Gold collapsing. Bitcoin UP.

[Adrian-x]

http://blockstream.com/2014/11/17/blockstream-a-champion-of-bitcoins-core-values/
http://blockstream.com/2014/11/17/blockstream-closes-21m-seed-round/

we all share a demonstrated commitment to advancing an open source, cryptographically-enabled future that supports user’s rights and freedoms and creates lasting public benefit.

These values are also core to the group of investors who participated in our seed round. Both Reid Hoffman and Vinod Khosla are well known for their deep commitment and generous contributions to companies, projects and causes that have benefited millions of people around the world. As Reid mentions in his post today, he sees Blockstream as similar to Mozilla (Reid is a board member of Mozilla).

“And that’s why I’m participating in this first-round financing as an individual investor, and why Blockstream itself will function similarly to the Mozilla Corporation. Here, our first interest is maintaining and enhancing Bitcoin’s strong open ecosystem. And the structure we’ve chosen will give us the freedom and flexibility to prioritize public good over returns to investors.”

We look forward to working with the community on fulfilling the potential of a faster pace of blockchain innovation, focussed and building on Bitcoin’s network-effect.

“Can’t be evil.” That was the first thing Adam Back and I wrote on a whiteboard at the start of the year.

Blockstream is the first startup focused on advancements to the core technology underpinning Bitcoin.
...
Blockstream is the first company extending the capabilities at the protocol level to support massive scaling of Bitcoin and blockchain technology to a broad range of asset types. Put another way, the extension mechanism of sidechains, the company’s initial area of focus, allows any number of so far unthought of developments to happen in an open and interoperable way.

Blockstream: A Champion of Bitcoin’s Core Values

Sounds like bad guys  

Sounds great, help me connect the dots. VC's invest $21M to improve Bitcoin, we assume it is going to add value to our Bitcoin holdings (at least you insist it will) yet BlockStream has no business plan, and the asset that is to go up in value as a result of this donation investment is not owned in large quantities by the VS's.

What is it they know that I don't, why not invest in BTC, or a company with a business plan? Or is it just that I don't know the business plan and they don't need BTC to capitalize on the proposed Bitcoin protocol change?

[brg444]

http://blockstream.com/2014/11/17/blockstream-a-champion-of-bitcoins-core-values/
http://blockstream.com/2014/11/17/blockstream-closes-21m-seed-round/

we all share a demonstrated commitment to advancing an open source, cryptographically-enabled future that supports user’s rights and freedoms and creates lasting public benefit.

These values are also core to the group of investors who participated in our seed round. Both Reid Hoffman and Vinod Khosla are well known for their deep commitment and generous contributions to companies, projects and causes that have benefited millions of people around the world. As Reid mentions in his post today, he sees Blockstream as similar to Mozilla (Reid is a board member of Mozilla).

“And that’s why I’m participating in this first-round financing as an individual investor, and why Blockstream itself will function similarly to the Mozilla Corporation. Here, our first interest is maintaining and enhancing Bitcoin’s strong open ecosystem. And the structure we’ve chosen will give us the freedom and flexibility to prioritize public good over returns to investors.”

We look forward to working with the community on fulfilling the potential of a faster pace of blockchain innovation, focussed and building on Bitcoin’s network-effect.

“Can’t be evil.” That was the first thing Adam Back and I wrote on a whiteboard at the start of the year.

Blockstream is the first startup focused on advancements to the core technology underpinning Bitcoin.
...
Blockstream is the first company extending the capabilities at the protocol level to support massive scaling of Bitcoin and blockchain technology to a broad range of asset types. Put another way, the extension mechanism of sidechains, the company’s initial area of focus, allows any number of so far unthought of developments to happen in an open and interoperable way.

Blockstream: A Champion of Bitcoin’s Core Values

Sounds like bad guys  

Sounds great, help me connect the dots. VC's invest $21M to improve Bitcoin, we assume it is going to add value to our Bitcoin holdings (at least you insist it will) yet BlockStream has no business plan, and the asset that is to go up in value as a result of this donation  is not owned in large quantities by the VS's.

