or devs or graphic designers.

Admins: There is serious potential here for people who invest their efforts heavily. Don't take that away so hastily.

[cyphunk]

I propose the following work, done by myself, to be funded by devcoin. Please let me know if this will fit.

I will write a definitive guide for Embedded Analysis, to be published on the CCC 30C3 wiki. This would be a significant update to the same entry i wrote in 2010, which today is the first result when searching for "embedded analysis". I would refactor and release a new tool based on an Arduino which can be used to dump NAND memory (a capability not readily available to most), unlicensed and open source. I will QA and release a voltage shifting board for IO lines, unlicensed and open source with Fritzing layout files. I would release a book (25 page pamphlet will illustrations and photography) developed with a photographer and initially previewed at the Create Art & Technology Exhibition in 2011 but never formally released, CC licensed. I would donate %10 of all Devcoin from the total sum of the entirety of all this work, from now and into the future, to the photographer. All of this will be documented in the 30c3 wiki and I would be happy to put "efforts supported by Devcoin and the Devcoin community" in the first section. This work is already in progress and WILL be completed by Dec 30th, preferably Dec 26 (before the 30C3 conference starts). If not clear, all code, text and designs were or will be authored by myself, except that of the photographer as mentioned.

BIO: I am a well known hardware and software reverse engineer. I've lectured at Recon and the CCC. I make things that break things and publish them unlicensed.

Full list of work and new additions to the documentation from the 27c3:

• Initial release of Arduino based NAND Memory dumper
• Memory breakout board list and techniques
• Release of voltage regulator board for low voltage targets
• Information on workflow and aesthetic analysis
• Links to new tools
• What to do after JTAG is found
• Finding JTAG by hand
• Crude and novel firmware analysis techniques
• Release of book with illustrations on hardware hacking, in PDF form (CC Share Alike license)

[giftculturewriting]

Hi all, I am happy to report that I have finished the devcoin.org site redesign:

http://devcoin.org/

Thanks to Weisoq for his wiki page and whoever created the Devcoin press release that went out a couple of weeks ago - really saved me a lot of time compiling the content.

Let me know what you guys think - I will be sticking around as the new Devcoin web guy so I can certainly make edits and additions going forward.

It's certainly a lot more user-friendly, and the smooth design I think will help inspire confidence. I was thinking originally that you were going to move all of Devtome's content to a new site (which seemed quite momentous), but now I see it's more of a portal site to get people into it. I think it could do with some more content, since right now it's pretty spare, and there's plenty of existing content from devtome and the thread here that can be ported.

So far it looks like the new windows installer is good (not sure if people want to test it more before it's included), so you could add the link for that:
http://media.andarazoroflove.org/Devcoin-Installer.exe

The 'where to spend devcoin' page can be updated to include:
http://altcoincards.com/
http://dvc4giftcards.us/

The 'earnings and payouts' tab can include these links:
http://www.devtome.com/doku.php?id=devtome_stats
http://www.devtome.com/doku.php?id=devtome_page_views
http://www.devtome.com/doku.php?id=devtome_analytics
http://www.devtome.com/doku.php?id=earn_devcoins_by_writing#earnings_per_word

I think the more people are able to see the backstage process for payouts right up front, the more confidence they'll have in joining the system.

I also think it should include a couple of links to where people can trade dvc for btc and dollars. Some people might want to invest in an alt currency, but a lot of writers from the mainstream-non-hacking world are just going to want to buy groceries. If they successfully pay for their groceries, then they might think, "Oh, hey, this is totally legit," and be more willing to invest in an altcoin, and dvc's reputation goes up.

What do people think about doing a 'my personal experience with devtome' sort of testimonials section? We don't want to make this all "omg devtome is srsly so awesome la di da di da!!!!" But I think people respond to genuine, short, pragmatic personal stories of success when they're trying to figure out if this is something they want to do. I wouldn't have joined devtome if not for a miner friend who convinced me it was legit. Other writers might not have miner friends, and they need something else to convince them its legit.

Another point, which might or might or might not apply to the new site: a lot of mainstream writers are not going to want to put up their material (even if they're not making money on it otherwise) under a free culture license out of fear of that license being abused. At the very least some links to places that explain the benefits of free culture licenses could be listed for writers who are afraid to release material under a liberal license. Some choices might be:

http://questioncopyright.org
http://freeculture.org/

I can add these to the "earn devcoins by writing page" (unless editing that is restricted), but I'm not sure if this level of detail is necessary for hypersire's site at its current size.

