Litecoin Minecraft - Seeking Feedback And Help

[Blindfolded]

Hi all -

Update on Litecoin Based Minecraft Server:


I'll start with some history on what happened to our server, and then proceed to the point of this post. Spendlitecoins.com was doing really well, gaining users, and getting good reviews overall. Then something ?unexpected? happened. The value of Litecoins shot up! There were players that had deposits in the thousands on our server. Suddenly $90 deposited with us, turned into $2500 which is quite alot of money to be deposited as game currency to play Minecraft with. At that point we were facing a "bank-run" so to speak on our server, people were cashing out, and I cant blame them. The sudden spike in LTC made everybody happy. Including me! However the problems we faced at that point were obvious. Many of our users had purchased plots of land on the server with hopes of re-selling them when the server became popular, and many players who had hoped to purchase land on the server were facing paying huge amounts of money if they wanted to buy. Simply lowering the LTC cost of land didn't seem fair, because there were already many land owners who at that point had no hope of ever getting drawing a profit from their land. I didnt feel that de-valuing their land 5000% was fair, and I couldnt keep it the same price, because it would be unreasonable to ask for so much money in order to buy "digital land" in an imaginary world. Eventually the economy went stagnant, and people stopped playing.


All of this is leading up to my main point. I believe I have solved the problem. There is plenty of bad blood going around with all of the useless crypto-clones popping up everywhere, and frankly I agree that most all of these coins are pretty pointless. BUT what if there was a crypto-coin made specifically to be used as a portable minecraft server currency? Well now there is... I have cloned one. Let me be perfectly clear that this coin is not meant to be a competitor with BTC/LTC or any other coin that currently exists. It is only a game currency, but the beauty of it is that it can be mined, or bought with other cryptos, instantly deposited or withdrawn to any wallet or other minecraft server that chooses to adopt the currency on their own servers.  The value of the coin is not based on other coins, it is based on what people are willing to pay for in-game items. This solves the sudden increase/decrease problem, and will provide a stable economy in the game, AND still keep the added benefit of my original intent of using a currency with a real life value in the game.

The coin is currently working, windows clients are built, and a group of us have been hashing it and making sure everything is solid. I'm proud to say everything looks good. YES there is pre-mining going on, but before you bash me about it, let me say that I fully intend to give it away to new players that join when I re-launch the server (very, very soon) and I am also going to give away large sums to any other operator that will adopt the currency on a minecraft server of their own. The point is the pre-mine is not being done for crooked reasons, or a dump situation when the value is right.

All of this being said, I have a few kinks to work out, and I want to have everything done, polished, and well presented before I release this into the wild. I am also seeking some help from reputable people in the crypto world to make sure everything is right for the big day. (you guys know who you are)


Can I get some feedback here?  - Can I get some help?


Thanks -Blindfolded.

[yeltz]

Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but doesn't any coin that has "value" outside the game make it a competitor with other cryptos?

[kimosan]

You should probably stop the premine now before it gets out of hand. Just take a look at this crazy alt forum to get an idea of what people see when they read "premine". Or in fact don't see as many people around here lack the basic ability to simply read.

I do think your coin idea is pretty good but how are you going to keep it from being tied in with other currencies? What happens when it gets listed on cryptsy? Are the wallets going to somehow be used only within minecraft?

[Blindfolded]

Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but doesn't any coin that has "value" outside the game make it a competitor with other cryptos?

If you look at it that way, you may be borderline correct I guess. However, the "value" would not be based on other coins but rather whatever a person is willing to pay for in-game items. I suppose it depends on how you look at it. My point was that it isn't meant to be a direct competitor with mainstream coins, but instead a game currency that can be moved to other servers if a person decides they no longer want to play on a particular server any longer.

[Blindfolded]

You should probably stop the premine now before it gets out of hand. Just take a look at this crazy alt forum to get an idea of what people see when they read "premine". Or in fact don't see as many people around here lack the basic ability to simply read.

I do think your coin idea is pretty good but how are you going to keep it from being tied in with other currencies? What happens when it gets listed on cryptsy? Are the wallets going to somehow be used only within minecraft?

I share your concern: The main reason for it is to have coins to put into circulation when we launch, and to offer them to other server operator as an incentive to adopt the currency. That being said I completely understand where you are coming from.

