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Would this make it possible to implement a cryptocurrency that wasn't an ecological disaster?

tomfitz 9y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stellar_(payment_network) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stellar_(payment_network) is a decentralized currency that already isn't the "ecological disaster" that Bitcoin is.
kronos29296 9y ago
probably not.
kristofferR 9y ago
Ethereum is planning to switch to Proof of Stake in the coming years: https://github.com/ethereum/wiki/wiki/Proof-of-Stake-FAQ https://github.com/ethereum/wiki/wiki/Proof-of-Stake-FAQ
- jacobush 9y ago
  Mmmm... good luck
- icey 9y ago
  There are some coins (NEO/AntShares for example) that are opting for DBFT-style governance -- https://themerkle.com/what-is-delegated-byzantine-fault-tolerance/ https://themerkle.com/what-is-delegated-byzantine-fault-tole...
vanderZwan 9y ago
I know this place is crawling with cryptocurrency fanboys, but this is a serious issue for many sceptics. Regardless of whether you think that criticism is valid, downvoting anyone who asks questions about how to address this does not help make their scepticism go away.
jack_pp 9y ago
There's ecological disaster regardless of mining, I haven't done any math on the issue but I believe mining waste is a very small part of the overall polution in the world. We must develop technology to clean our planet regardless of mining waste. Given this and the fact that energy is becoming cleaner by the year I think worrying about mining waste is not rational
- vanderZwan 9y ago
  > I haven't done any math on the issue but I believe This is not the kind of discussion where assertion by belief has any place, on either side of the discussion. What we need solid estimates of how this technology currently scales, how it might improve, and how it compares to existing electronic currency, and physical cash (taking into account things like embodied energy of coins).
bmcusick 9y ago
Bitcoin mines are in western China and Oregon precisely for the abundant and cheap hydro power. That's not so bad, ecologically speaking. Bitcoin is only as ecologically harmful as the source of the electricity used to run the miners, and it's no more harmful than any other use of electricity. If the world switches over to solar and wind as baseload power, problem solved. If the world doesn't switch away from using coal, that's not Bitcoin's fault. It's not a problem Bitcoin can solve.
- the8472 9y ago
  If the world's economies ran on bitcoin we would need a stupendous amount of energy to keep the miners running. That energy not being spent on something else is a huge opportunity cost since many problems could be solved if there were just enough spare energy..
  - bmcusick 9y ago
    > If the world's economies ran on bitcoin we would need a stupendous amount of energy to keep the miners running. You've misunderstood something about Bitcoin if you think this is true. Bitcoin miners use resources based on the logic of competing with each other for the value of the mining reward, not based on the number of transactions they process. If Bitcoin solved all its scaling problems so that everyone in the world could use Bitcoin, but mining rewards remained constant, the resources the miners expend to collect the reward wouldn't be any different from today.
    - Nursie 9y ago
      I think you're underestimating the issue with attackers, if the world ran on bitcoin, attacking it becomes much more attractive, so use must indeed use more energy. It must use enough to make attacking bitcoin very unattractive.
      - bmcusick 9y ago
        No, sorry, that's not how Bitcoin works either. If the whole world used Bitcoin and the market cap of Bitcoin was over a trillion dollars, a 51% attacker could still only double-spend its own transactions. As long a public key crypto is secure, you cannot just re-write arbitrary Bitcoin balances into your own wallet even if you had 100% of the mining power. Therefore the incentive to attack Bitcoin is only as big as your own Bitcoin holdings, not the value of the entire market cap.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
mtrycz 9y ago
There's more than one Proof of Stake cryptocurrency, and Ethereum does want to go PoS sometime. PoS have been around for 3 (maybe 4?) years by now. Proof of Stake is quite genius in the politics of it, and the power needed to run is minimal (you still need to keep your hardware powered on)
- GordonS 9y ago
  Can you give a short summary of how PoS works?
  - lloyd-christmas 9y ago
    Not a personal summary, but this is Ethereum's FAQ: https://github.com/ethereum/wiki/wiki/Proof-of-Stake-FAQ https://github.com/ethereum/wiki/wiki/Proof-of-Stake-FAQ
    - GordonS 9y ago
      So... the more Ether you lock up, the more Ether you stand to gain; sort of like having a higher chance of winning the lottery if you buy a lot of tickets?
clarkmoody 9y ago
First, please show that cryptocurrency is an ecological "disaster" is the first place. Next, please explain how crypto is more of a disaster than the existing monetary system. Does the cryptocurrency mining economy pose more of an ecological threat than the system put in place to secure government fiat money: buildings, employees, vaults, mints, printing presses, armored vehicles, police, (some part of) the military, etc?
antocv 9y ago
Byteball is such a cryptocurrency. There is no Proof-of-Work, or Proof-of-Stake.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stellar_(payment_network) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stellar_(payment_network) is a decentralized currency that already isn't the "ecological disaster" that Bitcoin is.

