[XMR] Monero - A secure, private, untraceable cryptocurrency

[BitcoinDN.com]

The only moves that I will commend with regards to emission are that if you don't like the emission, either fork and try to get people to use your fork or to just create a merge mined coin with a longer emission.

Just to be clear, that means that emission will remain like it is except obviously for what to decide for the final years OR that in case emission is changed we can always fork it and do whatever we want?

Oh, sorry, I meant with regard to increasing inflation dramatically at the current time, not the perpetual inflation at year 10 as discussed a long, long time ago and which was generally well received by the community. This I am strongly in support of, but a lot of my support for this is in the anticipation that it will secure the network perpetually.

That is a great solution. If I understand correctly, the goal is to allow Monero to penetrate general acceptance in it's current emission, and then tail off to an inflationary cycle for perpetuity during the general use everyday stage?

I would just like to revoice my concern that in the case of a 1% post-mine or block reward subsidy to devs, this general acceptance is less likely to occur due to the attitude of the general crypto community. They will all (rightfully) bash Monero as a scam if there is any sort of atonement to the developers, even if it is only to repay costs. While it isn't fair for developers to subside gains for whales, it is also not fair to jeopardize the entire project for the sake of the few (but important).

[GreekBitcoin]

The only moves that I will commend with regards to emission are that if you don't like the emission, either fork and try to get people to use your fork or to just create a merge mined coin with a longer emission.

Just to be clear, that means that emission will remain like it is except obviously for what to decide for the final years OR that in case emission is changed we can always fork it and do whatever we want?

Oh, sorry, I meant with regard to increasing inflation dramatically at the current time, not the perpetual inflation at year 10 as discussed a long, long time ago and which was generally well received by the community. This I am strongly in support of, but a lot of my support for this is in the anticipation that it will secure the network perpetually.

Nice!


Now can we all discuss how to fund the team?

[NewLiberty]

The only moves that I will commend with regards to emission are that if you don't like the emission, either fork and try to get people to use your fork or to just create a merge mined coin with a longer emission.

A merge mined fork with a very low, very long (perpetual?) emission would also reward mining, and provide for new entrants into many future generations.  It is something to consider.  It would preserve the currency XMR scarcity.

If it uses the same codebase, with only the emission parameters changed, it could solve the problems for everyone without a huge new burden.
Something to think about anyway.  There would be a lot of details to consider first.

[smooth]

Barring this, you can notice very strong opinions for and against the post-mine, for and against the miner fee, for and against changing the emission curve. I am not debating them, but it should be obvious to all by now they are very controversial and all damage trust in one way or another.

I don't necessarily agree. In such matters of practice, you must always ask the question, compared to what. A decision not to act is still a decision. The community trusts us to be good custodians and do the right thing with respect to ongoing development of the project. Failing to act when a strong case has been made in favor of acting, even if some controversy remains, could equally damage trust.

What is "the right thing" is certainly contentious and on that I agree entirely with your comments above.

I do not give the status quo any inherent advantage when considering a proposed change in its merits. There may be considerations that weigh in favor of the status quo, but they must still be weighed, not assumed.

Regarding the later question of subsidizing whales. All can rest assured that our decisions are most certainly not influenced by that consideration, at least not positively. If you want to be cynical about it, consider that we are not whales so we would be acting against our direct interests to do that. In any case, it is not going to happen.

Reasonable opinions may differ about the effect of various changes of course. I don't happen to think that inflation affects the price of the coin much at all within a reasonable range and assuming no change in the long term supply.

[NewLiberty]

Now can we all discuss how to fund the team?

That discussion is close to the hearts of the Monero Economic Group.  Have you joined?
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=776479.0;topicseen

[smooth]

Now can we all discuss how to fund the team?

Certainly yes. I remind that there is no immediate funding crisis. The work is getting done and the team remains, for the time being, comfortable with subsidizing the project with our own time and money.

So fix it yes, but don't panic.

[tacotime]

That is a great solution. If I understand correctly, the goal is to allow Monero to penetrate general acceptance in it's current emission, and then tail off to an inflationary cycle for perpetuity during the general use everyday stage?

I would just like to revoice my concern that in the case of a 1% post-mine or block reward subsidy to devs, this general acceptance is less likely to occur due to the attitude of the general crypto community. They will all (rightfully) bash Monero as a scam if there is any sort of atonement to the developers, even if it is only to repay costs. While it isn't fair for developers to subside gains for whales, it is also not fair to jeopardize the entire project for the sake of the few (but important).

Yeah. Currently with XMR we won't see single digit inflation until well into year 4, so between now and then users will be able to buy in cheaply.

[GreekBitcoin]

Now can we all discuss how to fund the team?

That discussion is close to the hearts of the Monero Economic Group.  Have you joined?
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=776479.0;topicseen

I will soon

Certainly yes. I remind that there is no immediate funding crisis. The work is getting done and the team remains, for the time being, comfortable with subsidizing the project with our own time and money.

So fix it yes, but don't panic.