Having said that; this is the type of feedback I'm looking for. Obviously the idea has some issues to address, but the main plan is to be able to continue my server and somehow stabilize the economy to protect it from sudden price fluctuations of the currency we were using prior, while still having it be portable to other servers.

[markm]

I don't really see how this solves the problem actually.

When this new coin skyrockets aka gets pumped how will things be any different?

I would ask you a question instead that maybe could give an idea...

Where are the coins that were spent on land?

What I think I would have tried to do would be to try to deal separately with land deeds and actual rental as in paying the server bills.

Imagine land having actual value, for example each certain square or cubic area or volume of it is worth one litecoin.

In order for anyone to have acquired that land, one litecoin would have to have been frozen into a coldwallet representing the value of that land.

Who-ever owns that land owns that litecoin. If ever the server shuts down, that litecoin gets sent out to who-ever owns that land at that time.

In virtual worlds there is not just the matter of owning land but also the matter of having it fired up actively online reachable over the internet by players.

(Look at kitely.com for example, merely owning a region is separate from actually putting it live online hour by hour.)

That is the "rent", or "land tax" or "cost of putting online for a span of time a piece of land that you own".

Land could gain in value if the server operator charged more for this month by month (or span of time by span of time) payment than just cost, so that a portion of each recurring payment can be added to the coldwallet frozen value of the land itself; for example 10% or even 50% of the recurring fee charged to players for putting online a piece of land they own could be deposited into the coldwallet that stores the sale/resale value of the land.

This way the server operator is not only always in a position to buy back all land but could even have land actually increase in value, such as by having NPCs who are willing to buy the land for something over its original value but less than the value it has accrued by paying bandwidth (being online) fees each month. (Land that is worth paying to have online is presumably worth more than land no one is willing to pay to put online; and is factually worth more because its coldwallet storing its value has more litecoin in it than it did originaly because a portion of the recurring fees kept being added into its coldwallet each span of time.)

It sounds to me like your problem has arisen simply by failing to store the coins representing the actual value of the land in order to be able to refund that value or to be able to buy back that land. Maybe you only thought about month to month rental type cost, the cost to have land actually loaded up online instead of sitting on a DVD somewhere not actually visit-able yet still belonging to its owner who just has not found it worthwhile to have it put online lately?

The fact that litecoins went up massively in value should have made your land go up massively in value, because basically each piece of land should have been a buried/frozen litecoin from the start.

instead it seems like you just used land as a pump and dump commodity and now are looking to create yet another coin as yet another pump and dump commodity, meanwhile where are all the litecoins that were sunk into the land? Someone dug them up and shipped them somewhere? The server admins did, maybe?

-MarkM-

[Blindfolded]

I don't really see how this solves the problem actually.

When this new coin skyrockets aka gets pumped how will things be any different?

I would ask you a question instead that maybe could give an idea...

Where are the coins that were spent on land?

What I think i would have tried to do would be to try to deal separately with land deeds and actual rental as in paying the server bills.

Imagine land having actual value, for example each certain square or cubic area or volume of it is worth one litecoin.

In order for anyone to have acquired that land, one litecoin would have to have been frozen into a coldwallet representing the value of that land.

Who-ever owns that land owns that litecoin. If ever the server shuts down, that litecoin gets sent out to who-ever owns that land at that time.

In virtual worlds there is not just the matter of owning land but also the matter of having it fired up actively online reachable over the internet by players.

That is the "rent", or "land tax" or "cost of putting online for a span of time a piece of land that you own".

Land could gain in value if the server operator charged more for this month by month (or span of time by span of time) payment than just cost, so that a portion of each recurring payment can be added to the coldwallet frozen value of the land itself; for example 10% or even 50% of the recurring fee charged to players for putting online a piece of land they own could be desposited into the coldwallet that stores the sale/resale value of the land.

This way the server operator is not only always in a position to buy back all land but could even have land actually increase in value, such as by having NPCs who are willing to buy the land for something over its original value but less than the value it has accrued by paying bandwidth (being online) fees each month. (Land that is worth paying to have online is presumably worth more than land no one is willing to pay to put online.)

