[ANN] SpreadCoin | True Decentralization (No Pools) | Testing New Masternodes

[girino]

Interesting concept -- I've browsed through most of the thread but haven't seen a clear answer on a key point:

How specifically are mining pools avoided with this coin?

I must admit, I'm a bit hazy on the detail too.

Maybe SPR could do with a one-para summary and a snappy buzzphrase? Something along the lines of the “Sign-to-Mine™” approach taken by by Ziftrcoin and described thusly:

“We will use the NIST chosen Keccak, a memory-hard 512-bit hashing
algorithm, along with our Sign to Mine™ protocol, to mine ziftrCOINs.
Essentially, the header must contain a signature of the header’s contents,
which must be verified with the script spending the coinbase transaction.
This ensures that the one who solves the block also has the capability to
spend the block, which limits large pools. With Sign to Mine, miners should
make sure they trust those with whom they are mining, as anyone in the pool
has the ability to spend the reward for the blocks they solve.”

Quoted from ”ziftrCOIN Specifications, Released December 6, 2014” https://d19y4lldx7po3t.cloudfront.net/assets/docs/ziftrcoin-coinspecs.pdf

They may even have actually registered the trademark.

Cheers

Graham

Are you allowed to trademark things? Does the open source licence or whatever it is stop that?

most important: are you allowed to trademark things done by others? because it sounds like he just copied the spreadcoin algorithm.

[gjhiggins]

looks like ziftrCOINs has just cloned spread algorithm and changed X11 for keccak. By the date, i'd say it's quite possible! Is their code available? BTW, Keccak is not memory hard. Those guys got something wrong!

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery but it's not a reassuring signal that they chose to be coy about the origin.

The code isn't available AFAICT, so my default is to consider it to be proprietary and closed-source.

The unforced error of describing Keccak as “memory hard” doesn't fit very well with the size of the team implied by https://www.ziftrcoin.com/about-us/ziftr-team, are they all clueless?

But at least they seem to be a properly registered US commercial entity (as myVBO): http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/snapshot.asp?privcapId=105672715

“myVBO LLC offers a Web based centralized information management software solution for small businesses. Its solution gathers business data, information, news, and business tools together in a Web portal; provides accounting, payroll, online meetings, and email marketing services; and enables customers to search Internet and rate Web sites. The company also offers real-time business statistics via QuickBooks and Google Analytics, stock tracking, news and video feeds, and market and price history on products, as well as enables customers to purchase products via the MyVBO purchasing engine. In addition, it offers a professional networking area for business professionals to discuss issues of th...”

I'm currently entertaining myself by imagining the consequences if Mr Spread's anti-pool solution was ported to Bitcoin <giggle>.

Cheers

Graham

[thelonecrouton]

I wouldn't worry about anyone copying SPR, all that does is provide validation. And Mr Spread's solution closely resembles aspects of previously proposed solutions, such as the two linked in the posts below, particularly the first.

https://darkcointalk.org/threads/croutonrant-237-the-happy-happy-dream-of-decentralised-mining.3038/#post-30493

https://darkcointalk.org/threads/croutonrant-237-the-happy-happy-dream-of-decentralised-mining.3038/#post-30522

Whether Mr Spread was influenced by the above (who knows, maybe he was one of the authors?) or came up with what he has done independently, he was the first that I know of to take the idea(s) from paper to reality.

[e1ghtSpace]

Is this solution a description of Spreadcoin? It it exactly the same as Spreadcoin?

http://hackingdistributed.com/2014/06/18/how-to-disincentivize-large-bitcoin-mining-pools/

[NoobKidOnTheBlock]

Is this solution a description of Spreadcoin? It it exactly the same as Spreadcoin?

http://hackingdistributed.com/2014/06/18/how-to-disincentivize-large-bitcoin-mining-pools/

I think the real question here is whether Mr. Spread is SpreadCoin lol

[girino]

Is this solution a description of Spreadcoin? It it exactly the same as Spreadcoin?

http://hackingdistributed.com/2014/06/18/how-to-disincentivize-large-bitcoin-mining-pools/

I skimmed through it and seems to me that it is similar, but not exactly the same. this proposal talks about a signature with a different difficulty than the hash, while Mr. Spread solution does the signing and than includes it in the hash. It saves a lot of space and is as secure as the one in the article.

[Mr. Spread]

Is this solution a description of Spreadcoin? It it exactly the same as Spreadcoin?

http://hackingdistributed.com/2014/06/18/how-to-disincentivize-large-bitcoin-mining-pools/

It looks similar but more complicated because of the requirement of backward compatibility with existing Bitcoin miners.

