rpietila Altcoin Observer

[HardwarePal]

DRK is somewhat better even though using coinjoin but with only 140 masternodes (140K USD +- for someone to have 50% of them) and then you have bad actors.

Apparently mixer based bitcoin clone solutions are working on improving their anonymity, and cryptonote based solutions are working on improving their usability.

Sorry for the misinformation about DRK. I remember seeing 140 in the charts.

Usability is fairly easy imo for Cryptonote but yes a GUI wallet will be alot easier for non techy individuals.

[IntroVert]

Seems there has been some ferocious selling of XMR today - there was a lot of trolling at polo about VTR this morning - with some new anon feature being released which caused a migration from xmr to vtr. Does VTR have anything to offer? or is it just another pump and dump. Does it just use the coinjoin feature?

It's just a mixer. Mixer are not anonymous.

I don't know anything about any VTR, but if you can't prove who sent what to whom after a mixer has been used, isn't that anonymity for all practical purposes? Especially if any "academically more exciting" solution has more practical obstacles to overcome before mass adoption is possible?

A mixer do not make a transaction anonymous. It just mix transactions (as you can guess by the name) between peers but you can always retrace.

Thanks for your reply. yes sorry i was meaning vertcoin - the reddit post which explained how their "stealth" worked was so confusing i could not get my head round it. But yes it seems if you know the amount of VRT sent then you can trace it - and it is closed source as well. i just could not believe the huge spike in buys just after the stealth feature was released, thought it must be something good...but it just seems like its the latest alt to be focussed on by the pump and dumpers.

Stealth addresses (Sx) are a mechanism that provides transactions with better privacy protection than regular transactions. A receiving party generates a key that it shares with the sending party which becomes the basis for the transaction. The transaction is obfuscated on the blockchain. As far as I understand it, there is no mixing of any kind. It seems they have implemented it in a way that is relatively simple to use; if you think that the reddit explanation is complicated, try http://coin.cubeconnex.com/poollist and click on Stealth Address for alternative one.

With regard to the Sx code being closed source, I think that is due to VTC team's frustration that some of their code was being aped by other coins without giving proper credit. From their thread it seems they want to publicize the fact that they are the first to implement Sx and once that is done they would open the code. I would give them the benefit of the doubt here, that team has been one of the few that has been on the up and up with regard to promoting open source development.

Edit: Some of the screenshots reference Monocle, which the VTC team released to support merged mining with other N-scrypt coins. The Sx feature was first released on the Monocle mainnet, and today on Vertcoin's. Don't let the references to Monocle in the screenshots confuse you, the mechanics of a end user utilizing Sx are identical.

[cAPSLOCK]

you can always retrace the transaction

I'd need a second (and a third) opinion before I can accept that claim. That surely has to depend on how the mixer has been implemented as well, right?

I am assuming after minimal research that Vertcoins new "stealth address" feature actually IS somewhat different than just trustless mixing.  If it actually succeeds at strong privacy is another question I am still trying to answer.

I was lucky to be awake for the Vertcoin announcement and day traded (night traded? myself a little cost free position in them.  So now a have a small pile of them sitting on an exchange, and will remain sleepily interested in them.

Would love to hear more insightful opinions.

[btc-mike]

DRK is somewhat better even though using coinjoin but with only 140 masternodes (140K USD +- for someone to have 50% of them) and then you have bad actors.

There are 500 drk masternodes running at the moment, and to buy one you'd need $9,000. Within a month or so I believe there will be between 1000 and 2000. Not to mention if you start buying hundreds of them what would happen to the price.

Apparently mixer based bitcoin clone solutions are working on improving their anonymity, and cryptonote based solutions are working on improving their usability.

Why do you believe the MN count will go up?

[aminorex]

you can always retrace the transaction

I'd need a second (and a third) opinion before I can accept that claim. That surely has to depend on how the mixer has been implemented as well, right?

I am assuming after minimal research that Vertcoins new "stealth address" feature actually IS somewhat different than just trustless mixing.  If it actually succeeds at strong privacy is another question I am still trying to answer.

I was lucky to be awake for the Vertcoin announcement and day traded (night traded? myself a little cost free position in them.  So now a have a small pile of them sitting on an exchange, and will remain sleepily interested in them.

Would love to hear more insightful opinions.

As I understand it they are similar to darkwallet stealth addresses in bitcoin.  They obfuscate by generating nonce addresses:  The recipient can generate key pairs, while the sender can generate public keys.  All of the transactions remain transparent in the block chain, and thus it provides no incremental anonymity beyond simply generating one-time addresses.  What it does do is make key distribution for a sequence of one-time addresses a one-time event.  I.e. the value add of stealth addressing is the reduction of key-distribution channel bandwidth and latency, no more, no less.