It sounds to me like your problem has arisen simply by failing to store the coins representing the actual value of the land in order to be able to refund that value or to be able to buy back that land. maybe you only thought about month to month rental type cost, the cost to have land actually loaded up online isntead of sitting on a DVD somewhere not actually vistable yet still belonging to its owner who just has not found it worthwhile to have it put online lately?

The fact that litecoins went up massively in value should have made you land go up massively in value, because basically each piece of land should have been a buried/frozen litecoin from the start.

instead it seems like you just used land as a pump and dump commodity and now are looking to create yet another coin as yet another pump and dump commodity, meanwhile where are all the litecoins that were sunk into the land? someone dug them up shipped them somewhere? The server admis did, maybe?

-MarkM-

Yes, actually you raise some good points. I'll try to address them all, but ill start by saying this.

"In order for anyone to have acquired that land, one litecoin would have to have been frozen into a coldwallet representing the value of that land.

Who-ever owns that land owns that litecoin. If ever the server shuts down, that litecoin gets sent out to who-ever owns that land at that time."

This idea is quite brilliant, but I'm unsure how I would go about implementing it. I'll definitely give it some thought because that is a solution.


As for where the coins are currently? They are still being held. For that matter the land still exists to this day. Everything is exactly how it was left before the server became a ghost town, coins included.
The way I was planning to address that was to offer an equal amount of the new game currency for the players to come back.


I might add that some of the players in the game were names that you would recognize, and there were no hard feelings when all of this happened. So I assure you there was no pump and dump situation happening.  The largest depositors on the server are still in contact with me to this day, and I'm sure they would agree that my intentions were never anything other than pure.


Renting and buying both were always options on the server, the players chose to buy on their own. In fact nobody was compelled to buy anything since any random person could join and play without being required to buy land. It was simply an option for them.

As far as the spike in value, you would be right up to a certain extent, but the price went so high that we all felt the costs of buying land were unreasonable. Had there been some type of mechanism as you suggested it actually would have prevented it. Again, your idea is sound.


To finalize, no, i did not take the coins and run. They are safe and sound, simply because the primary goal was having fun in the first place, along with an open economy where everybody had an opportunity to make a few coins while playing (if they chose to) I would rather keep the contacts and friends, than take the money and run.


Thanks for the feedback, and I will absolutely think about how I can implement your ideas.

[markm]

I guess I do not understand the problem then.

Can't you give everyone their coins back and take all the land back and start over with a cheaper price for land?

Or make land cheaper and give people back the amount that, according to your new prices, they "overpaid" for their land? This way they could also opt to take more land in lieu of some or all of the refund?

-MarkM-

[Blindfolded]

I guess I do not understand the problem then.

Can't you give everyone their coins back and take all the land back and start over with a cheaper price for land?

Or make land cheaper and give people back the amount that, according to your new prices, they "overpaid" for their land? This way they could also opt to take more land in lieu of some or all of the refund?

-MarkM-

Thats like saying somebody "overpaid" for pizza and owes somebody 39999.8 bitcoins. The coins were not worth that much when they were spent. But sure, that could be an option. Bear in mind that everybody in the game could (and did) open a shop to sell items to other players. The server economy was 100% open, and the operators were not the only players that were able to sell things. So by that logic the players who cashed out their coins would also need to pay back the players that bought items from them etc etc etc. That doesn't even begin to address the hours of work people spent building structures on their lands, and me re-claiming it and taring it all down to "reset".


I may not have been clear about EVERYBODY being able to buy and sell items to other players. The only thing the server owned was the land plots. All of the players shops were their business. 

[Blindfolded]

I might also add that this didn't all happen the following day, the server was running for quite awhile before the price spiked.

[markm]

Okay so again what is the problem? People speculated on litecoins, litecoins paid off, some won, some lost, so what?

I thought I got a great deal on a couple of dedicated servers, I loved the deal.

Yesterday I thought about buying another or a couple more and holy moly the new regular price is way the heck cheaper than the special cheap deal price I had paid a few months ago!

I will ask them about not charging me next year the same rate I paid on the special, instead getting the new rate.

But prices change, thats life.

One approach could be don't think about the price as in litecoins, think about it in acres or in cubes of raw game-materials or something.

