outline for a simpler virtual currency

[diogenes]

[

My currency would have value for the same reason bitcoin does-- it is limited in supply and has other properties that makes it a candidate medium of exchange.

Being limited in supply is not what makes bitcoin have value. You seem to have a fundamental misunderstanding of how currency works. And your proposed currency has no other properties that make it a good medium of exchange.

Also, you don't even have "limited in supply" going for you. There is no limit of the supply of your money. Even assuming that you somehow protect 100% against fraud and always give exactly 1000 DumbCoins to any one person, new people are created every day. You can make a new person in 9 months. Sometimes you even get "lucky" and make two or more. Every time someone is born, 1000 (potential) new DumbCoins are created.

Ok, so a was a little sloppy with the exact wording about the supply of the currency.  Perhaps I should have said the supply is controlled/constrained.  I'll assume you were smart enough to get the point of what I meant and so I'll just take your response as a nit-picking quibble (either that or I'll have to assume that you're rather dumb )


However, I will directly challenge you on your comment about my "smartcoin" currency having no other properties that make it a good medium of exchange:
Let's compare our two currencies against your own beloved bitcoin wiki's criteria about what makes a good virtual currency (https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Ideal_Properties_of_Digital_Commodities)

From the wiki:
1) Decentralized - no single point of failure or issuing authority:  wiki gives bitcoin an A  :  I give smartcoint an A :  my comment- personally I feel bitcoin is a B+ because a teleco failure/internet outage can take down bitcoin in a local region whereas you can trade smartcoin over *any* network connection (such a usb/wifi/bluetooth/near field/local ethernet/etc.. )

2) Scarce - required to be a reasonable store of value : wiki gives bitcoin an A : I'll give smartcoin an A : my comment- bitcoin has a strongly deflationary model in that it has a strict upper limit of the number of coins produced.  Where-as smartcoin ties the number of coins to the number of people using it thus smartcoin naturally grows the money supply in a controlled proportional way.  Overall depending on human population growth patterns, smartcoin would be very close to neutral (possibly slightly deflationary) because of coin attrition due to people dying with password locked devices and the destruction/loss of devices (see http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=6816.0.).  Which model is better is really a political argument.  What can't be argued is that both have quite rigid controls on currency supply, you can't just create extra currency on a whim.  The supply of money is quite predictable and smooth in both currencies.

3) Storage - actual commodity should be cheap and easy to physically store securely : wiki gives bitcoin an A : I'll give smartcoin a B : my comment- smartcoin can encrypt its coins with the exact same technology as bitcoin and it even has the advantage that it is *mandatory* that coins are stored on devices with anti-tamper mechanisms and trustworthy OSes.  However, I should admit that you cannot backup your coins with smartcoin because its not possible to copy them so they are risk of being lost due to forgotten passwords, device failure, device theft/loss.  (It should be noted that when you backup your bitcoins it increases your risk to theft-- although overall the it is a wise and advantageous thing to do.)

4) Irreversible Transactions : transactions should be irreversible : wiki gives bitcoin a B and notes that it is irreversible after an hour which is often not acceptable wait time : I'll give smartcoin an A+ : my comment- personally I feel bitcoin is a C. Within smartcoin general everyday transactions are immediately irreversible, ie. for everyday transactions smartcoin has a perfect score.  (Although it should be noted that the one-off bootstrap transaction would take about the same time as a bitcoin transation).

5) Anonymous : untraceable transactions (if desired) : wiki gives bitcoin a C and notes that it currently requires some trusted third party to obsfucate transactions : I'll give smartcoin an A+ : my comment- personally I feel bitcoin is an E.  It is *very* hard to do anonymous transactions in bitcoin and it will usually cost you money to try whereas for smartcoin *all* transactions are *completely* anonymous (ie. smartcoin has a perfect score here).

6) Unspoofable : should be exceedingly difficult to counterfeit   : wiki gives bitcoin an A : I'll give smartcoin an A : my comment- although they rely on completely different technologies and approaches they are both very good.

