AdCoin

[Bitcoin Oz]

I was thinking you could have a coin where when you leave your browser open at a certain url it shows advertising which "generates" an amount of coin. This coin might be like bitcoin but all created in the genesis block and you "mine" them with your browser,there is no client as such although you might have a browser extension to send coins to each other..... You could let  people redeem them for products and services.


You might need to do captchas every now and then or other "proof of work" to keep the botnets down. I also have other ideas about this. Do you think this idea has legs ? How would you structure this ?

[smoothie]

So people would leave their browser open with advertisements on it?

Did i get the right?

[markm]

If you use a blockchain how will you get enough mining power to secure it?

Having all the coins "pre-mined", as the miners like to term genesis block / first block coins, has not, historically, added to miners' enthusiasm for a blockchain...

...That is why Botcoins, Britcoins, Canadian Digital Notes, GMC, GRF, bitNicKeLs etc etc etc all moved to using Open Transactions until some time (if ever) when their transaction volumes would generate enough transaction fees to attract miners.

-MarkM-

[Revalin]

There are already some "pay you to watch ads" services out there, so if I wanted to do that, I would.  Instead of getting slightly better payouts by submitting hashes with a JS/Java miner, I could just as easily mine BTC/LTC directly.

It certainly isn't enough to justify creating a new coin.  You might be able to make an ad-watching service that HAPPENS to mine LTC, but I don't see where there would be a synergistic effect from tying them together be worth the effort.

[Bitcoin Oz]

If you use a blockchain how will you get enough mining power to secure it?

Having all the coins "pre-mined", as the miners like to term genesis block / first block coins, has not, historically, added to miners' enthusiasm for a blockchain...

...That is why Botcoins, Britcoins, Canadian Digital Notes, GMC, GRF, bitNicKeLs etc etc etc all moved to using Open Transactions until some time (if ever) when their transaction volumes would generate enough transaction fees to attract miners.

-MarkM-

Open Transactions is certainly interesting. How do you prevent someone from just creating more coins though ?

[markm]

Personally I do it by not allowing other people to issue assets on my Open Transactions server.

I suppose how other people stop me from doing it is by threat, whether of loss of reputation, loss of liberty, or loss of life or limb...

-MarkM-

[Stephen Gornick]

You might need to do captchas every now and then or other "proof of work" to keep the botnets down. I also have other ideas about this. Do you think this idea has legs ? How would you structure this ?

The bots can emulate anything the Javascript and browser would do, so if there is any financial gain from this then the bots will be mining you for income.  You couldn't do this, I wouldn't think, unless it was delivered as an executable and had anti-cheat smarts.

[Bitcoin Oz]

Personally I do it by not allowing other people to issue assets on my Open Transactions server.

I suppose how other people stop me from doing it is by threat, whether of loss of reputation, loss of liberty, or loss of life or limb...

-MarkM-

People have no idea if your server has issued more coins in the past or how "honest" it is in doing business ?

[markm]

People have no idea if your server has issued more coins in the past or how "honest" it is in doing business ?

I have no idea whether anyone else has any ideas nor what ideas they do have if they do have any.

If you trust the Brits, and know they trust my server to run their Britcoins, maybe the problem here is you have not chatted with Blloyd's of Blondon or whatever the Brits call their most reputable insurance company, or something?

Maybe Britcoins are just not 'up your alley'? Do you trust the Canucks? If not maybe Canadian Digital Notes are not 'up your alley' either.

Maybe you are just not being specific enough in identifying who exactly are the "people" you refer to? Do you consider the Brits to be "people"? How about the Canucks?

Well I can't blame you, basically if you aren't into the game why concern yourself about its institutions, such as stock exchanges existing on various of its planets.