They didn't have to think of what they spent on the land as litecoins, afterall they could have used fiat to buy litecoins to buy land. So the fact that litecoins went up would be irrelevant, the land cost them so many dollars, and if they can sell it for that many dollars or more they are in profit.

The fact that land didn't turn out to be as explosive an investment as litecoins is just tough, they should have bought and held litecoins instead of buying and holding land. Hopefully they held some of both, and can still profit from the land if they can sell it for more dollars, or more cubes of in game raw resources, or whatever, than they paid for it.

Bitcoins had similar problems, there have been very few things, at some point in time, that would give you more income by holding them than you would get by holding bitcoins.

-MarkM-

[Snail2]

Take a look at Phenixcoin. It started as poker chips as well. Today it's on Cryptsy and has a relative good price. Rule of thumb: if it's useful then someone will try to make some profit from it. If it's really useful then there will be a lot of someone's and sooner or later you will find your coin on the exchange(s) and then you will be in the same situation as you are today .

[Blindfolded]

Take a look at Phenixcoin. It started as poker chips as well. Today it's on Cryptsy and has a relative good price. Rule of thumb: if it's useful then someone will try to make some profit from it. If it's really useful then there will be a lot of someone's and sooner or later you will find your coin on the exchange(s) and then you will be in the same situation as you are today .

I imagine you have a good point there.

[aa]

The mistake people make is treating cryptocoins as stocks or investments. Do you want to use these as currency or as stocks? Currency doesn't have the benefit of being traded only when it's beneficial to the holder--it gets used at spot price when needed.

Simple currency exchange example: you don't buy something from Europe for $100 USD and then the next day, when the values of the currencies fluctuate, whine that you could have paid $90 USD instead. The price of the purchase, in EUR, is the same on day one and day two, your currency just happened to be worth more the next day--it could have just as well been worth less.

Of course, since cryptocoins are a "world currency" and are treated like stocks by pretty much everyone, you have to either adjust your own prices (up or down) or keep selling at the original price.

If I buy a house for $300k but the market crashes, I don't get $200k back. Newcomers do get to enjoy their $100k houses, though.

[aa]

Also, on that note, there's a reason why you pay land taxes and land transfer fees, etc. You are supporting the area that runs services for that land when you do so. The MC server has costs--even just spending time reconfiguring the land for the new user that it's been sold to.

1. You own the land, they pay you for it.
2. If they want to sell it, they find a buyer then put in an application to transfer the land.
3. They get the money from the buyer and you get the fee from the land transfer tax.

Keeping the server online costs money so you could even have land taxes on a yearly basis. Just like any other land, if the taxes aren't paid, the land goes back to the city. This helps free up ghost town land (the situation that you have now) while collecting enough money to actually keep the server online.

[Shad3dOne]

Also, on that note, there's a reason why you pay land taxes and land transfer fees, etc. You are supporting the area that runs services for that land when you do so. The MC server has costs--even just spending time reconfiguring the land for the new user that it's been sold to.

1. You own the land, they pay you for it.
2. If they want to sell it, they find a buyer then put in an application to transfer the land.
3. They get the money from the buyer and you get the fee from the land transfer tax.

Keeping the server online costs money so you could even have land taxes on a yearly basis. Just like any other land, if the taxes aren't paid, the land goes back to the city. This helps free up ghost town land (the situation that you have now) while collecting enough money to actually keep the server online.

This sounds like a good solution. better than a full reset. just pick a date and implement a new policy. if after a set grace period taxes arent paid you lose your ghost land.

[The_Catman]

How about you tie the value of the coin to in-game goods? Say a diamond is worth 100CRC (I assume you're the craftcoin guy I've been working with), so the value of the coin on exchanges will never exceed what someone is willing to spend on an in-game item.

Could theoretically make it the most stable coin on exchanges.

[Blindfolded]

How about you tie the value of the coin to in-game goods? Say a diamond is worth 100CRC (I assume you're the craftcoin guy I've been working with), so the value of the coin on exchanges will never exceed what someone is willing to spend on an in-game item.

Could theoretically make it the most stable coin on exchanges.

Yes, exactly this. That is the whole point of the currency is to have its value tied to in game items. I have trouble articulating myself at times.

[Blindfolded]

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