[illodin]

DRK is somewhat better even though using coinjoin but with only 140 masternodes (140K USD +- for someone to have 50% of them) and then you have bad actors.

There are 500 drk masternodes running at the moment, and to buy one you'd need $9,000. Within a month or so I believe there will be between 1000 and 2000. Not to mention if you start buying hundreds of them what would happen to the price.

Apparently mixer based bitcoin clone solutions are working on improving their anonymity, and cryptonote based solutions are working on improving their usability.

Why do you believe the MN count will go up?

Because some of the large holders haven't set up their nodes yet - there's been talks of a "multi-ticketed" node feature coming that would allow large holders to store let's say 5k coins in an address and have that node get 5 "tickets" to the payment and mixing draw. Someone with 10k coins might not want to set up 10 separate nodes, but would likely set up 2 (or 1 if max ticket amount is 10+). So I think some whales are waiting for that. But it's not sure thing to happen yet, so if the multi-ticket feature doesn't happen, they'll just have to suck it up and set up multiple nodes. And, people will likely arrange node "pools" where you can participate with for example 100 coins and get 10% of the profits. This will help small time holders to participate as well.

[cAPSLOCK]

As I understand it they are similar to darkwallet stealth addresses in bitcoin.  They obfuscate by generating nonce addresses:  The recipient can generate key pairs, while the sender can generate public keys.  All of the transactions remain transparent in the block chain, and thus it provides no incremental anonymity beyond simply generating one-time addresses.  What it does do is make key distribution for a sequence of one-time addresses a one-time event.  I.e. the value add of stealth addressing is the reduction of key-distribution channel bandwidth and latency, no more, no less.

This afternoon my due diligence amounted to your last statement.  My little pile of free Vertcoins will most likely be sold on the next wave up if there is one.  Seems like a fairly unscammy coin, but also fairly shallow on real useful features IMO.  I certainly hope the devs involved where I have most of my risk are as eager to fulfill their vision as the Vertcoin devs seem to be.

[darlidada]

DRK is somewhat better even though using coinjoin but with only 140 masternodes (140K USD +- for someone to have 50% of them) and then you have bad actors.

There are 500 drk masternodes running at the moment, and to buy one you'd need $9,000. Within a month or so I believe there will be between 1000 and 2000. Not to mention if you start buying hundreds of them what would happen to the price.

Apparently mixer based bitcoin clone solutions are working on improving their anonymity, and cryptonote based solutions are working on improving their usability.

Why do you believe the MN count will go up?

Because some of the large holders haven't set up their nodes yet - there's been talks of a "multi-ticketed" node feature coming that would allow large holders to store let's say 5k coins in an address and have that node get 5 "tickets" to the payment and mixing draw. Someone with 10k coins might not want to set up 10 separate nodes, but would likely set up 2 (or 1 if max ticket amount is 10+). So I think some whales are waiting for that. But it's not sure thing to happen yet, so if the multi-ticket feature doesn't happen, they'll just have to suck it up and set up multiple nodes. And, people will likely arrange node "pools" where you can participate with for example 100 coins and get 10% of the profits. This will help small time holders to participate as well.

Every time I see someone mention darkcoin and its darknodes I can't help but think about Ptolemaic epicycles.

[aminorex]

Every time I see someone mention darkcoin and its darknodes I can't help but think about Ptolemaic epicycles.

Apt, in more ways than one

[canonsburg]

Isn't "stealth addresses" essentially what CryptoNotes coins like Monero have already by default? It's what the whitepaper refers to as "unlinkable payments" and part of the reason why CryptoNote addresses are twice as long as Bitcoin addresses.

But Monero also has "untraceable transactions", using one-time ring signatures, which other coins are trying to use coinjoin to get the "same" effect.

[darkota]

Isn't "stealth addresses" essentially what CryptoNotes coins like Monero have already by default? It's what the whitepaper refers to as "unlinkable payments" and part of the reason why CryptoNote addresses are twice as long as Bitcoin addresses.

But Monero also has "untraceable transactions", using one-time ring signatures, which other coins are trying to use coinjoin to get the "same" effect.

Yes, Cryptonote's(Monero) already offer all of that.

[sonoIO]

I'm not much of a trader but I think something is happening with DRK. Feel sorry for people that tied their funds to MasterNodes.

[cAPSLOCK]

Every time I see someone mention darkcoin and its darknodes I can't help but think about Ptolemaic epicycles.

That's funny.  I happen to hold exactly (√-1) Darkcoin.

