Do you think Bitcoin should modify to POW + POS ? █████ Poll █████

[Flashman]

Ghash.io held 51% hash power.

Please provide a reference for the point in time where Ghash.io actually had 51%

Edit: Ah, nevermind, my memory of the event was that they faced increasing pressure approaching 50% and throttled back in time, but I see they did actually exceed 51% for a short time before throttling effective, and thereafter committed to 40% maximum.

[1713943994]

1713943994

[1713943994]

1713943994

[1713943994]

1713943994

[pawel7777]

Sure. But what does matter is if any of them gains too much power, there are actions you can take to change the current state.

What doesn't matter are the stats you've quoted. They don't show "persons or accounts" they show "accounts" only.

How many people control what stake? You don't know and you'll never know, until the biggest holders reveal themselves and prove their holdings.

Who in the right mind, holding 40%, 50% or 60% of coins, would keep them all in one wallet? Would you?

And that's another problem with PoS.

Where's the difference between PoS and PoW here? Hashpower controlled by one party split between multiple pools is just as much possible in PoW.

Highlighted the difference for you (in the post you quoted).
So you agree the PoS doesn't have any advantage in this matter?

Don't forget pools are just pools, they don't necessarily own any power. When things get ugly miners can choose to switch to other pool (P2Pool) or even create a separate one.

If the problem exist in PoS, all you can do is switch to other coin.

You can just set the PoS reward to barely cover the expense of running a full node, it's not for rich getting richer at all.

That's what most people don't realize. PoS reward is just a measure to prevent blockchain spam. Even large stakeholders in non inflationary PoS systems don't make much money from forging.

Yeah, I didn't realise that. You're saying that by staking 1 PoS coin I'll get the same (small) reward as someone with 1,000,000? If so - that's brilliant. If not - that's completely irrelevant to ab8989's post (to which kokoije replied).

[mistercoin]

I think this would be great. But do I see it ever happening? Nope.

[achimsmile]

But what does matter is if any of them gains too much power, there are actions you can take to change the current state

Look, Ghash.io had >51%, and you are telling me that mining is better because miners would switch pools?... Then how did it get this large?

It just looks like there are no actions you can take to change the centralized mining situation either, because miners will go where fees are the lowest / pool is stable etc.
that's why we observe >%20 hash power in a single pool. You say that in theory, miners could switch pools. Yes, a dangerously large stakeholder also could split/sell part of his stake, but it seems like they both wouldn't.

Don't forget pools are just pools, they don't necessarily own any power. When things get ugly miners can choose to switch to other pool (P2Pool) or even create a separate one.

When a pool is too large, it can do all kinds of nasty stuff. Validating blocks = power!

Yeah, I didn't realise that. You're saying that by staking 1 PoS coin I'll get the same (small) reward as someone with 1,000,000? If so - that's brilliant. If not - that's completely irrelevant to ab8989's post (to which kokoije replied).

I just said otherwise a few posts ago:

Same chances for everyone per bought coin.

[pawel7777]

Look, Ghash.io had >51%, and you are telling me that mining is better because miners would switch pools?... Then how did it get this large?

It just looks like there are no actions you can take to change the centralized mining situation either, because miners will go where fees are the lowest / pool is stable etc.
that's why we observe >%20 hash power in a single pool. You say that in theory, miners could switch pools. Yes, a dangerously large stakeholder also could split/sell part of his stake, but it seems like they both wouldn't.

Look, Ghash doesn't have 51% anymore. Look, Slush or Eligius, who were major pools are not such anymore. Look, now you're complaining about Discus Fish who were irrelevant not too long ago.

According to your theory (highlighted), such changes are not possible. So how did that happen?

When a pool is too large, it can do all kinds of nasty stuff. Validating blocks = power!

But you/miners or even pool itself could take actions before it gets too big.

Yeah, I didn't realise that. You're saying that by staking 1 PoS coin I'll get the same (small) reward as someone with 1,000,000? If so - that's brilliant. If not - that's completely irrelevant to ab8989's post (to which kokoije replied).

