6 ms·

The Parity fallout: Which ICOs are affected?

88 points by mgalka 9y ago

mv4 9y ago
Interesting analysis. What I always find interesting about these crypto incidents is how quiet everyone is, including the parties that end up "losing" significant amounts irreversibly. There's never an investigation.
- mhluongo 9y ago
  You want an investigation on how the funds got frozen?
  - matt4077 9y ago
    If your new $100,000,000 skyscraper collapses and the engineer says "oops, I had my slide rule set to imperial units" would you not talk to a lawyer about it? In most cases, indemnification clauses are even invalid for gross negligence. I seem to remember that software has carved out some limitations. It remains to be seen how long they will last if idiots such as these continue to use them in their little scheme to separate fools and their money.
- DennisP 9y ago
  In this case the funds are frozen in place, not stolen by a hacker. The reason it happened doesn't take much investigation; see my explanation at the top here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15642856 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15642856
crankylinuxuser 9y ago
Oh look. The ethdevs lost more money. I guess we'll expect to see another hard fork, with more sinister language? (edit: 1) Yeah, this whole episode is what's wrong with Ethereum. Solidity was sold as a cure-all. And its a bugridden festering sore that leaves money for the takings. These side effects should be caught if there was a good lang used: and Im talking about a possibly nonturing complete DSL. Instead, we have innovative companies that are building on this quicksand thinking its a good foundation; its not. How many more millions will be lost before someone goes back to the drawing board and does this monetary infrastructure right? (1) https://labs.mwrinfosecurity.com/assets/Uploads/_resampled/ResizedImage600565-Capture3.PNG https://labs.mwrinfosecurity.com/assets/Uploads/_resampled/R...
- pjc50 9y ago
  The developers made the right choice: ship now rather than take the time to do it properly. There will eventually be a reckoning when either the bottom falls out of the market or all these ICOs are banned as unregistered secuirities offerings, and like the Silk Road some people will go to jail. It's vitally important to take as much money as possible off suckers before this happens.
- mv4 9y ago
  Yes, amateur hour all around - it's almost as though random individuals with limited tech experience are allowed to mess with a production system. But, this is exciting and fun, and I feel good things will emerge from this eventually.
- zeroxfe 9y ago
  This is the same kind of complaint as was with C, Perl, PHP, then Javascript. All of these languages broke new ground, not in programming languages, but in domains. The people building these languages weren't PL experts -- they were just trying to solve problems. The domains got successful, and the languages either evolved or were replaced. This is exactly where Ethereum is right now.
  - klipt 9y ago
    Who uses untested C code to control an "oops I just lost $100M and there's no recourse" system?
    - zeroxfe 9y ago
      Pacemakers, satellites, rocket ships, cars, nuclear plants, etc.
      - jjjensen90 9y ago
        Those systems are most definitely not running "untested C code."
touchofevil 9y ago
This is why I'm really interested in Tezos. The promise of Tezos is that the governance will happen on the Tezos blockchain via voting by holders of Tezos. Decred is also doing something similar, but I don't think Decred has smart contracts, whereas Tezos will. Here's a recent Tedx Talk by the CTO of Tezos. https://youtu.be/SbaVNkyGT3M https://youtu.be/SbaVNkyGT3M PS. I did not contribute to the Tezos ICO and I don't hold any Decred.
- matt4077 9y ago
  Great! Start with the Federal Reserve and SEC settings rules in a somewhat transparent process, run by people appointed by democratically elected governments. But people started doubting monetary policy, rule-making around securities, and the democratic process in principle. Lo and behold: someone creates a system with all of its ideology baked into an algorithm that cannot be changed. But that leads to rather obvious injustices. And where, previously, these were settled in the open court of law, now the response was a faint shrugging: "That's how it's supposed to work. Shoulda audited the 43,563 lines of code underlying your really smart contract", said one unnamed cryptobro incapable of distinguishing ex ante and ex post fairness[0]. So now we get yet another blockchain, which is almost like a democratic government. Except your wealth determines the power of your vote. (Plus, of course, it's also untested, and throws away everything the concept of democracy stands for except the faint resemblance of something not entirely unlike voting). [0]: Example: your parents decree in their will that their $100,000,000 fortune shall be distributed among your sister and you according to the following rule: Flip a coin. Heads: Jane gets everything. Tails: Bob gets everything. That process is fair ex ante because you enter with equal chances to win. But the result it produces is decidedly unfair. Good thing it doesn't matter, though: Your mother lost that fortune somewhere in the blockchain, which lead to that horrible horrible murder-suicide that brought you two here today)
  - shallot_router 9y ago
    Not sure why you're being downvoted for this. Seems like a valid concern for such a system.
wyldfire 9y ago
While counterparty (XCP) isn't as rich as Ethererum, I wonder: is it adequate for what many of these ICOs are intended? It's unfortunate that it likely requires higher transaction fees but it seems much simpler to me (and trustless).
- willitpamp573 9y ago
  You're spot on. counterparty is a better platform for token offerings, and was the dominant platform until the term "ICO" emerged, and all token sales took to ERC-20.
  - CryptoPunk 9y ago
    The ERC-20 standard is now finalized as an official EIP (Ethereum Improvement Proposal), meaning any bugs in the leading implementation will almost certainly be considered a protocol bug and rolled back with a hard fork. So I don't think there's any disadvantage in using Ethereum for token sales, and plenty of advantages like experimenting with new token sale smart contracts (different auction mechanisms to allow better price discovery), not to mention the larger suite of compatible applications (anything ERC-20 compliant like Etherdelta or 0x for decentralized exchange). Also, Counterparty uses a port of the Ethereum Virtual Machine, so any innovative uses of it will have the same risks as using Ethereum.
    - willitpamp573 9y ago
      Counterparty can run the EVM port, it doesn't run on the EVM port.
      - CryptoPunk 9y ago
        Yes I didn't intend to imply otherwise. That's why I specified "innovative uses", as opposed to all uses, of Counterparty as suffering the risks as Ethereum