7) Gratis Transactions : transactions should be gratis, or nearly so, forever : wiki gives bitcoin a D and notes that bitcoin future tx fees are certain, but could remain low : I'll give smartcoin an A+ : my comment - you may be suprised to learn that I actually rate bitcoin higher than the wiki on this and give it a C+.  Smartcoin has a perfect score here-- all transactions are completely free!

Offline Transactions : ideally two participants should be able to safely transact without requiring internet access or trust of one another (like normal cash) : wiki gives bitcoin an F and notes that is not securely possible with Bitcoin- double-spending is always possible without Internet access : I'll give smartcoin an A : my comment- any two machines can transact smartcoin over any network connection, even local ones such as usb/wifi/bluetooth/near field/etc..

9) Speed : ideally transactions would be instantaneous : wiki gives bitcoin a D   and notes that currently bitcoin is fast enough only for shipments; anything faster than an hour on average requires compromising security : I'll give smartcoin an A+ : my comment- smartcoin has a perfect score here because transctions clear immediately.

10) Scalability : usable for every transaction everywhere in the world : wiki gives bitcoin a C   and notes that currently there is a lack of lightweight and offline bitcoin clients (if such a thing is even possible) to replace the need for conventional cash : I'll give smartcoin an A+ : my comment- gee whiz another A+ . Why an A+ you may ask, because smartcoin is infinitely scalable ie. a perfect score.


Please Note:
I've skipped the Unique Use-value property because I don't believe this is necessary or useful for a currency.  However, I will admit that the bitcoin concept of block chains is a pretty neat idea-- so neat that I actually use it in smartcoin to store the global user IDs.
I've skipped the verifiable funds property because I can't really see how this is a necessary property.  However, you can implement this ontop of either currency using escrow.  It should be noted escrow can be achieved more securely with smartcoin because you can insist upon the use open-proof programs and it is madatory that it uses trustworthy computers- this elimanates concerns about the trustworthiness of the third party.


So, summing up my evaluation:  
wiki's bitcoin scoring-  A, A, A, B, C, A, D, F, D, C
my bitcoin scoring-  B+, A, A, C, E, A, D, C+, F, D, C
my smartcoin scoring: A, A, B, A+, A+, A, A+, A, A+, A+
Smartcoin beats (somethimes even thrashes) or equals bitcoin on each point except one.  The one and only advantage that bitcoin has over smartcoin is that you can backup your coins.

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[diogenes]

This is a nonstarter.

Hmm, perhaps not!


Initially, when I started this thread, I put out these ideas to see what people think.  I wasn't really all that interested in implementing it-- just interested in the general concept.  I had only just concieved of the idea before I wrote it down on this thread (I more or less made it up while typing the original post).  I actually assumed that there would be some fundamental flaw in it that someone would notice.  Since no-one yet has pointed out any reasonable game stopping flaws or shown me how it is worse than bitcoin the scheme has started really growing on me.  I'm now seriously thinking about hacking up some code and doing a proof of concept (the proof of concept would be without the trustworthy remote attestation part-- the hardware infrastructure isn't available for that yet).  


Indeed, I'm already thinking how to improve it in response to some comments on this thread.  

For example, comments have lead me to believe that the authentication system should be improved. So I've come up with the following novel system:

I believe that it would be better if there were two separate way to authenticate within the authentication system to assist with rapid mass adoption of this scheme:  
method 1-- to get as many people into this currency as quickly as possible it should be *extremely* easy to collect the joining reward via this method, however the total number of people who can join with is strictly limited.  It should take no more than a very short web-form and a couple of clicks by the user and just a couple of minutes.  This authentication process should use resources already freely available on the internet as evidence.  These objectives should be the goal even it means that it is exclusionary (ie: some people can't join by this method) and even if it means that a small percentage of people can double dip and claim the reward multipe times (as long as it is very limited eg: no more than 10 times).  The reward for this method would not be the full method 2 reward, let's say it is 250 coin.  The number of users allowed to join by method 1 should be great enough that an ecosystem of businesses can evolve around the currency-such as exchanges, escrow, lending and importantly method 2 authentication services: I feel that 25 million users would be sufficient.