[pokeytex]

Mr. Spread, I mean ZERO disrespect when I ask this and will definitely not push the issue as it's your coin... but would you be open to a name change for Spreadcoin at some point?  One of the biggest arguments against Darkcoin by many is its' name.  Spreadcoin is going to have many of the same features as DRK (and maybe even some improvements by the sounds of it!) BUT in my opinion, "Spreadcoin" isn't the greatest name ever for a coin, especially for a coin I feel can be a top 3-10 market cap coin within a year. Again, I mean no disrespect and if you love the current name, I won't mention it again.  But if you are open to a name change, I think it could bring even more attention to this coin.

I politely disagree (spreadcoin) as in spread around the world makes good sense to me.  We want this to spread around the world and make us all rich.  I vote leave it alone.

[NoobKidOnTheBlock]

Is this solution a description of Spreadcoin? It it exactly the same as Spreadcoin?

http://hackingdistributed.com/2014/06/18/how-to-disincentivize-large-bitcoin-mining-pools/

It looks similar but more complicated because of the requirement of backward compatibility with existing Bitcoin miners.

I freaking love you Mr. Spread You are one solid dude bro!!! and you apparently know your shit so I insist if there is anything I can do for the SpreadCoin community just let me know and I'm on it

[NoobKidOnTheBlock]

Mr. Spread, I mean ZERO disrespect when I ask this and will definitely not push the issue as it's your coin... but would you be open to a name change for Spreadcoin at some point?  One of the biggest arguments against Darkcoin by many is its' name.  Spreadcoin is going to have many of the same features as DRK (and maybe even some improvements by the sounds of it!) BUT in my opinion, "Spreadcoin" isn't the greatest name ever for a coin, especially for a coin I feel can be a top 3-10 market cap coin within a year. Again, I mean no disrespect and if you love the current name, I won't mention it again.  But if you are open to a name change, I think it could bring even more attention to this coin.

I politely disagree (spreadcoin) as in spread around the world makes good sense to me.  We want this to spread around the world and make us all rich.  I vote leave it alone.

+1000 to that people SPREAD the word about SPREADCOIN to thy neighbours

[MyFarm]

I personally like the current name.

Fair enough.  Thanks for the response.

[AlexGR]

May I also propose a few more suggestions, beyond the fixing / upgrading of the masternode payments system?

1) Block time of 1 minute could create bloat in the long run and might need upward adjustment. It is also worth looking into a mini-blockchain integration. If InstantX is also copied from Darkcoin in the future (something that only coins with masternodes can emulate - and spreadcoin will be in that position), block time can be safely revised upwards.

2) There are two DarkSend parameters which can be tweaked for a DarkSend implementation that can differentiate spreadcoin: Default and max mixing rounds. So Spread could opt for better anonymity by default by increasing the default number of rounds and taking the max number of rounds to 10 or beyond instead of 8 max (DRK).

3) Darkcoin faced an interesting problem with the compromise between speed of mixing and sybil resistance*. With 2 participants speed was ok but sybil protection was practically non-existant (the one party mixing knew the other party mixing). With 3 participants sybil protection is much better but it can still go higher (at the expense of mixing speed). Spreadcoin can use a higher number of mixing participants if it wants to. To ensure mixing takes place and mixing parties don't wait for a very long time, a happy hour can be established where the client has a scheduler to start mixing at a predefined hour, or a certain block. In this way a lot of participants can start mixing at a predetermined point and be almost assured of mixing success. This will be less of a problem when greater adoption happens and more of a problem as fewer people are mixing.

* Resisting the attempt of fake mixing parties to take all the mixing seats and thus know the rest of the legitimate parties who are mixing.

4) DRK's Sybil resistance is relatively low right now due to not having a fee structure that acts as a preventative measure. A weakness was discovered where through the fees paid by each mixing participant => the fees betrayed the participants. Evan kind of shut down the fees to solve the issue, or used the fee structure in a way where one out of several mixings is charged. This allows a degree of Sybil abuse which needs an alternate system in place to charge participants per use (so as to penalize sybil attempts), but without revealing the participants identities.

5) A strong IP obfuscation method, integrated to the client, is a must. DRK doesn't have an IP obfuscation method in place at this point of time - although it is on the cards. Anonymity is not complete without IP obfuscation.