I just said otherwise a few posts ago:

Same chances for everyone per bought coin.

So your/kokoije's posts were pointless and didn't address ab8989's concerns?

----------------------

OK. To summarise, I'm not here to say PoW is better. I'm really happy that PoS coins exist. I joined this thread hoping for some constructive discussion. Ffs I even voted YES in the poll.

I'm not very familiar with PoS, so asked few questions. But it seems impossible to get any straight-forward answers here, other than hysterical reaction and arguments like "PoS is great because mining sucks".

I'll try again. This time let's do an exercise and pretend that PoW and mining doesn't exist and have never existed. Lets focus entirely on PoS and its design (no PoW or mining arguments). 3 simple questions:

1) Since anyone can own infinite number of wallets/addresses, how would you even know whether the coin is currently centralised or not? Is there anything more than just hopes and belief?

2) If at any point in the future (when the coin is established) it is revealed and proven that one person/entity/government owns say 40% and plays on maximising his stash. What can be done to prevent him from increasing his stake to 50% by simply stashing. Can anything be done or is it 'Game Over'?

3) Assuming PoS coin not fully issued from the start. There is a clear and strong incentive to hoard ('stake'). Who would spend such coin (sacrificing possible gains) and why? What would keep it alive? Is there anything more than hopes that majority of holders will see the 'greater good' and kept regularly spending some portion of their holdings? Even if that happens, aren't those who break out and don't spend rewarded even more?

[kokojie]

Miners CAN NOT switch if GHash decides to act maliciously. Since GHash is mostly cloud mining nowadays, the hashrate is actually owned by GHash and then resold to miners.

[jonald_fyookball]

Miners CAN NOT switch if GHash decides to act maliciously. Since GHash is mostly cloud mining nowadays, the hashrate is actually owned by GHash and then resold to miners.

and GHash is 10% of the total nowadays.

[fonenumba]

Miners CAN NOT switch if GHash decides to act maliciously. Since GHash is mostly cloud mining nowadays, the hashrate is actually owned by GHash and then resold to miners.

ghash is also only ~15% of the network now and is no longer a dominating player. There is no longer a "danger" that ghash will attempt a 51% attack as they have much too far from 51% of the network.

BItcoin is moving away somewhat from pool mining to large corporate farm mining

[sandykho47]

Miners CAN NOT switch if GHash decides to act maliciously. Since GHash is mostly cloud mining nowadays, the hashrate is actually owned by GHash and then resold to miners.

ghash is also only ~15% of the network now and is no longer a dominating player. There is no longer a "danger" that ghash will attempt a 51% attack as they have much too far from 51% of the network.

BItcoin is moving away somewhat from pool mining to large corporate farm mining

GHash will be like BTC Guild who used to have big mining percentage
Even AntPool already bigger than GHash now

[achimsmile]

Look, Ghash doesn't have 51% anymore. Look, Slush or Eligius, who were major pools are not such anymore. Look, now you're complaining about Discus Fish who were irrelevant not too long ago.

According to your theory (highlighted), such changes are not possible. So how did that happen?

You misunderstood me. It does not matter if the pool is called GHash.io or XY, point is that mining pools are too big and miners still tend to mine with big mining pools. Currently bitcoin is controlled by 4 mining pools (together >51%)

So your/kokoije's posts were pointless and didn't address ab8989's concerns?

Sorry, I don't understand what you mean. ab8989's concerns are that "market pull" of PoS is small... sounds like an argument with unclear or subjective assumptions.

it seems impossible to get any straight-forward answers here, other than hysterical reaction and arguments like "PoS is great because mining sucks".

Noone said that. Facts were presented. Do you agree with following statements?:

• If anyone controls >51% of block generating in a blockchain currency, they can double spend. Such a system is centralized.
• GHash.io controlled >51% at one point
• Currently, 4 mining pools control >51% of hashing power
• There is not a single PoS with market cap over 1M where 4 accounts produce >51% of all blocks.
• Multiple mining pools could in theory be controlled by one party, as could multiple PoS accounts.