method 2-- via this method *everyone* should be able to join but it should be *very* hard to join multiple times.  Authentication by this method would be an indepth process and it would require physical evidence to be produced and would most likely require a new user to present themselves in person.  People would be prepared to do this because the system gains so much momentum and interest by users joining via the method 1.  Method 2 authentication can itself be run as a profitable competitive business.  The bootstrap reward at this stage is the full 1000 coin.  People who have already joined by method 1 can rejoin by method 2 and claim its reward in addition to the first one-- this further encourages people to join quickly so they can claim both rewards before method 1 is retired.

So the big question is: "How to create a method 1 authentication process".  

Well here's one idea I've been toying with--- Facebook!.  The client simply fills out a web-form that asks for their facebook entry credentials (which is just two items, their email address and password-- no big burden on the user to supply!).  The system then goes to their facebook page and checks if the first entry on their wall is before March, 2011.  If it is then it retrieves their facebook name plus the entry's date and leaves facebook.  It then checks with a p2p block chain system if the someone with that client name and date already exists-- if not it then adds that user/date to the network and once they're added it authorizes the client to collect the method 1 joining reward. This achieves the requirements of method 1 authentication in that extremely easy and quick and the vast majority of facebook users could only join once (most people have just one facebook account, I would be surprised if anyone has more then ten).  Obviously, people who haven't an existing facebook account can't join by this mechanism but that's just too bad for them; also if two people with the same name joined on the same day- method 1 is first in best dressed.  In fairness, I should remark that this has the potential flaw in that it is at the mercy of Facebook, Facebook might get pissed off with this system using their data (especially considering that facebook has it own virtual currency) and remove all the date data from the accounts.

[diogenes]

1) Decentralized - no single point of failure or issuing authority....

F: a bunch of global ID's verifiers are the central issuing authority.

I can just as equally say:  bitcoin has a central issuing authority in that it is a bunch of computers connected together that make up the bitcoin network.  
The global ID's verifiers are a network of computers similar to the bitcoin network, but instead of racing to process transactions into block chains, they process crypto-hashed credentials of a new user.   (If I was to actually start coding this -- I am very, very tempted to atleast code a proof-of-concept-- I would actually use the bitcoin code.  From what I understand I wouldn't have to change much at all, just the a few fields in the transction record).

So if you give it an F then likewise bitcoin must be an F+  (smartcoin is always slightly ahead because it doesn't have the internet-not-accessible problem as a point of failure)

2) Scarce - required to be a reasonable store of value

F: stored on hackable local client, issued to every fake ID, a finite number of "global ID verifiers" can collude to issue unlimited number of DumbCoins to themselves

Well, if this was really a problem I could just limit the total number of coin produced.  I would say 10 trillion is appropriate,  that's 1000 coin for 10 billion people.  Also, it is quite easy to make to it *very* difficult for the verifiers to be able to collude because you can split the process up into different subprocesses and distribute them multiple times out randomly to different verifiers and requiring them to concur before accepting the transaction.  You can also severely restrict collusion by tying part of authorization process to something independent of the verifiers such as existing federated indentity schemes (ie: tie part of it to something that they can't control/change).
Just to put the the problem of collusion in perspective consider this (Note: this assumes a limited smartcoin supply-- which I might as well do):  the total number of bitcoins that will be produced is 21 million and a miner collects 50 for each block, so each block reward is 0.000238% of the total money supply while in smartcoins each instance of collusion would give 1000 coin out of 10 trillion or 0.00000001% of the money supply, ie: each bitcoin block reward is equalivent to the reward of 23800 instances of collusion.

So if a strictly limited money supply is adopted smartcoin once again has an A.

3) Storage - actual commodity should be cheap and easy to physically store securely

C: no backup, unless hacked, cloned etc...

