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All these articles completely disregard the cost of the system - and this is not a trivial problem. The bitcoin blockchain is subsidized by the speculators. Ev

by zby 11y ago

All these articles completely disregard the cost of the system - and this is not a trivial problem. The bitcoin blockchain is subsidized by the speculators. Eventually I think that the solution will kind of relax the 'permisionless' aspect of the system and have some cheap but slightly more centralized timestamping. Just like the PrivaTegrity proposal by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Chaum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Chaum (I can't find the source for this - but Google finds many articles about it: https://www.google.pl/search?q=privategrity https://www.google.pl/search?q=privategrity). The timestamper does not need to know what it is timestamping and additionally timestamping might be distributed across many jurisdictions - so the damage of a rogue timestamper can be limited. And it is only timestamping that requires that wasteful proof-of-work.

statoshi 11y ago
You are correct - permissionless blockchains have a completely different threat model that results in a high cost to secure the blockchain from attack. The vast majority of new blockchain systems we're seeing developed are private, permissioned systems. This offers a different security model that is still useful for a variety of situations, such as in existing financial network where there is already a fair amount of trust between the actors.
- zby 11y ago
  It is kind of confusing to use the terminology from bitcoin on solutions unrelated to the element that was the technological breakthrough in bitcoin.
  - brighton36 11y ago
    It's fraudulent, even. Many of these "blockchain" companies are just writing weird crud apps, and marketing it as something else.
Kristine1975 11y ago
>The bitcoin blockchain is subsidized by the speculators. And parents paying for the electricity necessary for mining coins ;-)
brighton36 11y ago
Actually, the evidence is starting to show that the subsidy comes from federal government. Mining is the process of converting registered value to fungible value. The premium on fungible value comes by way of regulatory controls on drugs, gambling, capital flight, and sex workers. A little more than 50% of the bitcoin being mined on any day would appear to be allocated for use by those who need bitcoin, in these industries.

by zby 11y ago

statoshi 11y ago

You are correct - permissionless blockchains have a completely different threat model that results in a high cost to secure the blockchain from attack. The vast majority of new blockchain systems we're seeing developed are private, permissioned systems. This offers a different security model that is still useful for a variety of situations, such as in existing financial network where there is already a fair amount of trust between the actors.

zby 11y ago
It is kind of confusing to use the terminology from bitcoin on solutions unrelated to the element that was the technological breakthrough in bitcoin.
- brighton36 11y ago
  It's fraudulent, even. Many of these "blockchain" companies are just writing weird crud apps, and marketing it as something else.

Kristine1975 11y ago

>The bitcoin blockchain is subsidized by the speculators. And parents paying for the electricity necessary for mining coins ;-)

brighton36 11y ago

Actually, the evidence is starting to show that the subsidy comes from federal government. Mining is the process of converting registered value to fungible value. The premium on fungible value comes by way of regulatory controls on drugs, gambling, capital flight, and sex workers. A little more than 50% of the bitcoin being mined on any day would appear to be allocated for use by those who need bitcoin, in these industries.