Although nothing can be proven because of the last bullet, the above statements indicate that block generation process of existing PoS  systems is more decentralized.

1) Since anyone can own infinite number of wallets/addresses, how would you even know whether the coin is currently centralised or not? Is there anything more than just hopes and belief?

See last bullet

2) If at any point in the future (when the coin is established) it is revealed and proven that one person/entity/government owns say 40% and plays on maximising his stash. What can be done to prevent him from increasing his stake to 50% by simply stashing. Can anything be done or is it 'Game Over'?

Same as would happen when a malicious government controls 40% hashpower (40% is already enough to do "51%" attacks  ): Game Over. It does not matter if the situation in PoW can change, if a party wants to attack, they only need a few days max of 40% until they succeed with double spending it to death.

It is unclear which one would cost more, but if you look at market dynamics and price, it looks like buying 40% of a PoS version of Bitcoin would be a tad more expensive than building a 40% mining farm.

3) Assuming PoS coin not fully issued from the start. There is a clear and strong incentive to hoard ('stake').

Most PoS coins issue all coins at once.


Edit: This is my last post on the topic. I think that our views are not compatible, and that no one will change his point of view. It does not make sense to go on.

[pawel7777]

Edit: This is my last post on the topic. I think that our views are not compatible, and that no one will change his point of view. It does not make sense to go on.

Thanks for replying. Lets leave it like that, further discussion would be just posting the same all over again.

But for the record - I don't have a problem in changing my point of view if presented with reasonable arguments. That's my superpower. I've done it many times before.

In fact, when I first posted in this thread I was slightly in favour of migrating bitcoin to PoS, but now I think I'll rather stick to PoW.

Still keeping an open mind about other solutions tho.

[achimsmile]

Edit: This is my last post on the topic. I think that our views are not compatible, and that no one will change his point of view. It does not make sense to go on.

Thanks for replying. Lets leave it like that, further discussion would be just posting the same all over again.

But for the record - I don't have a problem in changing my point of view if presented with reasonable arguments. That's my superpower. I've done it many times before.

In fact, when I first posted in this thread I was slightly in favour of migrating bitcoin to PoS, but now I think I'll rather stick to PoW.

Still keeping an open mind about other solutions tho.

Good. I know what you mean, I used to like PoW at first, even had two miners (1 of them ROIed)

[FandangledGizmo]

http://bytemaster.bitshares.org/article/2015/01/07/The-Most-Decentralized-Proof-of-Stake-System/

Moving to POS would be an improvement. BTC's inflation is a drag in a bear market and I noticed LTC fell 3X more last year than BTC and it has 3X more inflation, so it could be a factor.

Volatility is the major problem & probably has the biggest impact on Crypto price though.

Businesses work on tight margins, they can't hold crypto due to volatility so a sale in crypto equals a sale of crypto. Imagine if everytime you bought something from a shop, the shop didn't keep & circulate that money but sold it immediately for Yen. This is what happens atm. It makes Bitcoin non-viable imo.

Only highly inflationary countries could consider utilising Bitcoin on a reasonable scale. (Which is why Argentina and Venezuala are often cited in studies as most likely to adopt it.)

This is what BitShares BitAssets, solves. http://bitshares.org/the-value-proposition-of-bitshares-part-ii-bitassets/

A dollar stable asset, you can send globally, in 10 seconds for 1 cent regardless of size. http://whatisbitusd.com/

Stable BitAssets are what I'm expecting to transform crypto in 2015, though I agree no/low inflation POS systems are an improvement.

[kokojie]

Miners CAN NOT switch if GHash decides to act maliciously. Since GHash is mostly cloud mining nowadays, the hashrate is actually owned by GHash and then resold to miners.

and GHash is 10% of the total nowadays.

Good job missing the point.

GHash had 51% yes?
Ghash is mostly cloud mining yes?

It has already happened in the past, there's absolutely nothing to stop it from happening again in the future. PoW is centralized and insecure, with the additional drawback of causing Bitcoin value loss and energy+hardware waste.

