Spammers should be required to send message in blockchain - Kidding

[the founder]

You know,  something has been bugging me more and more over the past few days.    If a spammer wanted to do bulk advertising,  due to the low prices of bitcoins now,  the spammer could technically get a few thousand coins,  then send them off at people at .02 each with their spam message..  That means they wouldn't violate spam mail laws because technically it's not mail,  and secondly they would say "everyone got paid to read it" .

This would piss off everyone royally because the blockchain would be inflated beyond belief...  but technically people would get paid to read spam.

I don't know...  just something that I was concerned would happen.

So you know,  I am completely kidding about the title,   I don't endorse this.  I just can picture it happening.

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[ElectricMucus]

Well if there ever is a widespread in-blockchain messaging service that could be possibility.  But transaction fees would have to go way up.

[the founder]

Well if there ever is a widespread in-blockchain messaging service that could be possibility.  But transaction fees would have to go way up.

 there's a field in bitcoind for it...  it's my guess that the only reason it hasn't happened yet is because a spammer didn't think it's worth it...  yet.

Then there's the problem of not knowing where to send it...   how's he going to guess what bitcoin address people have...   I guess trolling though block explorer would help him.

[BitterTea]

you can send a message with the client,  there's a field in bitcoind for it...  it's my guess that the only reason it hasn't happened yet is because a spammer didn't think it's worth it...  yet.

Wrong. That message is stored exclusively in your wallet.

[the founder]

you can send a message with the client,  there's a field in bitcoind for it...  it's my guess that the only reason it hasn't happened yet is because a spammer didn't think it's worth it...  yet.

Wrong. That message is stored exclusively in your wallet.

I was in the process of editing it when you replied "wrong" even though it appears I am right.    As it appears it already exists,  but not used for spam yet.

What does the field do in bitcoind ?

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

[BitterTea]

I was in the process of editing it when you replied "wrong" even though it appears I am right.    As it appears it already exists,  but not used for spam yet.

What does the field do in bitcoind ?

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

In what way does it appear that you are right?

I assume the field you're talking about is either "comment" or "comment-to"? Those are fields for arbitrary strings that you can associate with your own transactions/recipients. The data is stored in your wallet, nowhere else.

The page you linked has nothing to do with bitcoind. Yes, you can store arbitrary data in the block chain, but only because there's no way to tell the difference between a public key hash and arbitrary data. It would be a dumb way to send out spam, because people would have to go out of their way to look for it, it wouldn't show up in their client in any way. You would, however, only need to encode it into the block chain once, not once per recipient.

[the founder]

I was in the process of editing it when you replied "wrong" even though it appears I am right.    As it appears it already exists,  but not used for spam yet.

What does the field do in bitcoind ?

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

In what way does it appear that you are right?

I assume the field you're talking about is either "comment" or "comment-to"? Those are fields for arbitrary strings that you can associate with your own transactions/recipients. The data is stored in your wallet, nowhere else.

The page you linked has nothing to do with bitcoind. Yes, you can store arbitrary data in the block chain, but only because there's no way to tell the difference between a public key hash and arbitrary data. It would be a dumb way to send out spam, because people would have to go out of their way to look for it, it wouldn't show up in their client in any way. You would, however, only need to encode it into the block chain once, not once per recipient.

ok that makes sense...   so basically it can't happy right?  At least in any meaningful way ....

[BitterTea]

ok that makes sense...   so basically it can't happy right?  At least in any meaningful way ....

Essentially, yes. People can store messages in the block chain (because an encoded message is arbitrary data, and so is a bitcoin script), but you'll only ever see it if you go looking for it.

[the founder]

ok that makes sense...   so basically it can't happy right?  At least in any meaningful way ....

Essentially, yes. People can store messages in the block chain (because an encoded message is arbitrary data, and so is a bitcoin script), but you'll only ever see it if you go looking for it.

I was just curious because if there WAS a messaging system built into the client,  though it would be expensive in terms of fees,  it almost would qualify as serving someone for court,  as without a doubt it would be proven that the message would be sent,  and it's not something that can be forged.

In fact it would be arguable that due to HOW the message was delivered it's unarguable that the message wasn't sent,  or "they didn't get the memo" when everyone else on the planet did...