Hypersire, thanks for doing the site!

[giftculturewriting]

Weisoq wrote me:

..
This month there are 3 writers earning 46% of all devtome earnings (of ~30 writers). One of them is 120 shares! If your rating method is going to bound between <1 and >1 doesn't the max round share need to be cut. Not just because of the absolute number and absolute equivalent fiat but because the larger shares also serve to undermine all others.

There was a thread discussion on this and nobody seemed to object to something around 30-40, including these writers:
Wiser: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=233997.msg3781834#msg3781834
Matt608: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=233997.msg3782941#msg3782941
Markm: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=233997.msg3782966#msg3782966

Wiser even wrote a previous article on the issue:
http://devtome.com/doku.php?id=on_writing_and_market_forces#capping_the_number_of_shares_per_round

Since the admins want it to be lower, the max words counted has been changed to 50,000, effective in round 31. The code only has a limit for words counted, not total shares. Because the rating can go to 1.5, that means a max payout of 50 x 1.5 = 75 shares per writer. Also the weighting for ratings has been boosted to 60%, the categorization weighting has been increased to 10% and the popularity weighting has been reduced to 30%. The other reason the popularity rating has been reduced is because advertising is cheap and can otherwise boost the popularity so much that it overwhelms the actual quality. I want people to link to their articles and talk about them, because that lasts for a long time, but advertising is a short term popularity boost that skews the earnings. The highest normalized rating of the prolific writers is 1.07, so with a higher rating weighting, the current high earners will have a lower payout.

Even though I've only recently gotten involved, I think I can see why the admins would want to find some way to better reward people producing quality work. I don't know (as in literally have no opinion informed enough to be considered) if lowering the max word count is the way to do that. Devtome is still in a community learning process around rewarding high quality work and discouraging low quality work. I think the no notability requirements are great because that lets you write about whatever inspires you, but the area between 'no notability' and 'no drivel' is very grey at this point. Some articles are clearly written for word count, not because there was something to say or the author felt inspired to say it. Some of what's on devtome is drivel to my mind, but I'm coming from the bias of a writer and editor. And with avoiding censorship and no notability requirements, it's difficult to come up with a standardized system.

Out of curiosity: Do the article rating admins have a standardized rubric they go by, or is it subjective to the admin? If it's not already standardized, I think standardization would help.

I'm thinking the same thing.  A better way to spread the shares out would be to have more active writers join Devtome so compete for the shares, rather than limiting the payout. 

I'm a writer and a researcher. Professionally and as a hobby. Devtome remains enticing because I see the direct fruits of my labor within a month. But I've been writing for almost 20 years. Of course I'm going to have times where I max out the earnings. I think I've done it twice this year so far.

1. The material is peered review (ratings, other writers challenging content, categories, views, etc.).
2. I can't just spin an existing article to receive credit.
3. Devtome forces me to be creative in my contributions.

And although I have held back some original material since it's earning royalties elsewhere, I've been very pleased to release some of my successful content here, just to be open source and support this effort. It's not about greed or maxing out the monthly round. I think the more attractive Devtome is to hardcore writers, the more attention it will draw, the more it will grow and the more word is spread to other contributors, whether they are writers or devs or graphic designers.

Admins: There is serious potential here for people who invest their efforts heavily. Don't take that away so hastily.

I think eeh raises a good point. If mainstream writers have support to get over any biases against free culture licenses, there's the potential for a ton of great writers to port a lot of great content to devtome. Because they don't get paid right now (or get paid very little) for creating, and devtome exists expressly to pay creators. So maybe (again, not informed enough to have a real opinion, but this is just a possibility) what devtome needs is more writers putting in 100k words, rather than a lower max word count. Advertising has been plugged a lot in this thread as the way to do that, but I think in conjunction with that, devtome needs to look safe and reliable to a non-hacker audience. Right now that's hard for a layperson to judge because of the visuals of devtome, the variability in quality, and the bias in language of a lot of the main pages toward people who understand the code of all this.

The two most immediate solutions I see are to continue to improve the quality control system and be in open communication about it (which seems like an active, on-going process as this discussion demonstrates), and to get a page up written for the layperson about earnings (which I'm drafting).

