Dark Exchange: a 100% decentralized p2p exchange

[jtimon]

Maybe I don't understand your proposal.
What in the block chain says that the tainted satoshis are USD?
Do you need a centralized server from the issuers to tell you what satoshis are "tainted dollars"?

Yes, in a certain moment the server would announce new backed coins. After that, anyone can keep track of their movements. A common protocol could be defined so that different issuers can use the same software, just by adding different announcing servers.
Of course such announcement could be done in a P2P network, but there's no point in it, since the issuer is already a known central entity in which you have to trust anyway.

I see, the issuers only need to announce newly created usdCoins and the redeemed (destroyed) ones.

By tainting coins you can profit from everything that already exists, including miners. A different chain, even if this merged mining works, would have to offer incentives to miners...

Yes, fees. The same incentive that miners will ask for moving tainted coins. Merged mining already exists, is working for namecoin.

Do you know why people chose to create a new, independent chain for namecoin, with coins of its own?
Why not a chain dependent on bitcoin's chain, using bitcoin themselves for the transactions?

There was a proposal for having a decentralized DNS within the bitcoin chain, bitDNS I think. But people didn't like the idea of including more data than what's purely necessary for bitcoin transactions in the chain. For example, a merchant verifying transactions for his own purposes will need to download more transactions if the usdCoins are moving inside the bitcoin blockchain. I think it is cleaner this way too.
But note that creating a new currency wasn't necessary (although probably more convenient), the namecoin chain could have lived on bitcoin fees from the beginning.

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Alternative_Chains

Back to the topic, the fee structure is already there for bitcoin transactions. By creating another chain, you'd need to pay fees for both wouldn't you?

Yes.

[EhVedadoOAnonimato]

There was a proposal for having a decentralized DNS within the bitcoin chain, bitDNS I think. But people didn't like the idea of including more data than what's purely necessary for bitcoin transactions in the chain. For example, a merchant verifying transactions for his own purposes will need to download more transactions if the usdCoins are moving inside the bitcoin blockchain. I think it is cleaner this way too.

I agree that putting DNS data into bitcoin's block chain is not a good idea. But a new proof-of-work chain was not necessary either. A namecoin block could be considered valid if signed with the secret key of the generation address of the latest generated bitcoin block. You create a bitcoin block, and without having to do another proof-of-work, you create a namecoin block.
The namecoin protocol could know about the existence of bitcoin's and, for example, require payments to be made in bitcoin for a name transaction to be considered valid.

Do you know if this option of creating a dependent-chain was considered?

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

usdCoin miners? A different chain? Why? Just "taint" satoshis, no need to create another chain, that's much more complicated.

What's the problem with a new chain?
Another currency, another chain.
I don't think it's more complicated, the issuers can just use the beertoken code and change the name and backing of the currency.

It would be great to be able to trade ripple credits for bitcoins. But to make the trades atomic and decentralized you need:

1) Decentralized ripple (in progress).
2) commit scripts.

But how do you make sure that every coin is worth exactly 1 USD ?
To control the price, there would have to be an entity who controll the supply of the currency and the currency would essentially become centralized. There is no other way.

Who could be such issuer ?

[jtimon]

usdCoin miners? A different chain? Why? Just "taint" satoshis, no need to create another chain, that's much more complicated.

What's the problem with a new chain?
Another currency, another chain.
I don't think it's more complicated, the issuers can just use the beertoken code and change the name and backing of the currency.

It would be great to be able to trade ripple credits for bitcoins. But to make the trades atomic and decentralized you need:

1) Decentralized ripple (in progress).
2) commit scripts.

But how do you make sure that every coin is worth exactly 1 USD ?

Every usdCoin is backed by a usd. This is the same if usdCoins are implemented through tainted satoshis, right?

To control the price, there would have to be an entity who controll the supply of the currency and the currency would essentially become centralized. There is no other way.

Who could be such issuer ?

A trust like the one sacarlson describes for beertokens.
An exchange (say mtgox) that wants to provide decentralized exchanges while still providing the service of "storing your dollars".
An association of businesses that doesn't want to rely on centralized exchanges. 

