What happens in a copyright infringement scenario?

[BlackHatCoiner]

The sharing of a copyrighted content, such as a movie, image, book is prohibited if it's not of the artist's or author's awareness and they illegitimately purchase it or enjoy it for free. Websites of the clear net can be shut down if it's demanded by law from the contextual government.

What happens in a scenario where the sharing of the copyrighted content is censorship resistant? Where you can't stop the sharing as it happens peer-to-peer? Does that make running a node illegal? What can the author do in such cases?

[ABCbits]

First of all, it's not new scenario. There are few past discussion about it such as,
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5175999.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5102449.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=950922.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5255218.0

What happens in a scenario where the sharing of the copyrighted content is censorship resistant?

AFAIK nothing is done/happening because,
1. It's not easy to extract the data (At least for non-technical user).
2. It's rare scenario because storing content on blockchain is very expensive.
3. It's more realistic to hunt centralized website which are more popular, but easier to take down or blocked by ISP.

Does that make running a node illegal?

Probably no, because it's still legal to run Bitcoin node despite some people store illegal content such as wikileaks file.

[Pmalek]

I wonder how those who wish to stop and destroy bitcoin (lol) aren't using that as an argument. Saying that the bitcoin blockchain contains data including illegal porn, classified reports, and stuff like that. It has to be stopped to protect the innocent and preserve our democracy (yeah right).

If the blockchain contains links to child pornography, and a node operator downloads the blocks (like he does with all other blocks) despite the warning from his democratic government about such content being store there, is he now a criminal waiting to be charged?

[BlackHatCoiner]

I wonder how those who wish to stop and destroy bitcoin (lol) aren't using that as an argument.

I guess it's much much much cheaper and easier to do it on the dark web which makes the block chain as useful as tits on a bull for this purpose. Also, there aren't cases, are they? If there were, the haters would be the first to protest.

If the blockchain contains links to child pornography, and a node operator downloads the blocks (like he does with all other blocks) despite the warning from his democratic government about such content being store there, is he now a criminal waiting to be charged?

Linking isn't going to harm. As said, (clear net) websites have a central point of failure. What would matter is if you embedded the video inside a block. You could only achieve this on a shit chain such as BSV's, as the blocks can't weight more than 4MBs in Bitcoin.

[coinlatte]

You could only achieve this on a shit chain such as BSV's, as the blocks can't weight more than 4MBs in Bitcoin.

It depends how long you want to wait and how much you are willing to pay. With empty mempool, 4 MB per 10 minutes is quite slow transfer, so to push 4 GB video, it would take at least 1000 blocks, so about a week. Also, assuming one satoshi per stored byte, it would cost 0.01 BTC per megabyte, so around 40 BTC for storing that with the lowest fees.

Also note that you can upload any data in a hidden way. For example, you can use some HD wallet to generate pseudorandom keys, then you can tweak them with 32-byte chunks from your video file. When all coins will be moved back to your wallet and you will have a lot of confirmations, then you can release your xprv and release some program that will extract that data.

Another thing is you don't have to actually pay that 40 BTC to do that. If you are some big exchange with some significant liquidity, then you move a lot of coins in your daily transactions, so all that you need is tweaking keys with chunks of data you want to store. Also if you can produce deterministic signatures, then you can tweak them too. So the true cost is not really 40 BTC, but rather 4 GB / 32 byte keys = around 2^27 keys. If you assume each output has one public key and one signature, it would mean the total cost is spending 2^26 outputs. So if you have that much traffic with random keys, you can upload videos for free, just by switching to deterministic keys and signatures, and tweaking them with your data.

[larry_vw_1955]

You could only achieve this on a shit chain such as BSV's...

So you admit that you can't do something on bitcoin that you can do on bsv, so that must mean that bsv has some kind of utility. now the thing is, you call bsv a shit chain but don't explain why so i deduct a few points for that... you been watching the trial??

It depends how long you want to wait and how much you are willing to pay. With empty mempool, 4 MB per 10 minutes is quite slow transfer, so to push 4 GB video, it would take at least 1000 blocks, so about a week. Also, assuming one satoshi per stored byte, it would cost 0.01 BTC per megabyte, so around 40 BTC for storing that with the lowest fees.

That means to store a home video would cost 1 million dollars on the bitcoin blockchain. I wonder if satoshi ever imagined that!

[pooya87]

So you admit that you can't do something on bitcoin that you can do on bsv, so that must mean that bsv has some kind of utility. now the thing is, you call bsv a shit chain but don't explain why so i deduct a few points for that... you been watching the trial??

Animal manure (poop) is used as fertilizer in farming but that doesn't change the fact that it is still poop.

Cryptocurrency and specifically bitcoin has a clear definition, using an immutable blockchain, fully decentralized, censorship resistant, etc. Copycat-coins such as BSV that are abusing the name "bitcoin" have none of these characteristics ergo they are categorized as shitcoins.

[vjudeu]

That means to store a home video would cost 1 million dollars on the bitcoin blockchain. I wonder if satoshi ever imagined that!