Good to know because it felt for a moment that we were panicking indeed

[xulescu]

During the April vote (around 200k MRO were mined) I and others strongly argued to make the emission twice longer and halve everyone's holdings. Alternatively, one could have doubled the emission forward (denomination) for the same net effect but without the "taking away half ma coins" factor. The second option was psychologically better.

I don't think either is an option anymore. We know the story of Monero's inception and how the curve is twice faster than it should be because thankful_for_today doubled the block frequency in the last moment without adjusting the block reward. In this sense, yes, the emission curve is wrong. However, how many of Monero's CURRENT users know that? Back then there were very few users so taking the first option would have been much less traumatic than now.

I insist that changing the emission curve is at this point to only be considered in force majeure (only if the alternative is certain death of the currency) because itself bears a tremendous risk to kill the currency. No matter what I or you or the early adopters think, for the crypto community at large changing the emission curve to favour the early adopters directly is taboo. It should not even be on the table.

Another issue that gets to me from time to time is any discussion about the "total" or "final" emission. We know and have always known that the "final" emission is infinite. Defining "final" as "when the tail starts" is inane as long as we don't know when the tail starts. The only metric we have is the emission curve (or its derivative, the block reward curve).

All three of (1) post-mine (2) moving emission around and (3) miner fee, even if they violate the emission curve, are strictly (much) more palatable alternatives to outright slowing the emission curve. And all three are strictly (much) worse than fundraising through any other methods. Even issuing MEW voting rights as a PoS asset is better, because it does not affect Monero the coin.

Sorry for the brash words but I feel this point is not getting across. Changing Slowing the emission curve is taboo. In this respect, the status quo is inherently better simply because it is the status quo. It's not my opinion, it's my opinion of the market/community opinion. You may disagree with this, but read the last pages again.

I am one of the first 50 if not fewer people involved in Monero and it is my only non-BTC holding. I will dump all and probably never touch alts again if the emission is slowed. In my mind, the risk far outweighs the benefits if things work OK. I am sure I am far from the only one in this situation.

[smooth]

changing the emission curve to favour the early adopters directly is taboo. It should not even be on the table.

I agree. But we are still left with the question of what favors the early adopters (presumably this means over later adopters?) and what does not.

Example:

I mined in block 10 hold on to my coins, never buy or sell, and never mine again.

How does shifting around the rewards in various ways (unspecified) between blocks 11 and 1 million but without changing the total number of such coins mined affect me one way or the other?

I suppose there are extreme cases where it likely does. For example, moving all the rewards to block 11 and then having no rewards. In that case, it is likely no mining occurs and the coin dies, so it does affect me.

Leaving out those obviously harmful permutations, how does this affect me as an early adopter?

[xulescu]

changing the emission curve to favour the early adopters directly is taboo. It should not even be on the table.

I agree. But we are still left with the question of what favors the early adopters (presumably this means over later adopters?) and what does not.

Example:

I mined in block 10 hold on to my coins, never buy or sell, and never mine again.

How does shifting around the rewards in various ways (unspecified) between blocks 11 and 1 million but without changing the total number of such coins mined affect me one way or the other?

I suppose there are extreme cases where it likely does. For example, moving all the rewards to block 11 and then having no rewards. In that case, it is likely no mining occurs and the coin dies, so it does affect me.

Leaving out those obviously harmful permutations, how does this affect me as an early adopter?

I have argued above that the bolded phrase is meaningless. Please read my post again.

EDIT (to prevent double post): I proved maybe ~50 pages earlier that Monero's block reward is actually a simple exponential decay once you solve the recurrence relation. This means that the emission curve is really only defined by three parameters: constant term (premine, 0), reward of first block (17.something but can be normalized to 1 for this discussion) and base of exponential (reward "decay factor", which is 1 - 2^-something * 10^-something, a value very close to 1). I claim there are good reasons for the exponential form and should not be changed. Now let's consider our options:

1. A post-mine changes the constant factor and a posteriori (i.e. for later adopters) it is the same as a premine, which is frowned upon. A 1% premine seems to be acceptable, but one of Monero's main selling points was ZERO premine. Even 0.1% is much larger than 0. As I noted before, I would accept a 1% post-mine but only if other methods of fundraising have failed.

2. Changing the normalization factor is equivalent to a redenomination. This would have been acceptable in April (second option in my previous post) but I do not believe it is the case now. I think doing this will kill the coin with p > 0.5. Increasing the normalization factor is the second option in the previous post, decreasing the normalization factor is a posteriori equivalent to a fastmine.

3. increasing the decay factor is a posteriori equivalent to a fastmine. See (2) above. Increasing the decay factor is the same situation as decreasing the normalization factor.

So to sum up, any of [increase|decrease] the [normalization|decay] factor, as well as increasing the constant factor, clearly and directly affects one of [early|late] adopters to the advantage of the other group. Fucked if you do, fucked if you don't. And in this situation, the only winning move is to not play.

[smooth]

but without changing the total number of such coins mined affect me one way or the other?

I have argued above that the bolded phrase is meaningless. Please read my post again.

Okay fair enough. Do you feel my argument is valid for Bitcoin?