6) It would be good to have a system of encrypted communication so that merchant and user (or user-to-user) can exchange encrypted information that preserve anonymity (like exchanging fund addresses, providing shipping details). There are probably implementations that could be ripped from other coins or open source software, modified, integrated and adopted for use.

7) CPU mining is ideal in the way it is conducted through the menu, but the mining speed should be faster / more optimized for certain architectures and instruction sets. This needs some work.

It would be ideal if GPU mining can also be integrated or "associated" from the mining menu... ie spreadcoin-qt calling the gpu miner program with the right parameters (that the newbie user doesn't know how to setup).

8 ) Low network hashrate is a danger. Complicated solo mining (=anything that isn't click and play) creates the possibility of 51% by even moderate-size "whale farms / whale miners". This creates the need for an upgrade of (7): If mining is to be decentralized by a multitude of solo miners, low-hashrate cpu mining need to be optimized and gpu-mining must be merged or "called" from the wallet client itself in a way that is noob-friendly.

9) A real problem that DRK-clones will face, is that the DRK network has a serious value in its own masternode network. This means that breaking sockpuppet* resistance is an expensive proposition. Coins implementing DarkSend do not have the same value on their network and are thus much easier to sockpuppet by obtaining a large number of masternodes. This will require a well-thought out strategy to deal with the issue of proper value per masternode. A much better alternative -if the dev can make it work- is to attempt blind signing of transactions where the masternode does not know who transacts what. IIRC from some discussions back in April-May, Darkcoin abandoned this approach because blind signing could be DOSed in a way where the network could not penalize the attacker (as the node didn't know who was transacting). Again IIRC, Kristov Atlas in his Darkcoin review believed that sockpuppet resistance could probably be improved through blind signing.

* Sockpuppet = Fake actor controlling masternodes to map transactions

10) Quantum-resistance: The ECDSA of Bitcoin / Bitcoin clones is not quantum-computing resistant. This means that once a public key is known, a private key is weaker against a QC attack.

I believe there can be two solutions for this issue: Changing the algorithms to QC-resistant and thus creating the first QC-resistant altcoin (there is the possibility that they might introduce bloat). Alternatively a work-around QC-resistance can be created through a checkbox. When ticked, all addresses with even one spend transaction will have their funds moved, automatically, to new addresses with zero spends. This will prevent the pub key from being publicly known (and thus being reversed), if and when a QC attack occurs / if and when a QC is developed and deployed. Futureproofing in this way could create a new way of crypto-diversification asset to counter a QC-attack risk (that will leave vulnerable the other coins).

[mdsn]

"7) CPU mining is ideal in the way it is conducted through the menu, but the mining speed should be faster / more optimized for certain architectures and instruction sets. This needs some work.

It would be ideal if GPU mining can also be integrated or "associated" from the mining menu... ie spreadcoin-qt calling the gpu miner program with the right parameters (that the newbie user doesn't know how to setup)."

I second that.

[NoobKidOnTheBlock]

"7) CPU mining is ideal in the way it is conducted through the menu, but the mining speed should be faster / more optimized for certain architectures and instruction sets. This needs some work.

It would be ideal if GPU mining can also be integrated or "associated" from the mining menu... ie spreadcoin-qt calling the gpu miner program with the right parameters (that the newbie user doesn't know how to setup)."

I second that.

I would definitely be down with that because the only miner I've ever been able to configure on my own is cgminer for scrypt lol and I would love a user friendly built in NOOB friendly way to mine more of these delicious coins

[e1ghtSpace]

"7) CPU mining is ideal in the way it is conducted through the menu, but the mining speed should be faster / more optimized for certain architectures and instruction sets. This needs some work.

It would be ideal if GPU mining can also be integrated or "associated" from the mining menu... ie spreadcoin-qt calling the gpu miner program with the right parameters (that the newbie user doesn't know how to setup)."

I second that.

I would definitely be down with that because the only miner I've ever been able to configure on my own is cgminer for scrypt lol and I would love a user friendly built in NOOB friendly way to mine more of these delicious coins

I could probably create a batch file that asks for the pool url, username and password and extra stuff. Here you would type something like "-I 17 -auto-fan" and the thread concurrency options. I think I can make it save to a .txt file. I remember a time when I made a username and password batch file that saved it to a .txt file. Oh damn I remember that it only checked if the username and password matched. Hmm. Maybe I can figure something out.

[NoobKidOnTheBlock]

"7) CPU mining is ideal in the way it is conducted through the menu, but the mining speed should be faster / more optimized for certain architectures and instruction sets. This needs some work.