[QuestionAuthority]

Miners CAN NOT switch if GHash decides to act maliciously. Since GHash is mostly cloud mining nowadays, the hashrate is actually owned by GHash and then resold to miners.

and GHash is 10% of the total nowadays.

Good job missing the point.

GHash had 51% yes?
Ghash is mostly cloud mining yes?

It has already happened in the past, there's absolutely nothing to stop it from happening again in the future. PoW is centralized and insecure, with the additional drawback of causing Bitcoin value loss and energy+hardware waste.

But aren't the people of the world supposed to hold hands and sing "end oppression using Bitcoin"? Bitcoin self corrects because we all love each other and won't allow one evil power to take over. Even if someone gets all the control they won't do anything because they will not profit then, right? lol


Let's praise Bitcoin and save the world

[VectorChief]

Miners CAN NOT switch if GHash decides to act maliciously. Since GHash is mostly cloud mining nowadays, the hashrate is actually owned by GHash and then resold to miners.

and GHash is 10% of the total nowadays.

Good job missing the point.

GHash had 51% yes?
Ghash is mostly cloud mining yes?

It has already happened in the past, there's absolutely nothing to stop it from happening again in the future. PoW is centralized and insecure, with the additional drawback of causing Bitcoin value loss and energy+hardware waste.

But aren't the people of the world supposed to hold hands and sing "end oppression using Bitcoin"? Bitcoin self corrects because we all love each other and won't allow one evil power to take over. Even if someone gets all the control they won't do anything because they will not profit then, right? lol

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_1AobnciMN0k/TI1uX5Q-S_I/AAAAAAAAAAM/y-i5y8oPoT4/s1600/world.gif
Let's praise Bitcoin and save the world

+1
We are in it together, that's how we win!

[venij]

Proposal:  Protocol level rotation between PoW and PoS blocks with separate difficulties. Example – Block A is found under bitcoin’s current PoW system with a difficulty of ~12billion (difficulty A) in a majority ASIC mining environment. Block B will then be found under a PoS environment that requires the coin-age of the blockfinder to be included and consumed in the block. Block B would be subject to a separate difficulty B such that a combined effort of CPU mining and coin-age (say difficulty / coin-age or difficulty to the coin-age root) could also be adjusted to similar 5 or 10 minute intervals.

How it fixes problem in PoW: “51%” are based on the knowledge that the attacking party will eventually be able to control all blocks that are added to the blockchain. Interjecting a separate PoS system between blocks makes this impossible. At the same time, it frees PoW miners to work in their best interest and capture even upto 100% of the mining pool distribution.

How it fixes the problem in PoS: So called nothing-at-stake attacks are based on the assumption that any self-interested minter would continue to mint all forks of the chain in an effort to maximize his potential rewards (due to very low cost of minting). To the limit of such a case, all branches of the blockchain are continuously mined, and no single version is provably authentic. Interjecting a separate PoW system between blocks provides the resource intensive requirement to prevent the blockchain from spiraling out of control.

Side-thoughts
 – part of the original reason for PoS was to avoid the electricity cost of PoW. PoW miners could be setup to run on standby (only listening to the network communication) after a PoW block was found. Upon communication of a PoS block, they would again run at full speed. That savings vs. costs of thermal cycling or lost mining time could be optimized per mining hardware.
 - block times could be modified for 5 minute averages (5 mins PoW + 5mins PoS = 10 minute overall) so that PoW rewards stay consistent during the cutover.
 - As mentioned, a hard-fork or side chains using "burned" coins could be used for implementation

[jonald_fyookball]

i had the same idea... and have considered some of the consequences/implications...please feel free to start another thread on this topic specifically and i'll happily contribute. too much noise here...let me know.

[CryptoCurrencyInc.com]

This poll needs at least 5000+ votes to know for sure what the entire Bitcoin community feel about changing Bitcoin to Proof of Stake + Proof of Work.

[QuestionAuthority]

This poll needs at least 5000+ votes to know for sure what the entire Bitcoin community feel about changing Bitcoin to Proof of Stake + Proof of Work.

And then the devs/Bitcoin Foundation still won't do it.