I think I might argue that it isn't, because a finite supply is just as impossible for Bitcoin as it is for Monero, but they just haven't realized it yet.

[xulescu]

but without changing the total number of such coins mined affect me one way or the other?

I have argued above that the bolded phrase is meaningless. Please read my post again.

Okay fair enough. Do you feel my argument is valid for Bitcoin?

I think I might argue that it isn't, because a finite supply is just as impossible for Bitcoin as it is for Monero, but they just haven't realized it yet.

Firstly, please read my previous post again, I have written more.

What is your argument exactly? I don't care about Bitcoin, that's why I'm here. Bitcoin left the sanity world a long time ago.

[David Latapie]

Wait, Risto says you are one of the 7 developers. But you pay someone else to develop? :Mind Blown:

We do. A lot. Even by allocating as much of our time to it, we do not have enough manpower by ourselves, even including the volunteer developers. So, yes, we outsource. And outsourcing is rarely free. Remember, we don't have 5 years of Bitcoin shoulders to stand on, especially considering we are addressing issues Bitcoin did not (and may never do).
Note: this is not as much a reply to a possible troll than something that new readers would be interested in reading.

[windjc]

I am one of the first 50 if not fewer people involved in Monero and it is my only non-BTC holding. I will dump all and probably never touch alts again if the emission is slowed. In my mind, the risk far outweighs the benefits if things work OK. I am sure I am far from the only one in this situation.

I have heard this mentality over and over again from BTC turned XMR supporters. And I admit that I was a part of this group for a while.  But, I assume that you got involved with XMR either because A) You believed in the tech and realized that Bitcoin would never go the way of Anon and you wanted to be a part of a tech that could fill that market or B) you had BTC friends that recommended the coin so there was "group think" involved or C) Both.

Now the part I don't understand is, if XMR lets you down, why you would never touch other alts? XMR let me and others down and but we still believed in CryptoNote tech and the need for a real Anon to fill that market. So BBR was the choice for me - for others it was other CN coins.

Unless the only reason you got involved was "B," why would you leave CryptoNote for good?

[David Latapie]

I doubt any not technically expert from MEW will try to make changes in the technically expect of coin. Since if goes wrong price would fall and their reason why are here would go down.

It is my belief that if it is technical, this should not even be discussed in the MEW. MEW is about adoption, ecosystem, B2B. To each their own and overlap should be minimal (although probably not non-existant).

Let the DEV's work on the code and let MEW build a viable peripheral economy.

I agree and not only I hope but it all looks like this is the case here.

+1

[smooth]

for others it was other CN coins.

Now I know you are full of shit and just throwing FUD bombs over here.

No serious experienced players in the crypto scene are remotely interested in "other CN coins" with the possible exception of those who are interested in Bytecoin as the first technical implementation (but still would never buy it).

The only one remotely worth considering would be duckNote/darkNote and its is pretty clear that nobody takes it all that seriously. Some of us find their marketing mildly amusing, but expecting anyone to view that as a substitute for Monero is silly.

What "other" ones are there? FCN/QCN/MCN? That boat sailed a long time ago.

[aminorex]

I think developer block funding (not 100% sure about the latter) in a rather formal process which means the question won't go away and must be addressed.

It will go away if we (you) stop raising it.

Unfortunately this can't stop the discussion of the reward curve for the reason stated above.

In the MEW I suggested that emission in excess of adoption was bad because it concentrates wealth, and creates a 'common knowledge' of unfairness.  
I also suggested that the best way to fix this is not to change emission but to grow adoption faster than emission can decline.  I prefer to discuss this topic there.
I don want the subject "decided" in the public mind by bytecoin trolls.

[windjc]

for others it was other CN coins.

Now I know you are full of shit and just throwing FUD bombs over here.

No serious experienced players in the crypto scene are remotely interested in "other CN coins" with the possible exception of those who are interested in Bytecoin as the first technical implementation (but still would never buy it).

The only one remotely worth considering would be duckNote/darkNote and its is pretty clear that nobody takes it all that seriously. Some of us find their marketing mildly amusing, but expecting anyone to view that as a substitute for Monero is silly.

What "other" ones are there? FCN/QCN/MCN? That boat sailed a long time ago.

Look, I agree with you. But some people (there were discussions even with crypto colleagues of mine) invested in FCN and QCN. So I am not going to just dismiss the investments of people I personally know.

But, your right, there is only one viable alternative at this time, although I don't know much at Darknote, so I won't right out dismiss it either.

[aminorex]

I am one of the first 50 if not fewer people involved in Monero and it is my only non-BTC holding. I will dump all and probably never touch alts again if the emission is slowed. In my mind, the risk far outweighs the benefits if things work OK. I am sure I am far from the only one in this situation.

if XMR lets you down, why you would never touch other alts? ... why would you leave CryptoNote for good?

XMR was formed to avoid scams.  Everything else is a scam, or threatens a scam.  The realistic alternative is to fork XMR for fair emission.  But that is too hard (expensive) and likely to fail, due to XMRs huge lead.  Better to buy counterfeit Euros.