[sidhujag]

Hi all, I am happy to report that I have finished the devcoin.org site redesign:

http://devcoin.org/

Thanks to Weisoq for his wiki page and whoever created the Devcoin press release that went out a couple of weeks ago - really saved me a lot of time compiling the content.

Let me know what you guys think - I will be sticking around as the new Devcoin web guy so I can certainly make edits and additions going forward.

Nice design.. feedback

1) on iphone the intro page I expect to swipe the screens to see next slide.. also the icons and devcoin logo etc of each slide is cut off on the right side of screen.
2) Will you be updating the round payout info page manually or syncing sonehow ? Is there a cms to easily edit page content?

Good work!! I like the idea if a website being informative and usable to keep ppl coming back like getting round payout info.

Can we add a whats new? New bounties recrntly completed or milestones like drvcoin hitting $10 million marketcap etc?

[weisoq]

As it's my message quoted I think it's fair that I reply. That it's you eeh isn't relevant, I wasn't making a point any particular writer's writings and I'd assume it's not my preference alone.

This month there are 3 writers earning 46% of all devtome earnings (of ~30 writers). One of them is 120 shares! If your rating method is going to bound between <1 and >1 doesn't the max round share need to be cut. Not just because of the absolute number and absolute equivalent fiat but because the larger shares also serve to undermine all others.

1. Yes, that is me. 120 shares. Does it reduce anyone else's shares when I max out that round?
They still receive the same amount, correct? So what is the *purpose* in limiting the number of shares in a round? Last month I had zero shares. It's very, very difficult to produce that much material consistently. Someone was kind enough recently to point out one project that I had neglected to fine tune. And now I'm about 8000 words in and loving it. No hard feelings, just a better project when I finally finish it.

No they don't. Payout is calculated as 180m/shares. If the denominator is higher it must reduce others' shares in dvc. But that technically is not my point. I'd like to see thousands of shares per round. Although I would personally lower the max a lot more, the change proposed now is in the context of ratings and vetting where with the bounding it means the max will be 75 per round rather than 80 now. This implies very little difference for quality writing.

2. Does that mean that shares are going to be excess every round or are 180m still distributed monthly?

If so, will we be expanding then number of bounties for visibility and refinement of Devtome and DVC in general?

Not quite sure what you mean there. 180m is generation - miners and that can't change. Also as far as I'm aware, word counts in excess of 50k will still be rolled over to the next round as they are now. There is no net loss, only a longer tie-in and greater time distribution of payouts.

3. The addition of ratings, categorization and page views has made me relook some of my contributions. I've been forced to clean up even what I thought was my most well prepared material.

So what is the point of reducing it? Just so someone like myself or Raptorak can't max it out at the high end? I don't see the purpose.

I believe that was the point of ratings, categorization and page views.
The point? 'The purpose of devcoin is to give money to open source developers for their work in as fair a manner as possible'. Although I have my own stronger views on devtome payouts and technicalities (which I've been honest about before) the adjustment is because with a bound now between <1 and >1 (rather than just 1) the max should at minimum move in line with it, resulting in max 75. In my opinion it's also to align reward with all other bounty payments where the maximum other that I know of (open transactions and a devcoin atm) is 96 shares.

Which is what markm asked in his post: Markm: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=233997.msg3782966#msg3782966. What's the purpose? He didn't say he approved of the change, just that he wasn't necessarily opposed, but his question is a good one: What's the point?

I can't speak for markm so I won't. Speaking for myself I would like devtome to appeal to ALL writers and writings, and for the greatest incentive not to be reward by word count but reward for writing.

Over the months I have been involved with Devtome there have been a number of attempts (some successful, some not) to game the word count. We can pretend it's not an issue, or that all current and prospective writers are able to mutually and constructively mix money and ethics, or we can at least try to improve methods and incentives. I believe this is a start.

In reply I would like to ask you or anyone else to explain why there shouldn't be a maximum, or why 120 is better or fairer than 75? And then how administering that would work in practice in a way that is less 'pointless' than the change?

[weisoq]

I'm thinking the same thing.  A better way to spread the shares out would be to have more active writers join Devtome so compete for the shares, rather than limiting the payout.  

The payout is not limited, only the payout per round.

Edit: just to make clear, the payout has never been limited. It has always rolled over. The only difference now is that to earn the max of 75 rather than previous max of 80 per round, writing has to be of better quality with better copy, with some element of popularity incorporated.