Actually, it is possible for me to create a backup system.  The way you do that is have another system that does the opposite to how the coins are minted.  What the mint is really doing is converting a token (the global userID) into 1000 coin: you can just as easily program a tokenizer (or reverse-mint) that converts the coin back to tokens and deletes the amount from the user account.  These tokens are just long strings of numbers which you can copy your heart's content- you can even print them on paper and physically store them in a vault!.  However, they should be treat just like bitcoins (actually that's more-or-less what they are!) and be very careful not to let anybody have access to them.  

4) Irreversible Transactions : transactions should be irreversible

F: backup/clone , MITM attacks

If you think MITM is still a problem in this day and age then I've no idea where you've been for the last 20 years.  MITM attacks were solved a *long* time ago-- maybe you should brush up on your computing knowledge.  (By-the-way: it should be *obvious* that this attack isn't unique to smartcoin, anything that communicates over a network is suspectable.  Now let me think, hmmmmm: wait a minute, doesn't bitcoin run on the internet?)

5) Anonymous : untraceable transactions (if desired)

F: provide IRL ID's to 50 or more like 5000 "Global ID verifiers" and you give it A+ , come on! this is beyond unreasonable.

The general transctions in smartcoin *are* anonymous!

You clearly don't understand what the global user ID is and what it used for.  This could be partly my fault for calling it a user ID.  While it is technically an ID it is *never* used as ID within the transaction system it is only used as and acts as a token within the transction system- this is why transctions *are* anonymous.  Also, it needn't be used as an ID in the authenication system- although it might be (in the system I've in mind it doesn't need to be). Sorry, I should have been more careful in naming it.  
A good analogy of how the it works *exclusively* as a token in the transaction system (even though it is an ID) is comparing it to how a ticket works in a movie theatre: when you buy a ticket using a credit-card at the box-office the staff who serves you checks your name by having you sign it, she then gives you a ticket. However, the movie ticket *doesn't* have your name on it!  Its just a token that the usher on the door can recognize has being genuinely issued from the box-office, authorizing the bearer (who may be you, or someone you gave it to) to enter a particular theatre sitting.  It's the same in smartcoin: the user token doesn't have *any* of accessible credentials of you stored in it and its used just as a token that the transaction system can recognize as being genuinely from the verification system and it authorizes the bearer to collect 1000 coins.  Just to repeat it one more time- It is *never* used as an ID within the transaction system it is *only* used as a token!.
Here's all the requirements all of a smartcoin userID:
0) Transportable (this requirement is the same for movie tickets)- you must be able to move it around/between the systems
1) Recognizble/Can be authenticated (same for movie tickets)
2) Unforgeable (same for movie tickets).  Please note: unforgeable is different from copyable- see copyable below
3) Copyable (opposite to movie tickets!)- this requirement is a consquence of the transportability requirement.  In addition to being digitally copyable, its recommended to make it possible to copy to/from a physical form (eg:allow it to be printed) so the user can make physical backups or use physical transport methods.
4) Global (not necessary for movie tickets : is necessary for airline tickets purchased from airports so you can by connecting flights) - this property is best explained by using the theatre example: a global movie ticket would be one that you could buy from any theatre's box-office allowing you to watch the movie at a theatre of your choice.  To achieve this property in smartcoin may be challenging since I plan that the authorization services should have no central control but rather act in a distributive and independent manner (it may be that this property is not achievable with the architecture and thus there is need for a certain level of organization among the authorization servers-- not too sure, haven't thought that far ahead).
5) The smartcoin token for each person must be unique- but not unique for each token.  ie, they're uniquely deterministically dependent upon the user-- also known as --wait for it------here it comes--- oh no!!!! its an...... ID!!  what-the-#$%#@!$!!!.  (not necessary for movie tickets) - this property has two parts the uniqueness and the deterministic part.  The uniqueness is necessary so that transaction system can compare it against all previously presented tokens to tell if its been presented already.  The deterministic part is necessary so that if the user requests a token multiple times from the authentication system they are always given the same one.  This a property is not achieved perfectly in the current authentication system I've in mind but comes close enough for my liking- the deterministic part fails for some people and they can get a few different tokens from it and thus make multiple new user claims (which is not really all that big a deal: compare this to the fact that there is a bitcoin miner "knightmb" who claims to own over 370000 bitcoins which is about 1.8% of the total supply!  If the smartcoin supply was limited to 10 trillion you would have to cheat the authorization system 180000000 times to get this much of the supply).
(Note: just to round out the comparison to movie tickets, movie tickets usually have the opposite to the ID property in that they're exactly the same for each movie goer.  Even though the overall purpose of the movie ticket and smartcoin userID is that the users are granted authority at most once, the reason its not required for movie tickets is because they're non-copyable and thus the movie entrance system can create a one-entry only system by destroying the ticket on entry)