[cbeast]

To control the price, there would have to be an entity who controll the supply of the currency and the currency would essentially become centralized. There is no other way.

Who could be such issuer ?

A trust like the one sacarlson describes for beertokens.
An exchange (say mtgox) that wants to provide decentralized exchanges while still providing the service of "storing your dollars".
An association of businesses that doesn't want to rely on centralized exchanges. 

What's to stop the association of business from competing with one another by offering a higher exchange rate? Are you asking business to not compete?

[jtimon]

What's to stop the association of business from competing with one another by offering a higher exchange rate? Are you asking business to not compete?

There can be sacarlsonUsdCoins, mtgoxUsdCoins, etc. But they will be considered different markets because the different usdCoins aren't fungible between them.

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

What's to stop the association of business from competing with one another by offering a higher exchange rate? Are you asking business to not compete?

There can be sacarlsonUsdCoins, mtgoxUsdCoins, etc. But they will be considered different markets because the different usdCoins aren't fungible between them.

So there could be multiple centralized systems with a different blockchain for each other.... Hmmm.

I think I like the idea.

Multiple centralized coins =~ decentralization.

[EhVedadoOAnonimato]

Backed coins are an interesting concept, but they don't solve the problem of getting money in and out. Instead of having to deposit or withdraw in an exchange, you'd have to deposit or withdraw in an issuer. Same problems would arise.

But at least trades can be made decentralized, thus more anonymous. Even if they keep records of who deposits or withdraw money on the issuer, they can't know who used this money in between.

I have a feeling this is probably illegal in most places, though.

[jtimon]

Maybe would be just a legal loophole, since most lawyer and lawmakers won't understand it anyway.

[HostFat]

It's freaking awesome!

[jago25_98]

Code:

path is /home/j/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin:/usr/games
2011-10-30 20:42:34,535 ERROR [darkexchange.uncaught-exception-handler]: Uncaught Exception:
java.awt.HeadlessException
        at java.awt.GraphicsEnvironment.checkHeadless(GraphicsEnvironment.java:173)
        at java.awt.Window.<init>(Window.java:476)
        at java.awt.Frame.<init>(Frame.java:419)
        at java.awt.Frame.<init>(Frame.java:384)
        at javax.swing.JFrame.<init>(JFrame.java:174)
        at sun.reflect.NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance0(Native Method)
        at sun.reflect.NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance(NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.java:57)
        at sun.reflect.DelegatingConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance(DelegatingConstructorAccessorImpl.java:45)
        at java.lang.reflect.Constructor.newInstance(Constructor.java:532)
        at java.lang.Class.newInstance0(Class.java:372)
        at java.lang.Class.newInstance(Class.java:325)
        at seesaw.core$construct_impl$fn__1856.invoke(core.clj:236)
        at seesaw.core$construct_impl.invoke(core.clj:239)
        at seesaw.core$construct_impl.invoke(core.clj:236)
        at seesaw.core$construct.invoke(core.clj:226)
        at seesaw.core$frame.doInvoke(core.clj:2136)
        at clojure.lang.RestFn.invoke(RestFn.java:512)
        at darkexchange.view.login.login$create.invoke(login.clj:43)
        at darkexchange.controller.login.login$show.invoke(login.clj:95)
        at clojure.lang.Var.invoke(Var.java:361)
        at darkexchange.main$_main.doInvoke(main.clj:17)
        at clojure.lang.RestFn.invoke(RestFn.java:397)
        at clojure.lang.AFn.applyToHelper(AFn.java:159)
        at clojure.lang.RestFn.applyTo(RestFn.java:132)
        at darkexchange.main.main(Unknown Source)

? This is on a VPS without X11... need to find the docs

[EhVedadoOAnonimato]

That error is expected. If you run a Java app in an environment with no graphs, you need to add the headless system parameter.
It's something like -Djava.awt.headless=true you add to the command line.
But if this app needs a graphical environment, well, it just won't work without it...

[Elwar]

This does not address the hard part of the exchange, which is exchanging currency for Bitcoin and vice versa.