What is it they havethat I don't...

Vision.

[Adrian-x]

Vision.

  That doesn't address the question, but the profit motive is missing how do they profit? As setup now Bitcoin isn't the winner.

[accesscoin]

Can a sidechain restrict the number of BTC converted to sidechainCOIN?

If they can be restricted, than value of scCOIN can grow but only be obtained via direct purchase and not btc conversion when the cap is hit. This removes value from the mainchain and will only be converted back to BTC if the scCOIN becomes less valuable than BTC again.

If it can’t be restricted then if the scCOIN value rises so does the value of BTC. Since anyone can use this extra value by converting BTC to it.

This should be true as far as both the mainchain and sidechain are representing value as a number. But what if the sidechain is more like a colored coin where an asset is represented by a token. I don’t know how that would affect the mainchain positively or negatively restricted or unrestricted.

[Adrian-x]

Can a sidechain restrict the number of BTC converted to sidechainCOIN?

If they can be restricted, than value of scCOIN can grow but only be obtained via direct purchase and not btc conversion when the cap is hit. This removes value from the mainchain and will only be converted back to BTC if the scCOIN becomes less valuable than BTC again.

If it can’t be restricted then if the scCOIN value rises so does the value of BTC. Since anyone can use this extra value by converting BTC to it.

This should be true as far as both the mainchain and sidechain are representing value as a number. But what if the sidechain is more like a colored coin where an asset is represented by a token. I don’t know how that would affect the mainchain positively or negatively restricted or unrestricted.

All options are feasible, even ugly tokens not pegged to the SideChain that is used to convert them.

[iCEBREAKER]

you should be able to understand  that it CANT be ALL on the mainchain.  There are diametrically opposed requirements.  Like anonymity vs. public spending accountability.  Like handling vast numbers of txns per second vs. keeping all transactions forever.  Like blockchain spam vs. document timestamping.  There are plenty of things with diametrically opposed requirements in life, like sleeping (darkness) and reading a book (bright light); its unrealistic to imagine no 2 applications will emerge in a space which covers the entire concept of economic activity.

All of that is true, ergo altcoins exist.

Your desired "forced buy in to BTC" is improper and unnecessary.

[accesscoin]

Can a sidechain restrict the number of BTC converted to sidechainCOIN?

If they can be restricted, than value of scCOIN can grow but only be obtained via direct purchase and not btc conversion when the cap is hit. This removes value from the mainchain and will only be converted back to BTC if the scCOIN becomes less valuable than BTC again.

If it can’t be restricted then if the scCOIN value rises so does the value of BTC. Since anyone can use this extra value by converting BTC to it.

This should be true as far as both the mainchain and sidechain are representing value as a number. But what if the sidechain is more like a colored coin where an asset is represented by a token. I don’t know how that would affect the mainchain positively or negatively restricted or unrestricted.

All options are feasible, even ugly tokens not pegged to the SideChain that is used to convert them.

All options including restricting the numbers of BTC able to be converted? That seems like a hard sell for miners to run that software if it can diminish the value of the mainchain. Thoughts?

[smooth]

you should be able to understand  that it CANT be ALL on the mainchain.  There are diametrically opposed requirements.  Like anonymity vs. public spending accountability.  Like handling vast numbers of txns per second vs. keeping all transactions forever.  Like blockchain spam vs. document timestamping.  There are plenty of things with diametrically opposed requirements in life, like sleeping (darkness) and reading a book (bright light); its unrealistic to imagine no 2 applications will emerge in a space which covers the entire concept of economic activity.

All of that is true, ergo altcoins exist.

Your desired "forced buy in to BTC" is improper and unnecessary.

Its not forced, it is offering another choice of a new type of altcoin that happens to be backed by BTC.

As for whether the market wants that particular solution, we will have to see.

[Adrian-x]

Can a sidechain restrict the number of BTC converted to sidechainCOIN?