I admire the flexibility of the scripts-in-a-transaction scheme, but my evil little mind immediately starts to think of ways I might abuse it.  I could encode all sorts of interesting information in the TxOut script, and if non-hacked clients validated-and-then-ignored those transactions it would be a useful covert broadcast communication channel.

That's a cool feature until it gets popular and somebody decides it would be fun to flood the payment network with millions of transactions to transfer the latest Lady Gaga video to all their friends...

That's one of the reasons for transaction fees.  There are other things we can do if necessary.

As you can see, people thought about that many years ago. And transaction fees were introduced to protect the network from spam. Satoshi's reply wasn't: "yes, you can upload videos to the blockchain", but rather "fees are needed to discourage people from doing that".

[larry_vw_1955]

That means to store a home video would cost 1 million dollars on the bitcoin blockchain. I wonder if satoshi ever imagined that!

I admire the flexibility of the scripts-in-a-transaction scheme, but my evil little mind immediately starts to think of ways I might abuse it.  I could encode all sorts of interesting information in the TxOut script, and if non-hacked clients validated-and-then-ignored those transactions it would be a useful covert broadcast communication channel.

That's a cool feature until it gets popular and somebody decides it would be fun to flood the payment network with millions of transactions to transfer the latest Lady Gaga video to all their friends...

That's one of the reasons for transaction fees.  There are other things we can do if necessary.

As you can see, people thought about that many years ago. And transaction fees were introduced to protect the network from spam. Satoshi's reply wasn't: "yes, you can upload videos to the blockchain", but rather "fees are needed to discourage people from doing that".

I guess Satoshi wasn't a fan of lady gaga. that's the takeaway  shame he doesn't come around here anymore. i wonder what "other things" he had up his sleeve to deal with lady gaga fanboys and girls.

[BlackHatCoiner]

So you admit that you can't do something on bitcoin that you can do on bsv, so that must mean that bsv has some kind of utility.

It doesn't. In my opinion, any fork that's highly manipulated by one entity and can't scale has no utility. Mainly, because it isn't censorship resistant. Better share your videos with torrents or if you're too cool for school, use Tor and sleep easy.

Animal manure (poop) is used as fertilizer in farming but that doesn't change the fact that it is still poop.

Animal manure is useful. BSV is like a non-utilized form of shit. 

I guess Satoshi wasn't a fan of lady gaga.

I'm sure they had a poker face, though. 

[larry_vw_1955]

Cryptocurrency and specifically bitcoin has a clear definition, using an immutable blockchain, fully decentralized, censorship resistant, etc. Copycat-coins such as BSV that are abusing the name "bitcoin" have none of these characteristics ergo they are categorized as shitcoins.

AFAIK,anyone can become a miner in bsv. also keep in mind that bitcoin hash power is conenctrated in the hands of just a few large miners from what i've heard.

It doesn't. In my opinion, any fork that's highly manipulated by one entity and can't scale has no utility. Mainly, because it isn't censorship resistant. Better share your videos with torrents or if you're too cool for school, use Tor and sleep easy.

torrents only stay online as long as people keep sharing it. it's not going to be around forever. blockchains are meant to be around longer than torrents. so storing data is one utility that a blockchain could offer, dont you think? i think we could agree that bitcoin doesn't really offer that service.

torrents are probably alot more susceptible to being taken down than blockchain data. with regards to copyright infringement issues or legality things.

[PrimeNumber7]

You could only achieve this on a shit chain such as BSV's, as the blocks can't weight more than 4MBs in Bitcoin.

It depends how long you want to wait and how much you are willing to pay. With empty mempool, 4 MB per 10 minutes is quite slow transfer, so to push 4 GB video, it would take at least 1000 blocks, so about a week. Also, assuming one satoshi per stored byte, it would cost 0.01 BTC per megabyte, so around 40 BTC for storing that with the lowest fees.

Also note that you can upload any data in a hidden way. For example, you can use some HD wallet to generate pseudorandom keys, then you can tweak them with 32-byte chunks from your video file. When all coins will be moved back to your wallet and you will have a lot of confirmations, then you can release your xprv and release some program that will extract that data.

Another thing is you don't have to actually pay that 40 BTC to do that. If you are some big exchange with some significant liquidity, then you move a lot of coins in your daily transactions, so all that you need is tweaking keys with chunks of data you want to store. Also if you can produce deterministic signatures, then you can tweak them too. So the true cost is not really 40 BTC, but rather 4 GB / 32 byte keys = around 2^27 keys. If you assume each output has one public key and one signature, it would mean the total cost is spending 2^26 outputs. So if you have that much traffic with random keys, you can upload videos for free, just by switching to deterministic keys and signatures, and tweaking them with your data.

You are describing something that a very specific person could cause to be on the blockchain, but would not be easily accessible to anyone besides yourself.

I might argue that you could potentially find a nearly arbitrary x amount of data (with some size limitations) using a complex algorithm to find the data. You could probably do the same thing with a series of 600k 1MB chunks of random data.