6) Unspoofable : should be exceedingly difficult to counterfeit   : wiki gives bitcoin an A : I'll give smartcoin an A : my comment- although they rely on completely different technologies and approaches they are both very good.

F: bold claim no proof.

I'm guessing the biggest concern people would have with smartcoin is that they have to trust *every* single computer that runs the transactional software for the system to maintain its integrity whereas with bitcoin they don't have to trust the computer of the person they're trading with and indeed they don't even have to trust the miners individually cause you need to comprise a substantial portion of the miners collectively to affect the block-chain.  Intuitively it might appear that for this reason bitcoin it is safer than smartcoin.  However, this is quiet flawed thinking.  Why?  Well imagine this: if the miners all had the same OS and software stack then obviously they would all be vunerable to the exact same flaws, ie: if you could hack one you could hack all- thus you would be no better off than smartcoin.  Now, I'm willing to admit that the miners aren't exactly the same but there wouldn't be much variety (I guess that most of them would be running a linux based stack) and many would not be operated by professional system admins- in otherwords you would only need a few exploitable holes to bring down the whole system.
Smartcoin would *only* run of systems that are trustworthy-- systems that have good reason to claim that they're trustworthy because they've been designed and coded within strictly controlled environments to stringent quality standards with inherently safe architectures-- such as OKL4*. OKL4 is deployed on over a *billion* mobiles, I've yet to hear it make headlines because someone has found an exploit -- I've heard about *many* exploits in linux/windows.
 
*OKL4 is nothing like the linux/windows kernels: it is a full mircokernel in that *everything* except the kernel runs in userspace (even the device drivers) and it has an object capability security model.  So its architecture is inherently more secure!  It is also coded to internationally recognized qualtiy control standards as well as being open source.  Also worth mentioning is that the group the made OKL4 are the same who made sel4-- the world's first formally verified kernel.  They are the world's foremost experts at coding kernels.

[wumpus]

*OKL4 is nothing like the linux/windows kernels: it is a full mircokernel in that *everything* except the kernel runs in userspace ...

Well, even if you could convince people that the software is safe, I'm not sure they would be convinced that the organisation behind it is trustable. As you say, with bitcoin you don't have to trust any of the miners personally, just that they will overall do the right thing. With your system there is still a single point of failure. One backdoored system is enough to compromise it.

[diogenes]

*OKL4 is nothing like the linux/windows kernels: it is a full mircokernel in that *everything* except the kernel runs in userspace ...

Well, even if you could convince people that the software is safe, I'm not sure they would be convinced that the organisation behind it is trustable. As you say, with bitcoin you don't have to trust any of the miners personally, just that they will overall do the right thing. With your system there is still a single point of failure. One backdoored system is enough to compromise it.

I take it you've never heard of open source?  ie: you don't have to trust the person who writes the code because you can look at the code yourself.

Personally I'm interested in formal verification methods and with them you can a step up from open source.  You release you code under the open proof paradigm.  Open proof is where you open source your code and you open source the formal verification proof of your code plus the program specification.  In otherwords, buy running the proof over the source code anybody can prove to themselves that the program you've supplied *exactly* conforms to the spec.  eg: The spec for smartcoin would include statements like: the general software transaction processing system cannot create and nor destroy coins (written as a mathematical statement of course not in English!).  Then by running the proof you would be 100% certain that this indeed the case!