If they can be restricted, than value of scCOIN can grow but only be obtained via direct purchase and not btc conversion when the cap is hit. This removes value from the mainchain and will only be converted back to BTC if the scCOIN becomes less valuable than BTC again.

If it can’t be restricted then if the scCOIN value rises so does the value of BTC. Since anyone can use this extra value by converting BTC to it.

This should be true as far as both the mainchain and sidechain are representing value as a number. But what if the sidechain is more like a colored coin where an asset is represented by a token. I don’t know how that would affect the mainchain positively or negatively restricted or unrestricted.

All options are feasible, even ugly tokens not pegged to the SideChain that is used to convert them.

All options including restricting the numbers of BTC able to be converted? That seems like a hard sell for miners to run that software if it can diminish the value of the mainchain. Thoughts?

Sure the free market will govern most options, not all will be successful, I am skeptical mainly because of the lack of attention to the downside risks.

[accesscoin]

Can a sidechain restrict the number of BTC converted to sidechainCOIN?

If they can be restricted, than value of scCOIN can grow but only be obtained via direct purchase and not btc conversion when the cap is hit. This removes value from the mainchain and will only be converted back to BTC if the scCOIN becomes less valuable than BTC again.

If it can’t be restricted then if the scCOIN value rises so does the value of BTC. Since anyone can use this extra value by converting BTC to it.

This should be true as far as both the mainchain and sidechain are representing value as a number. But what if the sidechain is more like a colored coin where an asset is represented by a token. I don’t know how that would affect the mainchain positively or negatively restricted or unrestricted.

All options are feasible, even ugly tokens not pegged to the SideChain that is used to convert them.

All options including restricting the numbers of BTC able to be converted? That seems like a hard sell for miners to run that software if it can diminish the value of the mainchain. Thoughts?

Sure the free market will govern most options, not all will be successful, I am skeptical mainly because of the lack of attention to the downside risks.

That is where I am at also, trying to understand the downsides and risks.

[justusranvier]

http://blockstream.com/2014/11/17/blockstream-a-champion-of-bitcoins-core-values/
http://blockstream.com/2014/11/17/blockstream-closes-21m-seed-round/

we all share a demonstrated commitment to advancing an open source, cryptographically-enabled future that supports user’s rights and freedoms and creates lasting public benefit.

These values are also core to the group of investors who participated in our seed round. Both Reid Hoffman and Vinod Khosla are well known for their deep commitment and generous contributions to companies, projects and causes that have benefited millions of people around the world. As Reid mentions in his post today, he sees Blockstream as similar to Mozilla (Reid is a board member of Mozilla).

“And that’s why I’m participating in this first-round financing as an individual investor, and why Blockstream itself will function similarly to the Mozilla Corporation. Here, our first interest is maintaining and enhancing Bitcoin’s strong open ecosystem. And the structure we’ve chosen will give us the freedom and flexibility to prioritize public good over returns to investors.”

We look forward to working with the community on fulfilling the potential of a faster pace of blockchain innovation, focussed and building on Bitcoin’s network-effect.

“Can’t be evil.” That was the first thing Adam Back and I wrote on a whiteboard at the start of the year.

Blockstream is the first startup focused on advancements to the core technology underpinning Bitcoin.
...
Blockstream is the first company extending the capabilities at the protocol level to support massive scaling of Bitcoin and blockchain technology to a broad range of asset types. Put another way, the extension mechanism of sidechains, the company’s initial area of focus, allows any number of so far unthought of developments to happen in an open and interoperable way.

Blockstream: A Champion of Bitcoin’s Core Values

Sounds like bad guys  

Maybe you don't know this because you're young and new here and this may come as a shock to you, but soundbites don't actually prove anything.

In fact, those soundbites remind me of a conversation I had a little over two years ago:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=113400.msg1227012#msg1227012

[cypherdoc]

In no way is the "Bitcoin's bullet proof BTC/blockchain linkage" broken.  The coins aren't actually moved to the other chain, they are held on the mainchain like gold in a vault and a representation which is NOT BTC and can't be spent at coinbase for example, appears on the sidechain.