kronos29296 9y ago

probably not.

kristofferR 9y ago

Ethereum is planning to switch to Proof of Stake in the coming years: https://github.com/ethereum/wiki/wiki/Proof-of-Stake-FAQ https://github.com/ethereum/wiki/wiki/Proof-of-Stake-FAQ

jacobush 9y ago
Mmmm... good luck
icey 9y ago
There are some coins (NEO/AntShares for example) that are opting for DBFT-style governance -- https://themerkle.com/what-is-delegated-byzantine-fault-tolerance/ https://themerkle.com/what-is-delegated-byzantine-fault-tole...

vanderZwan 9y ago

I know this place is crawling with cryptocurrency fanboys, but this is a serious issue for many sceptics. Regardless of whether you think that criticism is valid, downvoting anyone who asks questions about how to address this does not help make their scepticism go away.

jack_pp 9y ago

There's ecological disaster regardless of mining, I haven't done any math on the issue but I believe mining waste is a very small part of the overall polution in the world. We must develop technology to clean our planet regardless of mining waste. Given this and the fact that energy is becoming cleaner by the year I think worrying about mining waste is not rational

vanderZwan 9y ago
> I haven't done any math on the issue but I believe This is not the kind of discussion where assertion by belief has any place, on either side of the discussion. What we need solid estimates of how this technology currently scales, how it might improve, and how it compares to existing electronic currency, and physical cash (taking into account things like embodied energy of coins).

bmcusick 9y ago

Bitcoin mines are in western China and Oregon precisely for the abundant and cheap hydro power. That's not so bad, ecologically speaking. Bitcoin is only as ecologically harmful as the source of the electricity used to run the miners, and it's no more harmful than any other use of electricity. If the world switches over to solar and wind as baseload power, problem solved. If the world doesn't switch away from using coal, that's not Bitcoin's fault. It's not a problem Bitcoin can solve.

the8472 9y ago
If the world's economies ran on bitcoin we would need a stupendous amount of energy to keep the miners running. That energy not being spent on something else is a huge opportunity cost since many problems could be solved if there were just enough spare energy..
- bmcusick 9y ago
  > If the world's economies ran on bitcoin we would need a stupendous amount of energy to keep the miners running. You've misunderstood something about Bitcoin if you think this is true. Bitcoin miners use resources based on the logic of competing with each other for the value of the mining reward, not based on the number of transactions they process. If Bitcoin solved all its scaling problems so that everyone in the world could use Bitcoin, but mining rewards remained constant, the resources the miners expend to collect the reward wouldn't be any different from today.
  - Nursie 9y ago
    I think you're underestimating the issue with attackers, if the world ran on bitcoin, attacking it becomes much more attractive, so use must indeed use more energy. It must use enough to make attacking bitcoin very unattractive.
    - bmcusick 9y ago
      No, sorry, that's not how Bitcoin works either. If the whole world used Bitcoin and the market cap of Bitcoin was over a trillion dollars, a 51% attacker could still only double-spend its own transactions. As long a public key crypto is secure, you cannot just re-write arbitrary Bitcoin balances into your own wallet even if you had 100% of the mining power. Therefore the incentive to attack Bitcoin is only as big as your own Bitcoin holdings, not the value of the entire market cap.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

mtrycz 9y ago

There's more than one Proof of Stake cryptocurrency, and Ethereum does want to go PoS sometime. PoS have been around for 3 (maybe 4?) years by now. Proof of Stake is quite genius in the politics of it, and the power needed to run is minimal (you still need to keep your hardware powered on)

GordonS 9y ago
Can you give a short summary of how PoS works?
- lloyd-christmas 9y ago
  Not a personal summary, but this is Ethereum's FAQ: https://github.com/ethereum/wiki/wiki/Proof-of-Stake-FAQ https://github.com/ethereum/wiki/wiki/Proof-of-Stake-FAQ
  - GordonS 9y ago
    So... the more Ether you lock up, the more Ether you stand to gain; sort of like having a higher chance of winning the lottery if you buy a lot of tickets?

clarkmoody 9y ago

First, please show that cryptocurrency is an ecological "disaster" is the first place. Next, please explain how crypto is more of a disaster than the existing monetary system. Does the cryptocurrency mining economy pose more of an ecological threat than the system put in place to secure government fiat money: buildings, employees, vaults, mints, printing presses, armored vehicles, police, (some part of) the military, etc?

antocv 9y ago

Byteball is such a cryptocurrency. There is no Proof-of-Work, or Proof-of-Stake.