88 points by mgalka 9y ago

mv4 9y ago

Interesting analysis. What I always find interesting about these crypto incidents is how quiet everyone is, including the parties that end up "losing" significant amounts irreversibly. There's never an investigation.

mhluongo 9y ago
You want an investigation on how the funds got frozen?
- matt4077 9y ago
  If your new $100,000,000 skyscraper collapses and the engineer says "oops, I had my slide rule set to imperial units" would you not talk to a lawyer about it? In most cases, indemnification clauses are even invalid for gross negligence. I seem to remember that software has carved out some limitations. It remains to be seen how long they will last if idiots such as these continue to use them in their little scheme to separate fools and their money.
DennisP 9y ago
In this case the funds are frozen in place, not stolen by a hacker. The reason it happened doesn't take much investigation; see my explanation at the top here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15642856 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15642856

crankylinuxuser 9y ago

Oh look. The ethdevs lost more money. I guess we'll expect to see another hard fork, with more sinister language? (edit: 1) Yeah, this whole episode is what's wrong with Ethereum. Solidity was sold as a cure-all. And its a bugridden festering sore that leaves money for the takings. These side effects should be caught if there was a good lang used: and Im talking about a possibly nonturing complete DSL. Instead, we have innovative companies that are building on this quicksand thinking its a good foundation; its not. How many more millions will be lost before someone goes back to the drawing board and does this monetary infrastructure right? (1) https://labs.mwrinfosecurity.com/assets/Uploads/_resampled/ResizedImage600565-Capture3.PNG https://labs.mwrinfosecurity.com/assets/Uploads/_resampled/R...