There is no way sidechains break the 21 million scarcity limit of real BTC.  And anything that a sidechain could do to "dilute" the space (that is by creating a new token type) can be done with an altcoin today, and that has gotten nowhere.  Any "betrayal" of the BTC "brand" that can be done with sidechains can equivalently be done much more easily (and with the same brand damage) with centralized solutions.  We've seen it over and over again; Gox ponzi didn't kill BTC, and SCponzi won't either.  But the risk of SCponzi will certainly make the mainchain the preferred place to hold and make large transfers.  Sidechains will make Bitcoin the preferred long term store of value, because tremendous utility is just a chain transfer away.

  And how is Gox going to go Ponzi when the GoxBTC and GoxUSD on its sidechain must match the BTC "locked" on the mainchain and the USD in their bank accounts (which can be audited)?

If a multi-token sidechain is created with scBTC and inflata-Coin-to-make-devs-rich, what do you think people will do?  Probably not even touch the sidechain.  But assuming they do, they will hold the scBTC and when they need to "use" the sidechain features the require inflata-coin, they'll buy the inflata-coin moments before spending it.

But without sidechains you really do risk a new token that comes along and takes massive market share.  We as a society are not ready to put stocks, mortgages, etc on a blockchain (because why have the risk of a new tech coupled with the return of an old stock).  But someday we WILL be.  And when we are, what's going to be the preferred payment?  Old stodgy BTC that you have to sign up for exchanges, do AML, etc to access real markets, or tradecoin which can be tranformed into GOOG 5 seconds after receipt?  There's a REASON gold shot up when ETFs appeared -- its called access to markets.  

What about the IOT (internet of things) token?  20 years from now, items in your house might be doing 500 txns per day for a total of < $5 automatically on your behalf... Sidechains allow BTC to scale beyond our wildest dreams to applications we can't even consider.

You are like the guy who said there's only use for 5 computers in the world.  

You should instead consider that the biggest risk to BTC right now is the sidechain-altcoin that Blockstream so "kindly" offered to build instead of integrating these technologies directly into BTC.  That altcoin has the potential to leave BTC in the backwaters of digital currencies (except that I believe in the core devs in Blockstream to move the tech over).

Ok, that's probably the end of my rant... but my subsequent silence does not mean that you are right :-).  Honestly, I miss the great insights you guys (and mostly cypherdoc) provide about the larger world economic picture on this thread and hope that we can eventually get back to it!  But I'll tell you this; I'm a technologist and I've skipped from one newly breaking technology to the next for my entire career in startups; gaming, telecom in 1995-2000, storage, wireless, OSHW, bitcoin.  I'm telling you if sidechains CAN be done (honestly I haven't really verified the gory details of the automated 2-way peg myself) they WILL eventually be the dominant coin.  I proposed them in early 2012 (the concept not the mechanism)...  but don't worry to much, BTC will not die; it'll be the Rolls Royce with a valuation above what we have today, while the sidechain-enabled coin takes 99% of the market.

EDIT: tl;dr. Bitcoin is the zerg.  It will take over everything thru sidechains.

That's a really persuasive argument  from someone I respect.

The other way to question this though is that somehow btc units are fed through the peg and through some magic stocks, bonds , smart contracts, altcoins, etc come out the other side and somehow this is not inflationary? What if it just breaks the entire system?

[cypherdoc]

Someone was gushing over gmax over on reddit so in the interest of balance I had to show him this. For those who don't know, aantonop is Andreas ;

He didn't have the brass to post it publicly of course, he's a cowardly weasel through and through

In the interest of being a tough guy like you, here is the rest of our PM discussion which you must have missed in your posting:

Wait, so you lost the vote, cancelled the vote and are now telling me that you lost it but BY LESS THAN I CLAIMED?

Do you believe that everyone in the world who doesn't agree with you is just one person? I'm getting that impression.

No. I'm saying that you either can't count or you were outright lying.  And I'm letting you know in private because I'm kind enough to not point our your innumeracy-or-dishonesty in public even though you've been rather uncivil towards me.