If your interested in general verification theory-- read some of the sel4 papers, they're experts at it.  (They prove C code which is *very* hard to do-- it's really impressive).   If you wish to try writing code/proofs instead of just code read up and learn the ATS language, even learning this language just for fun will reward you a lot-- it has many very advanced programming language features such a dependent types which are interesting in their own sakes.

[Pieter Wuille]

Do you have proof that the centralized server infrastructure is running the code they claim they are using?

[wumpus]

I take it you've never heard of open source?  ie: you don't have to trust the person who writes the code because you can look at the code yourself.

Interesting that you say I've never heard of open source  

Who prevents from building devices that use the same source, with a few differences?

Even though the canonical source is proven and verified, that doesn't mean that all forks are as well.  Mine might well cause a random number of extra coins to be created for each transaction

All hardware and software can be hacked. The company making the "trusted machines" can be hacked. Or they could pretend to put different software on it than they really do. And so on. This really doesn't make it safer.

Everything that puts absolute trust in a certain authority is broken security-wise, IMO. For a recent example, look at all the controversy surrounding HTTPS CA's. The system is broken because browsers expect ALL CA's to be trustworthy. So even though CA's, on average, are trustable and secure, you only need one bad apple (such as Komodo) to make the house of cards crumble.

[diogenes]

Who prevents from building devices that use the same source, with a few differences?

No-one at all prevents this--  that's why smartcoin uses trustworthy computers/software that provide remote attestation features.  This means that if someone does change the code no computer in the system will transaction with it. 
By-the-way: this is a problem with bitcoin- nothing stops someone from writing a slightly different client that has the added feature that after a certain date/time in the future it transfers all the wallets coins to the attackers account.  The attacker then packages this up and passes it off as a true bitcoin client and uploades to a linux distribution which accepts user created packages.

Even though the canonical source is proven and verified, that doesn't mean that all forks are as well.  Mine might well cause a random number of extra coins to be created for each transaction

see above comment

All hardware and software can be hacked. The company making the "trusted machines" can be hacked. Or they could pretend to put different software on it than they really do. And so on. This really doesn't make it safer.

Once again, you've found another problem with bitcoin (your getting good at this!).  This is more of a problem with bitcoin than smartcoin because the hardware it runs on (eg: common everyday garden variety hardware) doesn't have any anti-tamper mechanisms whereas smart coin insists that they exist.  So which system do you think hackers would attack?

[diogenes]

Do you have proof that the centralized server infrastructure is running the code they claim they are using?

Smart coin doesn't have any centralized server infrastructure!

General transactions only require the two computers involved in the transaction-- the coin sender and the reciever.
Bootstrap transactions use a distrubuted network (which is actually based on the bitcoin technology-- it is almost exactly the same!).  
If you were to include a backup feature that produces tokens from coin then that also uses the bitcoin technology.

[BitterTea]

I'm amazed at the simplicity of this idea, and it seems to keep getting simpler and simpler!

[BitLex]

all we need is a identity-check system, a trustworthy-check system with remote access to all computers and a transaction system,
as simple as that.

oh and someone in control of all those systems to make sure noones cheating and maybe someone who controls the guy in control.

but it's all totally unrelated to eachother, decentralized and anonymous and doesn't rely on internet-connections, i think it's a perfect system,
why did nobody else come up with that yet?

[Cusipzzz]

Look, rather than have 5zillion posts about 5zillion bitcoin variants - i.e. "Better Bitcoin", it's pretty simple. If you want InflationCoin, or CentralizedCoin, or TimedecayCoin, or FlameCoin, or SuperTripleSHA2048Coin then BUILD it. Publish the code. If people think it is a good idea they will come on board.

The fact is that Bitcoin is structurally 90% 'perfect' - different people may want different things from that last 10%, but the fact is most of us accept that and agree to work over time with the small needed enhancements.

These allegedly BetterCoins are just a massive distraction from where the focus should be, nailing down the last 10% of real Bitcoin: fee/spam balance, block size, wallet encryption, other defensive measures (port flexibility, improved bootstrapping/fallback nodes), and thin clients (headers only).