It would be ideal if GPU mining can also be integrated or "associated" from the mining menu... ie spreadcoin-qt calling the gpu miner program with the right parameters (that the newbie user doesn't know how to setup)."

I second that.

I would definitely be down with that because the only miner I've ever been able to configure on my own is cgminer for scrypt lol and I would love a user friendly built in NOOB friendly way to mine more of these delicious coins

I could probably create a batch file that asks for the pool url, username and password and extra stuff. Here you would type something like "-I 17 -auto-fan" and the thread concurrency options. I think I can make it save to a .txt file. I remember a time when I made a username and password batch file that saved it to a .txt file. Oh damn I remember that it only checked if the username and password matched. Hmm. Maybe I can figure something out.

Well I would be more than happy to test that out if you could get something like that working because I haven't been able to mine hardly any of my SpreadCoins they have all been store bought but that's okay because the NoobStoryToGlory knows a good investment when he sees one

[th00ber]

Is bittrex aware of this coin ?
It could be a good bump for this coin to be listed in bittrex

[e1ghtSpace]

"7) CPU mining is ideal in the way it is conducted through the menu, but the mining speed should be faster / more optimized for certain architectures and instruction sets. This needs some work.

It would be ideal if GPU mining can also be integrated or "associated" from the mining menu... ie spreadcoin-qt calling the gpu miner program with the right parameters (that the newbie user doesn't know how to setup)."

I second that.

I would definitely be down with that because the only miner I've ever been able to configure on my own is cgminer for scrypt lol and I would love a user friendly built in NOOB friendly way to mine more of these delicious coins

I could probably create a batch file that asks for the pool url, username and password and extra stuff. Here you would type something like "-I 17 -auto-fan" and the thread concurrency options. I think I can make it save to a .txt file. I remember a time when I made a username and password batch file that saved it to a .txt file. Oh damn I remember that it only checked if the username and password matched. Hmm. Maybe I can figure something out.

Well I would be more than happy to test that out if you could get something like that working because I haven't been able to mine hardly any of my SpreadCoins they have all been store bought but that's okay because the NoobStoryToGlory knows a good investment when he sees one

Is that your alt account or something?

Edit: I just realised that I can just make my batch file generate a .bat for mining. Much easier than what I was originally thinking.

[NoobKidOnTheBlock]

"7) CPU mining is ideal in the way it is conducted through the menu, but the mining speed should be faster / more optimized for certain architectures and instruction sets. This needs some work.

It would be ideal if GPU mining can also be integrated or "associated" from the mining menu... ie spreadcoin-qt calling the gpu miner program with the right parameters (that the newbie user doesn't know how to setup)."

I second that.

I would definitely be down with that because the only miner I've ever been able to configure on my own is cgminer for scrypt lol and I would love a user friendly built in NOOB friendly way to mine more of these delicious coins

I could probably create a batch file that asks for the pool url, username and password and extra stuff. Here you would type something like "-I 17 -auto-fan" and the thread concurrency options. I think I can make it save to a .txt file. I remember a time when I made a username and password batch file that saved it to a .txt file. Oh damn I remember that it only checked if the username and password matched. Hmm. Maybe I can figure something out.

Well I would be more than happy to test that out if you could get something like that working because I haven't been able to mine hardly any of my SpreadCoins they have all been store bought but that's okay because the NoobStoryToGlory knows a good investment when he sees one

Is that your alt account or something?

Edit: I just realised that I can just make my batch file generate a .bat for mining. Much easier than what I was originally thinking.

Is what my alt account? NoobStoryToGlory? No I just deemed myself the NoobKidOnTheBlock when I officially started trading cryptocurrencies last april lol I'm still super wet behind the ears buddy.   I mean I'm just learning how to set up miners and the only ones I can get to actually work are cgminers for scrypt lol but I'm getting a boss ass Desktop to start mining with for Christmas which is why I would love all the help I could get when it comes to setting up .bat files or even .conf files for miners and wallets and all that crap.  But ya I can't mine SpreadCoin from my laptop right now cause I only get 11kh/s which don't get you coins too often lmao

[e1ghtSpace]

But ya I can't mine SpreadCoin from my laptop right now cause I only get 11kh/s which don't get you coins too often lmao

Lol. I remember a long time ago I left my laptop on all day while I went to school. 11kh/s. And got home and I had 1 block!
Then I mined with my desktop for 3 hours @ 100 khash/s and didn't get 1 single block.