5 ms·

Nasdaq to develop blockchain services in Estonia

72 points by jkaljundi 11y ago

cjg 11y ago
I don't really understand these kinds of initiatives that say they will use "blockchain technology", but seem to imply that they won't use the bitcoin blockchain. It's the amount of computing power that keeps a blockchain secure and an independent blockchain has no hope of reaching the same level of hashing as the bitcoin blockchain. It's the question of how their technology will interact with the bitcoin blockchain to leverage that hashing power that I'm interested in. Or perhaps they could just be happy with a blockchain that might be (relatively) easy to attack.
- lifeisstillgood 11y ago
  Surely we can adjust the protocol to say "has found 8 0's and signed the value with one of these private keys". Attacks become based around the security of those keys - as its a private chain anyway, do we mind?
  - steckerbrett 11y ago
    Why bother with it at all? Authenticated database sounds like.. postgres.
    - anon1mous 11y ago
      Because it's distributed (NasDaq going bankrupt won't kill it) and all changes are in the open (no rogue employee stealing your shares). Sure you can achieve more or less the same thing with a relational DB or by drawing sticks on a piece of papyrus.
      - RemoteWorker 11y ago
        So you think Bitcoin is the first distributed database? No. There is no reason for a private blockchain to exist; it's a nonsensical idea.
        lifeisstillgood 11y ago
        This seems to be a case of "you don't understand" - what sources / reading would you suggest covers this issue ?
zby 11y ago
Security is always about economy - it is after all about incentives and disincentives. Bitcoin makes this explicite with the mining process and the currency. Now it seems that some financial companies like the idea of a fully decentralized ledger, system where you don't need to trust a central authority to settle deals. But they don't like the currency part of it. I can understand them - I for one hate the wastefulness of the mining process - but it seems like they believe that they can build a decentralized system without the currency part that supports the economy of incentives and disincentives. Don't they understand the link between those two parts? Or maybe they think that it is enough to build some cargo cult system - that just copies the names, but is not decentralized at all - to lure investors? Update:s/distributed/decentralized/
- lifeisstillgood 11y ago
  But the implication is that the price of each new bitcoin must be a fraction of the total runtime of computing power on the planet. Let's say all financial transactions now appear on the blockchain, and every ten minutes a new block is mined. And furthermore let's say all the compute power of the world is on grid aka E3. And hiring the whole lot will take a credit card with 1 million dollars per ten minutes To Dr Evil, The value of controlling that chain is immense. And he would be willing to pay half a million dollars to write his adjustments to the chain The 25 bc handed over for that surely has to then be equal to that half million plus a tiny amount, otherwise Dr Evil will be willing to pay for half the worlds compute resources but good actors would not. Can we then assign a rough value to Bc now? And is the distribution of assets fair?
  - Already__Taken 11y ago
    If Dr Evil could do that it's not in their interest to because we'd all know how the 25 btc came to exist and the blockchain as a system would be undermined and lose its value. Isn't that the point? The act of defrauding it is what devalues the chain. *Edit: I misunderstood a bit. But to then go on, the value of operating the bitcoin chain with your compute resources is to control and charge transaction fees isn't it? Profit from mining is the initial gold-rush kick to get the system popular. You're not always supposed to make money minting the coin as it were.
ommunist 11y ago
This is really funny coincidence. Russia bans bitcoins and criminalise its usage, while the US takes advantage and places blockchain facility on the Russian border. This is what I call ROTFL.

72 points by jkaljundi 11y ago

cjg 11y ago

I don't really understand these kinds of initiatives that say they will use "blockchain technology", but seem to imply that they won't use the bitcoin blockchain. It's the amount of computing power that keeps a blockchain secure and an independent blockchain has no hope of reaching the same level of hashing as the bitcoin blockchain. It's the question of how their technology will interact with the bitcoin blockchain to leverage that hashing power that I'm interested in. Or perhaps they could just be happy with a blockchain that might be (relatively) easy to attack.

lifeisstillgood 11y ago
Surely we can adjust the protocol to say "has found 8 0's and signed the value with one of these private keys". Attacks become based around the security of those keys - as its a private chain anyway, do we mind?
- steckerbrett 11y ago
  Why bother with it at all? Authenticated database sounds like.. postgres.
  - anon1mous 11y ago
    Because it's distributed (NasDaq going bankrupt won't kill it) and all changes are in the open (no rogue employee stealing your shares). Sure you can achieve more or less the same thing with a relational DB or by drawing sticks on a piece of papyrus.
    - RemoteWorker 11y ago
      So you think Bitcoin is the first distributed database? No. There is no reason for a private blockchain to exist; it's a nonsensical idea.
      - lifeisstillgood 11y ago
        This seems to be a case of "you don't understand" - what sources / reading would you suggest covers this issue ?

zby 11y ago

Security is always about economy - it is after all about incentives and disincentives. Bitcoin makes this explicite with the mining process and the currency. Now it seems that some financial companies like the idea of a fully decentralized ledger, system where you don't need to trust a central authority to settle deals. But they don't like the currency part of it. I can understand them - I for one hate the wastefulness of the mining process - but it seems like they believe that they can build a decentralized system without the currency part that supports the economy of incentives and disincentives. Don't they understand the link between those two parts? Or maybe they think that it is enough to build some cargo cult system - that just copies the names, but is not decentralized at all - to lure investors? Update:s/distributed/decentralized/

lifeisstillgood 11y ago
But the implication is that the price of each new bitcoin must be a fraction of the total runtime of computing power on the planet. Let's say all financial transactions now appear on the blockchain, and every ten minutes a new block is mined. And furthermore let's say all the compute power of the world is on grid aka E3. And hiring the whole lot will take a credit card with 1 million dollars per ten minutes To Dr Evil, The value of controlling that chain is immense. And he would be willing to pay half a million dollars to write his adjustments to the chain The 25 bc handed over for that surely has to then be equal to that half million plus a tiny amount, otherwise Dr Evil will be willing to pay for half the worlds compute resources but good actors would not. Can we then assign a rough value to Bc now? And is the distribution of assets fair?
- Already__Taken 11y ago
  If Dr Evil could do that it's not in their interest to because we'd all know how the 25 btc came to exist and the blockchain as a system would be undermined and lose its value. Isn't that the point? The act of defrauding it is what devalues the chain. *Edit: I misunderstood a bit. But to then go on, the value of operating the bitcoin chain with your compute resources is to control and charge transaction fees isn't it? Profit from mining is the initial gold-rush kick to get the system popular. You're not always supposed to make money minting the coin as it were.

ommunist 11y ago

This is really funny coincidence. Russia bans bitcoins and criminalise its usage, while the US takes advantage and places blockchain facility on the Russian border. This is what I call ROTFL.