[diogenes]

all we need is a identity-check system, a trustworthy-check system with remote access to all computers and a transaction system,
as simple as that.

oh and someone in control of all those systems to make sure noones cheating and maybe someone who controls the guy in control.

but it's all totally unrelated to eachother, decentralized and anonymous and doesn't rely on internet-connections, i think it's a perfect system,
why did nobody else come up with that yet?

Well I know your taking the piss but I'll just set out what you really need:

1) Hardware/OS that supports secure booting and remote attestation and is trustworthy.
2) A bitcoin like network  (the system actually has three uses for it- you could use three separate or accumulate into one)
3) The physical user verification system (if you wish to add a physical element to the identity checks)
4) A secure software content management service (sourceforge is good enough I'd think)
5) A secure software distribution system

What you don't need is
-remote access to all computers-- that would be a *major* security flaw and a definite no-go.

[BitterTea]

Remote attestation allows changes to the user's computer to be detected by authorized parties.

I don't think there's going to be much interest in your currency by members of this community if it requires them giving up this kind of information/control.

[BitLex]

why not just use Bitcoin instead?

it doesnt need secure booting, remote attestationing (is that a word?) and trustworthy hardware or OSes,
it doesnt need any user verification,
it doesnt need a secure software content management service,
it doesnt need a secure software distribution system.

but anyway, i'm sure you're system is much simpler.

[Jaime Frontero]

authoritarian.

centralized.

non-anonymous.

government IDs.

...........


non-starter.

EDIT:  oh... and more complicated than my poor little pea-sized brain even wants to think about.

[diogenes]

The biggest problem is, most of us here have trust issues. We do not trust ANYBODY! Importantly, bitcoin does not force us to trust anybody.

Acutally that is *totally* wrong, nothing could be further from the truth!! 

In the secure software industry the word "trust" has a particular meaing: "a trusted system is a system that is relied upon to a specified extent to enforce a specified security policy. As such, a trusted system is one whose failure may break a specified security policy."  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trusted_system)

In otherwords, a trusted system is one that you are forced to use, you have no other option (eg: if you use an ATM machine to withdraw money-- the ATM is trusted since you have no other option but to use it to get your money). 

So with bitcoin you *do* trust a lot of things, let's see what:

1) The software authors are trusted

2) The software content management system is trusted

3) The software packaging system- some versions of linux allow random users to package and upload programs to the distro-- this is a security nightmare!

4) The software distribution system- the majority of people download software from places other than the offical project outlet: for example, I personally do this when chose a server in/close to my country when installing linux apps

5) The hardware/OS and stack for the system that it runs on: this is quite litterally 10's of millions of lines of code:  it would take less than 100 lines of malicious code anywhere within those millions for a hacker to be able compromise the system

6) The bitcoin software itself

7) the miners in the network and their harware/OS/software stacks!

8 )  If people leave unencrypted bitcoin keys lying around then they have to trust *every* other program on their system that is running with the same access rights (eg: right now I've got about 160 different processes running and that's what I've got running just to type this while listening to some music-- that amounts to 100's of millions of lines of code anywhere in which a malicious hacker could hide an attack that searches my user directory for unencrypted wallets to steal)


So are you still certain that bitcoin users don't trust anybody?


Indeed, the mentality that you displayed by saying what you did puts you in the *worst* possible position because you are living in denial and blinded by it-- hiding the size of the problem!

With smartcoin, it acknowledges these trust obligations and explicitly requires that they are exposed and dealt with according to the highest known quality practises.



PS: I've done a little bit of quick background research on who you are and if I'm not mistaken you offer bitcoin mining services as a business-- well you should be delighted with smartcoin because it requires just such a network.  Infact if you allow a coin back system it uses three of them otherwise two. 

[diogenes]

authoritarian.

centralized.

non-anonymous.

government IDs.

...........

Nope.  Not at all.  Obviously you have no idea.  Maybe you have a comprehension problem?

EDIT:  oh... and more complicated than my poor little pea-sized brain even wants to think about.

Well, that explains it then (you said it not I!)

[BitterTea]

Is all of the software used in your system, and all of the software it depends upon, going to be open sourced like Bitcoin?