The you accuse me from gathering community input (Wow!), which is what y'all said was needed.
Have you no shame?

Gathering input is good— but what you posted wasn't a genuine effort to get opinions it was a heavily biased rabel-rousing rant which has had the effect of causing people to make threats of violence against me. And if I'm uncharitable I might conclude from the fact that you never mentioned it in the main discussion that you intended to keep it hidden so that your incorrect claims would go unchallenged... or perhaps you just didn't think to mention it, it happens... but still stinks.

to which you replied:

GO fuck yourself you little weasel. You have no shame, no integrity and no balls. You can't even handle a public discussion without getting some sycophant to shut it down when you're losing.

FUCK YOU and suck on a cactus.

I honestly believed that if it were actually a vote the position I was recommending would have eventually won out, the vote-stacking you were conducting only goes so far— as I said in the discussion, the only criteria I've seen I've seen suggested that would have kept Bruce Wagner, Nefario, or even Pirate40 off is the one of not including people where there was genuine concern— all hard large basis of public support. That this has been an enormous time and emotion suck, and it had reached the point where aantonop was name calling people who didn't agree with him, along with threats and other embarrassing responses... it probably was best to kill it mercifully.

[cbeast]

Drama. That's why we have 25,000 denominations of Christianity.

[Odalv]

http://dcmagnates.com/electric-blankets-sidechains-and-a-cashless-society-gavin-andresen-discusses-bitcoins-future-at-web-summit/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VfLxAB9w3cA

[NewLiberty]

Sure the free market will govern most options, not all will be successful, I am skeptical mainly because of the lack of attention to the downside risks.

That is where I am at also, trying to understand the downsides and risks.

What the cheerleaders miss is that by continuing to ignore the downsides and risks, or to claim that they do not exist, or to suggest that they are unimportant because the upside is so huge....the message is that any problems will not be solved.

Most of us understand the incredible potential of the offering.
However if this thread were any indication...there is very little confidence that there are any adults in the room with them, shepherding this development effort to that potential success by looking out for the pitfalls.

[Erdogan]

I think you should stop talking about sidechains, invent altcoins and exchanges or banks if you like, trust-based or automatic.

An altcoin, with an automated bank, issuing exactly the same number of altcoins as bitcoins deposited in the bank. This is the same as the pegged sidechain, but easier to understand, therefore it removes all kinds of futuristic fluff.

[justusranvier]

I thought of tvbcof when I read this:

http://torrentfreak.com/copyright-monopoly-wars-repeat-much-worse-141116/

[Zangelbert Bingledack]

I'm just trying to make incremental progress in my understanding by answering the question "on which ledger is the value stored?"  The probability that the 2-way peg is severed is a different discussion.

I think the probability of the 2-way peg being severed is actually central to the definition of "sidechain" vs. "altcoin," and for practical purposes determines investment behavior in the chain.

On one end of the spectrum, if a sidechain's 2-way peg can be severed at the whim of the sidechain devs, it would essentially be an altcoin and would presumably attract about as much investment as altcoins do (not a threat to Bitcoin).

At the other end of the spectrum, if it's mathematically impossible to sever the 2wp, then it is a true sidechain and the value seems to always remain with the Bitcoin ledger (not a threat to Bitcoin, at least not for this reason).

For cases in between, we cannot really call it a true sidechain, and by the same token we cannot really expect substantial portions of the bitcoin holders to just jump over to the sidechain.

In other words, there's a reasoning error to watch out for here: insofar as the value that could be funneled over to the sidechain relies on the certainty that the 2wp will remain, the concern is self-defeating. If there is any shadow of possibility that the 2wp could be broken, it won't attract that many bitcoins - not much more than any altcoin; and if any sidechain does attract a large portion of the bitcoins, it will only be because the 2wp is as certain of a thing in investors' minds as Bitcoin itself is, which is an extremely high bar.

(This does still leave the possibility that the devs could hamstring Bitcoin deliberately to reduce confidence in Bitcoin to bring it in line with confidence in a not completely solid 2wp so that many people would switch despite some uncertainty. However, this is a much smaller argument to be making.)