How much of what is issued is probably part of what the audit systems planned for Open Transactions are to cover. Heck it is even planned to have the ability to fire off copies of all receipts constantly to third party persistent remote storage, maybe something like Freenet, GNUnet, maybe even optionally to anyone's own tahoe-lafs grids if they chose to subscribe such a grid to such a data-stream. Maybe it will have Really Simple Syndication streams of them among the possibilities too. But I am not sure I would use that feature simply because I am not sure my users would actually want copies of all their receipts broadcast all over the internetz like *coin blockchains are for everyone to see how many of what which nym sent to which nym...

-MarkM-

[Bitcoin Oz]

I am simply pointing out that when I use a site like ebay or bitcoin-otc I can see an identities past interactions and judge the likelihood that future trades will be successful. These "identities" have something to lose reputation wise if they screw someone over.

[markm]

I am simply pointing out that when I use a site like ebay or bitcoin-otc I can see an identities past interactions and judge the likelihood that future trades will be successful. These "identities" have something to lose reputation wise if they screw someone over.

There is a thread somewhere way back when in which my facebook, myspace, linkedin, sourceforge, realname@yahoo.ca, realname@gmail.com, G+, github, WHOIS (knotwork.com, knotwork.net), etcetera etcetera etcetera (did I mention #bitcoin-otc?) identities are given. I am far from anonymous and the RCMP knows full well who I am. (Which probably means CSIS, MI5, CIA, FBI and gosh knows who else does too.)

Oh gosh maybe though it might have failed to give my Amazon identity, which since Goddess Knotwork (Goddess.knotwork.com) was the site I first put Amazon ads on is goddessknotwork.

-MarkM-

[fellowtraveler]

Open Transactions is certainly interesting. How do you prevent someone from just creating more coins though ?

I love good questions.

This is actually two questions, however:

1. How do you prevent the issuer from just creating more coins?
2. How do you prevent a transaction server from just creating more coins?



1. How do you prevent the issuer from just creating more coins?

The issuer can create as many coins as he wants: he is the issuer. Presumably he has an adequate supply of real-world gold/bitcoins/etc in his possession, in order to redeem the units he issues according to the terms of the contract he used to issue them.

One thing the issuer cannot do is issue coins without signing for them in the process. The receipts are unforgeable. But the rest from there (enforcement, storage and auditing of physical gold, etc) is more a governance issue than a technical one. It's between you and the issuer, and the jurisdiction.

With Bitcoin there is a great solution possible, which I have been discussing here for months now: Use multisig transactions (ON the blockchain itself) to enable the storage of Bitcoins in voting pools. This way, no single issuer or transaction server has the ability the move funds out of the pool until the other pool members have taken a vote. (For example, if MyBitcoin had been storing their reserves in a blockchain pool, then everyone would have been able to recover their funds, when the site disappeared, instead of losing their money...)

A fitting solution that the Bitcoin "issuer" on any OT server should actually be a pool of voters on the Blockchain. I can't wait to implement this protocol.


2. How do you prevent a transaction server from just creating more coins?

A transaction server (issuers can release units of their currency onto multiple servers) is already unable to forge a receipt in a transaction with you or any other legitimate user. This is because the user must form the receipt first, and sign it, and only then does the server verify and countersign. The server will reject your transaction if your receipt is false, and the server cannot change or fake the receipt later, because the server cannot forge your signature.

Here is the weakness: the server can create a "dummy account" and sign a false receipt for it (collusion between server and account) and thus create units in that account which could later be spent into the general population. However, it is impossible to spend such units without having them show up on an audit. Therefore there must be an auditing protocol between the transaction server and the issuer to insure the total number of units in circulation is the same as the number on the issuer's last signed receipt.

If you combine an auditing protocol, with OT's unforgeable receipts, and Bitcoin voting pools, it makes it possible to run "low trust transaction servers" for Bitcoin on OT -- which could even operate anonymously! And provide Bitcoin-backed markets and exchanges, Bitcoin-backed untraceable cash, Bitcoin-backed scriptable smart contracts, etc where the users can feel safer knowing that the server will be unable to steal their coins.

[WinterParker]

So is anyone laying claim to Adcoin  (the name)?  If not, I have an idea for it &have already developed it a bit.