[hodlmybtc]

Hey everyone, I'm new to altcoins and Monero in particular and after a little bit of reading just bought about 140 XRM at about 0.00357 after fees at MintPal.

This is my only altcoin I've ever bought and got a couple of questions:

1: What's the best (for newbies) usable Monero wallet at the moment?

2: What would you guys think is a good percentage of Monero holding : BTC holding at the moment? I believe Monero will be pretty popular soon (if it isn't already) and don't want to miss out so I could definately switch a high percentage of my BTC holdings towards Monero if that adviseable.

Thanks!

[btc-mike]

DRK is somewhat better even though using coinjoin but with only 140 masternodes (140K USD +- for someone to have 50% of them) and then you have bad actors.

There are 500 drk masternodes running at the moment, and to buy one you'd need $9,000. Within a month or so I believe there will be between 1000 and 2000. Not to mention if you start buying hundreds of them what would happen to the price.

Apparently mixer based bitcoin clone solutions are working on improving their anonymity, and cryptonote based solutions are working on improving their usability.

Why do you believe the MN count will go up?

Because some of the large holders haven't set up their nodes yet - there's been talks of a "multi-ticketed" node feature coming that would allow large holders to store let's say 5k coins in an address and have that node get 5 "tickets" to the payment and mixing draw. Someone with 10k coins might not want to set up 10 separate nodes, but would likely set up 2 (or 1 if max ticket amount is 10+). So I think some whales are waiting for that. But it's not sure thing to happen yet, so if the multi-ticket feature doesn't happen, they'll just have to suck it up and set up multiple nodes. And, people will likely arrange node "pools" where you can participate with for example 100 coins and get 10% of the profits. This will help small time holders to participate as well.

I haven't been following closely and wanted to see if there were any new developments. There aren't.

The multi-ticket system has been talked about for months. Someone has been promoting a masternode service for over a month.

[statdude]

Hey everyone, I'm new to altcoins and Monero in particular and after a little bit of reading just bought about 140 XRM at about 0.00357 after fees at MintPal.

This is my only altcoin I've ever bought and got a couple of questions:

1: What's the best (for newbies) usable Monero wallet at the moment?

2: What would you guys think is a good percentage of Monero holding : BTC holding at the moment? I believe Monero will be pretty popular soon (if it isn't already) and don't want to miss out so I could definately switch a high percentage of my BTC holdings towards Monero if that adviseable.

Thanks!

There is a GUI looking good depending on your platform.
Everyone seems to use SimpleWallet. Maybe someone can post the URL to the guide.

2) At least 10% IMO depending on your risk tolerance and cost basis - good prices available to get in. Typically they say a stock trader should put no more than 10% per investment to mitigate risk. So, let's double that for a "strong" investment.

[illodin]

The multi-ticket system has been talked about for months.

Yea, I'm not sure if it's a good idea or not. Large holders obv want it.

[nioc]

Hey everyone, I'm new to altcoins and Monero in particular and after a little bit of reading just bought about 140 XRM at about 0.00357 after fees at MintPal.

This is my only altcoin I've ever bought and got a couple of questions:

1: What's the best (for newbies) usable Monero wallet at the moment?

2: What would you guys think is a good percentage of Monero holding : BTC holding at the moment? I believe Monero will be pretty popular soon (if it isn't already) and don't want to miss out so I could definately switch a high percentage of my BTC holdings towards Monero if that adviseable.

Thanks!

There is a GUI looking good depending on your platform.
Everyone seems to use SimpleWallet. Maybe someone can post the URL to the guide.

2) At least 10% IMO depending on your risk tolerance and cost basis - good prices available to get in. Typically they say a stock trader should put no more than 10% per investment to mitigate risk. So, let's double that for a "strong" investment.

OK https://monerotalk.org/t/bounty-create-a-useful-tutorial-on-how-to-setup-monero-closed/13

10% you say?  I had 100% in btc.  Of that I put a significant % in Monero. 

Btc is a sure thing.  Monero I haven't a clue.  So why did I do it?  I'm blaming the mirror neurons.

[hodlmybtc]

Thanks for the replies!

I'm downloading the wallet now and I will increase my Monero holdings to 10-15% today/tomorrow and maybe up to 20% later when I read more about it and play around with some small amounts.

[StoraGottes]

Does Monero have an alternative, desirable destination besides the moon? I'm checking Expedia and have a BTC burning a hole in my pocket.

Putting on a spacesuit just to go outside seems kind of 1960s to me. I think.."To da penthouse in Singapore" or "I just bought Dick Clark's old mansion in Malibu" seem more fitting for version 2.0. Not to take anything away from a nice castle.