[NewLiberty]

In no way is the "Bitcoin's bullet proof BTC/blockchain linkage" broken.  The coins aren't actually moved to the other chain, they are held on the mainchain like gold in a vault and a representation which is NOT BTC and can't be spent at coinbase for example, appears on the sidechain.

There is no way sidechains break the 21 million scarcity limit of real BTC.  And anything that a sidechain could do to "dilute" the space (that is by creating a new token type) can be done with an altcoin today, and that has gotten nowhere.  Any "betrayal" of the BTC "brand" that can be done with sidechains can equivalently be done much more easily (and with the same brand damage) with centralized solutions.  We've seen it over and over again; Gox ponzi didn't kill BTC, and SCponzi won't either.  But the risk of SCponzi will certainly make the mainchain the preferred place to hold and make large transfers.  Sidechains will make Bitcoin the preferred long term store of value, because tremendous utility is just a chain transfer away.

  And how is Gox going to go Ponzi when the GoxBTC and GoxUSD on its sidechain must match the BTC "locked" on the mainchain and the USD in their bank accounts (which can be audited)?

If a multi-token sidechain is created with scBTC and inflata-Coin-to-make-devs-rich, what do you think people will do?  Probably not even touch the sidechain.  But assuming they do, they will hold the scBTC and when they need to "use" the sidechain features the require inflata-coin, they'll buy the inflata-coin moments before spending it.

But without sidechains you really do risk a new token that comes along and takes massive market share.  We as a society are not ready to put stocks, mortgages, etc on a blockchain (because why have the risk of a new tech coupled with the return of an old stock).  But someday we WILL be.  And when we are, what's going to be the preferred payment?  Old stodgy BTC that you have to sign up for exchanges, do AML, etc to access real markets, or tradecoin which can be tranformed into GOOG 5 seconds after receipt?  There's a REASON gold shot up when ETFs appeared -- its called access to markets.  

What about the IOT (internet of things) token?  20 years from now, items in your house might be doing 500 txns per day for a total of < $5 automatically on your behalf... Sidechains allow BTC to scale beyond our wildest dreams to applications we can't even consider.

You are like the guy who said there's only use for 5 computers in the world.  

You should instead consider that the biggest risk to BTC right now is the sidechain-altcoin that Blockstream so "kindly" offered to build instead of integrating these technologies directly into BTC.  That altcoin has the potential to leave BTC in the backwaters of digital currencies (except that I believe in the core devs in Blockstream to move the tech over).

Ok, that's probably the end of my rant... but my subsequent silence does not mean that you are right :-).  Honestly, I miss the great insights you guys (and mostly cypherdoc) provide about the larger world economic picture on this thread and hope that we can eventually get back to it!  But I'll tell you this; I'm a technologist and I've skipped from one newly breaking technology to the next for my entire career in startups; gaming, telecom in 1995-2000, storage, wireless, OSHW, bitcoin.  I'm telling you if sidechains CAN be done (honestly I haven't really verified the gory details of the automated 2-way peg myself) they WILL eventually be the dominant coin.  I proposed them in early 2012 (the concept not the mechanism)...  but don't worry to much, BTC will not die; it'll be the Rolls Royce with a valuation above what we have today, while the sidechain-enabled coin takes 99% of the market.

EDIT: tl;dr. Bitcoin is the zerg.  It will take over everything thru sidechains.

That's a really persuasive argument  from someone I respect.

The other way to question this though is that somehow btc units are fed through the peg and through some magic stocks, bonds , smart contracts, altcoins, etc come out the other side and somehow this is not inflationary? What if it just breaks the entire system?

This, along with Cypherdoc's question pretty much sums up where I am too.
In order to make Bitcoin what it promises to be we do need to chase away the hubris, and look at the real problems.
When identified, they can be monitored and worked. 

If there are ways our advancements can be used against us, we need to know them.  We should expect that those that would see the Bitcoin experiment fail, will attempt this.

tl;dr
When you can see no evil, you are the evil.