As you mentioned, it would cost millions of dollars in TX fees to publish data of copyrighted material. Most copyrighted material is already available online, but people don’t pirate it because it is very cheap to access most copyrighted data legitimately (for example via Netflix, or Spotify).

[pooya87]

AFAIK,anyone can become a miner in bsv.

Anyone can mine any shitcoin that is mineable. That doesn't change any of the things I said.

also keep in mind that bitcoin hash power is conenctrated in the hands of just a few large miners from what i've heard.

No it is not.

[larry_vw_1955]

Anyone can mine any shitcoin that is mineable. That doesn't change any of the things I said.

let's see what you did say...

Cryptocurrency and specifically bitcoin has a clear definition, using an immutable blockchain, fully decentralized, censorship resistant, etc. Copycat-coins such as BSV that are abusing the name "bitcoin" have none of these characteristics ergo they are categorized as shitcoins

fully decentralized means anyone can mine. check for bsv.
immutable blockchain means it's hard to do 51% attack. that hasn't happened to bsv in the last few months has it?
censorship resistant means the following: "Censorship resistance refers to the idea that no party can prevent anyone from participating in a given platform or network". I think bsv meets that definition. as do almost all cryptocurrencies I am aware of.

i know bsv is not on the level of btc in terms of peoples' trust here but still. i think it's better than some shitcoins out there. like shiba inu maybe?? you cant seriously tell me that bsv is not a more serious project than something like shiba inu...but i guess you will.

[pooya87]

fully decentralized means anyone can mine. check for bsv.

Decentralization is so much more than whether or not you can mine it.

immutable blockchain means it's hard to do 51% attack. that hasn't happened to bsv in the last few months has it?

Wrong. Immutability means the blockchain is not going to change. They have already rolled back some blocks at least once which means BSV blockchain has not been immutable ever since then.
This is also the indication of how centralized BSV and its mining is.

censorship resistant means the following: "Censorship resistance refers to the idea that no party can prevent anyone from participating in a given platform or network". I think bsv meets that definition. as do almost all cryptocurrencies I am aware of.

Wrong. BSV was built on the idea that users do not need to and must not run full nodes. This means the node will be and should be run by centralized companies that can decide which transaction to relay and which one to reject, ie. to censor.

[NotATether]

As nodes are not used for transportation of arbitrary large files in OP_RETURN scripts anymore, this is no longer a problem for bitcoin nodes.

It is only a problem for actual P2P sharing protocols such as Bittorrent (which I hope makes it clear that such technology's ports will be blocked by ISPs, and you getting sent eviction notices from your ISP)

[larry_vw_1955]

I don't know how what exactly you heard (and how you remember it), but it probably refer to hashrate distribution between multiple pools. But according to Blockchair, hashrate distribution on Bitcoin (https://blockchair.com/bitcoin/charts/hashrate-distribution) is more healthy compared with BSV (https://blockchair.com/bitcoin-sv/charts/hashrate-distribution).

"More healthy" doesnt mean healthy though. I think that graphic proves my point. You have bitcoin mining power concentrated into about 5 main pools. Yes, BSV is even worse at 2 main pools but they are both not anywhere near being "distributed". They both have a large "Unknown" percentage which is roughly the same for each so that cancels out.

SHIB isn't even coin/cryptocurrency, but only token.

i would have thought it was but what does that really matter? my question still stands.

It is only a problem for actual P2P sharing protocols such as Bittorrent (which I hope makes it clear that such technology's ports will be blocked by ISPs, and you getting sent eviction notices from your ISP)

i actually heard or read somewhere that running a bitcoin node some isps don't like that and will issue you a warning for it. not sure how true that is...

[BlackHatCoiner]

AFAIK,anyone can become a miner in bsv.

Yes, and everyone has a moment of speaking, but that doesn't make it necessarily a free speech. Obviously you can help to extend the chain, but you should be aware that the blocks may be censored. And they've been in the past.

torrents only stay online as long as people keep sharing it. it's not going to be around forever.

Neither will the BSV chain.  

torrents are probably alot more susceptible to being taken down than blockchain data.

Bullshit. It's peer-to-peer! Once you shut down a seeder after you've found out they've transferred copyrighted content, which isn't a walk in the park since the information isn't publicly announced, there may be others willing to re-share it!

fully decentralized means anyone can mine. check for bsv.

No need to add “fully”; redundancy. A decentralized system means it doesn't have a central point of failure.

you cant seriously tell me that bsv is not a more serious project than something like shiba inu

What have I done, God, to deserve answering this comparison?

[Ucy]

A decentralized and censorship resistant system does not mean things should be lawless. There should be good/fair rules (must not be written rules) it should be based on.
 You could have people enjoy the all the benefits of decentralized system but when the law is broken they could lose those benefits and the system could automatically censor them or the system could hand the moderation part to humans to handle in automated way.

[NotATether]

i actually heard or read somewhere that running a bitcoin node some isps don't like that and will issue you a warning for it. not sure how true that is...

It's more because of the enormous bandwidth it spits out than the content of that bandwidth (network activity measurements show my node pulls a few dozen G's a day during the IBD). And the warnings are mainly about throttling your internet speed.