Setting the price in a decentralized manner is easy.

If we had several exchangers that each wanted to run their p2p exchange, they just put in the current ratio for Bitcoins to dollars.

You want to start an exchange, you put in the current ratio, $3 for every 1 BTC into your available trade amount.

Say you have $30 and 10 BTC in your exchange. Someone wants to trade 1 BTC for $3. You send them the $3 and they send you 1 BTC. You now have $27 and 11 BTC. Your P2P system goes out to other exchanges and finds the best price to even out your ratio. You find the best one out there accepts $2.9 for 1 BTC. You trade 1 BTC with them and you now have $29.90 and 10 BTC. Then that other exchange goes out and tries to find the best deal to even its ratio and on and on. Each exchange could set up whatever transaction fee they want. When trying to locate the best ratio you also try to find the best transaction fee.


But the hardest part is the actual exchange of currency for BTC. Dealing with Dwolla or Liberty dollar or banks or anything is more than an individual wants to deal with or is capable of. But that is the key to Bitcoin's success. An easy transfer from currency to BTC.

[finway]

Who's on DarkExchange? Why can't i find nobody?

[jago25_98]

In Argentina in the last few days currency controls are heavily now in place. It is illegal to swap a peso for a dollar (it is possible to do it but the tax reporting rules make it almost completely unworkable)

This is needed NOW and there's massive demand.


Freenet: Nobody has the knowledge to set it up in Argentina. Hard to build a dynamic site for buy & sell offers.

i2p: Again, hard to setup. Need to run a server 24/7. No proxy gateway for average users (well there are generic ones but because that allow access to all i2p sites that are too slow)

Orisis and Iris: Iris docs are in Italian. The darn thing is close source and dynamically compiled to an X11 so can't run on a server!

Dark Exchange: Great idea but again not ready. What we need is a way to mirror the content of the market to a website. When this website gets blocked it should be easy to bring up again.

[Sultan]

Dark Exchange: Great idea but again not ready. What we need is a way to mirror the content of the market to a website. When this website gets blocked it should be easy to bring up again.

This is an EXCELLENT idea! If Dark Exchange had a way to store the current offers without those nodesbeing online, there could be a "server node" who stays up to date with their peers and translates them onto a website!!

I think it shouldn't be nessecary for ppl who want to use Dark Exchange to use i2p. Bitcoin isn't run over an i2p layer, and that won't get shut down. I agree people need to have the choice of being able to connect via TOR or i2p or Freenet, but its decentralised nature is its strong point, not the fact that it resides in the DarkNet.

[HostFat]

Orisis and Iris: Iris docs are in Italian. The darn thing is close source and dynamically compiled to an X11 so can't run on a server!

I think that it's quiet easy to install Isis, I'll write somewhere how to do it.
You can run an Osiris client on a cheap VPS, but even 2/3 peers are enough to maintain it online ( see the anarchy bitcoin forum ... )
About sources, they said that it will be open ... I like to say that I know them ( not face 2 face ), but I can guarantee that if they said it will be open source ... then it will be.

[jtimon]

In Argentina in the last few days currency controls are heavily now in place. It is illegal to swap a peso for a dollar (it is possible to do it but the tax reporting rules make it almost completely unworkable)

This is needed NOW and there's massive demand.

Isn't open transactions useful for your needs?

[ctoon6]

im just testing this and i get no peers in the peer tab. i had it running for over 10 minutes and tried restarting. i am not using i2p, is it required?

[caston]

I haven't tried the software but at the moment there is a lot of trading on mtgox and other exchanges where the exchange takes a slice in the form of a "trade commission". Ideally these should be replaced with transaction fees in the p2p exchange model and these fees are paid out to miners. This will make mining for transactions fees very profitable indeed. Are there any plans to integrate a p2p exchange into the existing system in such a way that miners get the transaction fees for these trades?

I would also like to see it as a kind of p2p ebay where anything can be traded e.g. food, clothing, commodities and so on. It could also be like a p2p stock exchange where you could buy shares in companies.