pjc50 9y ago
The developers made the right choice: ship now rather than take the time to do it properly. There will eventually be a reckoning when either the bottom falls out of the market or all these ICOs are banned as unregistered secuirities offerings, and like the Silk Road some people will go to jail. It's vitally important to take as much money as possible off suckers before this happens.
mv4 9y ago
Yes, amateur hour all around - it's almost as though random individuals with limited tech experience are allowed to mess with a production system. But, this is exciting and fun, and I feel good things will emerge from this eventually.
zeroxfe 9y ago
This is the same kind of complaint as was with C, Perl, PHP, then Javascript. All of these languages broke new ground, not in programming languages, but in domains. The people building these languages weren't PL experts -- they were just trying to solve problems. The domains got successful, and the languages either evolved or were replaced. This is exactly where Ethereum is right now.
- klipt 9y ago
  Who uses untested C code to control an "oops I just lost $100M and there's no recourse" system?
  - zeroxfe 9y ago
    Pacemakers, satellites, rocket ships, cars, nuclear plants, etc.
    - jjjensen90 9y ago
      Those systems are most definitely not running "untested C code."

touchofevil 9y ago

This is why I'm really interested in Tezos. The promise of Tezos is that the governance will happen on the Tezos blockchain via voting by holders of Tezos. Decred is also doing something similar, but I don't think Decred has smart contracts, whereas Tezos will. Here's a recent Tedx Talk by the CTO of Tezos. https://youtu.be/SbaVNkyGT3M https://youtu.be/SbaVNkyGT3M PS. I did not contribute to the Tezos ICO and I don't hold any Decred.

matt4077 9y ago
Great! Start with the Federal Reserve and SEC settings rules in a somewhat transparent process, run by people appointed by democratically elected governments. But people started doubting monetary policy, rule-making around securities, and the democratic process in principle. Lo and behold: someone creates a system with all of its ideology baked into an algorithm that cannot be changed. But that leads to rather obvious injustices. And where, previously, these were settled in the open court of law, now the response was a faint shrugging: "That's how it's supposed to work. Shoulda audited the 43,563 lines of code underlying your really smart contract", said one unnamed cryptobro incapable of distinguishing ex ante and ex post fairness[0]. So now we get yet another blockchain, which is almost like a democratic government. Except your wealth determines the power of your vote. (Plus, of course, it's also untested, and throws away everything the concept of democracy stands for except the faint resemblance of something not entirely unlike voting). [0]: Example: your parents decree in their will that their $100,000,000 fortune shall be distributed among your sister and you according to the following rule: Flip a coin. Heads: Jane gets everything. Tails: Bob gets everything. That process is fair ex ante because you enter with equal chances to win. But the result it produces is decidedly unfair. Good thing it doesn't matter, though: Your mother lost that fortune somewhere in the blockchain, which lead to that horrible horrible murder-suicide that brought you two here today)
- shallot_router 9y ago
  Not sure why you're being downvoted for this. Seems like a valid concern for such a system.

wyldfire 9y ago

While counterparty (XCP) isn't as rich as Ethererum, I wonder: is it adequate for what many of these ICOs are intended? It's unfortunate that it likely requires higher transaction fees but it seems much simpler to me (and trustless).

willitpamp573 9y ago
You're spot on. counterparty is a better platform for token offerings, and was the dominant platform until the term "ICO" emerged, and all token sales took to ERC-20.
- CryptoPunk 9y ago
  The ERC-20 standard is now finalized as an official EIP (Ethereum Improvement Proposal), meaning any bugs in the leading implementation will almost certainly be considered a protocol bug and rolled back with a hard fork. So I don't think there's any disadvantage in using Ethereum for token sales, and plenty of advantages like experimenting with new token sale smart contracts (different auction mechanisms to allow better price discovery), not to mention the larger suite of compatible applications (anything ERC-20 compliant like Etherdelta or 0x for decentralized exchange). Also, Counterparty uses a port of the Ethereum Virtual Machine, so any innovative uses of it will have the same risks as using Ethereum.
  - willitpamp573 9y ago
    Counterparty can run the EVM port, it doesn't run on the EVM port.
    - CryptoPunk 9y ago
      Yes I didn't intend to imply otherwise. That's why I specified "innovative uses", as opposed to all uses, of Counterparty as suffering the risks as Ethereum