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There are plenty of consensus protocols that don't waste energy but I think it's important to understand why PoW relies on an unproductive algorithm. Mining fu

There are plenty of consensus protocols that don't waste energy but I think it's important to understand why PoW relies on an unproductive algorithm. Mining fulfils two roles: - identity management: To identify who is a trustworthy block producer in an anonymous and trustless network, mining introduces a cost to the block generation process and we use a game theory assumption that it serves as a barrier for attackers. This doesn't mean there aren't validation checks performed by other nodes in the network and the consensus forming rules themselves of course. - consensus formation: In a distributed network, nodes are bound to disagree on which is the canonical chain out of two or more competing forks. The most common algorithm calculates the accumulated computational effort of each chain of blocks and picks the "heaviest" one, ie the one with the most work done on it. This has the nice side effect of ensuring economic finality for the transactions in those blocks. Now, regarding decentralisation you state that "the cryptocurrency people" use it wrong, but the definition you gave is incorrect. As a cryptocurrency person, Vitalik Buterin described decentralisation here: https://medium.com/@VitalikButerin/the-meaning-of-decentralization-a0c92b76a274 https://medium.com/@VitalikButerin/the-meaning-of-decentrali...

keymone 8y ago
PoW isn't wasting anything. PoS is not cheaper that PoW. this myth just won't die..
- decentralised 8y ago
  I don't think you understood what I wrote. PoW is wasteful in that the vast majority of the product of it's algorithm (hashes) is discarded. This means that block producers can be trusted because they wouldn't be spending energy / electric power to produce blocks for any reason other than gaining the block rewards, which they can only get if the block is valid. If PoW did some sort of useful work (gene folding, seti, etc) then there would be no reason to trust block producers since all of their blocks are useful and therefore they can be "mining" for reasons other than obtaining the block reward. Hope that helps.
  - keymone 8y ago
    i don't think you understand the technology at all.. > PoW is wasteful in that the vast majority of the product of it's algorithm (hashes) is discarded do you know what "PoW" means? it's 3 words: proof, of, work. what you consider "discarded" and "waste" is the Work in PoW. miners convert energy into blockchain security and every block signature is the proof that certain amount of energy was spent to find it. if there was another "useful" activity (gene folding, seti, etc) it would have created additional "value" for miners, making mining more valuable, creating incentive for more miners to mine and subsequently raising the difficulty to mine matching the additional "value" from "useful" activity. it's trivial econ and i really do hope it helps you better understand what you're arguing about.
    - decentralised 8y ago
      We might be arguing about the meaning of words here but the work in PoW is it's output and the hashimoto algorithm in PoW discards all computed hashes that fail to meet the difficulty requirement. I suppose you know how consensus algorithms work, but if you don't I'd suggest you start by reading this https://medium.com/@jpa_of_snc/consensus-casper-and-cryptoeconomics-in-15-minutes-or-less-c7ca2427bf88 https://medium.com/@jpa_of_snc/consensus-casper-and-cryptoec.... If cryptoeconomics is interesting to you I can also recommend the best list of learning resources available, here: https://github.com/jpantunes/awesome-cryptoeconomics https://github.com/jpantunes/awesome-cryptoeconomics The concept of a useful PoW algorithm has been debated a number of times and the consensus view is what I wrote earlier: If there are incentives to mining other than the block reward, the security assumption provided by hashrate majority is lost and blocks producers cannot be trusted. I'm a blockchain developer for a couple of years now, and I often write about it as you can see by the links I shared above. (edit: typos)
      - keymone 8y ago
        > arguing about the meaning of words here isn't that the most important thing? > work in PoW is it's output and the hashimoto algorithm in PoW discards all computed hashes that fail to meet the difficulty requirement you've used few specific words in your comments: "work" and "product". i agree that work in PoW is hashing and most of hashes are discarded, but product of PoW is the signature that satisfies the difficulty. if finding the signature didn't require going through lots of energy - it wouldn't have been proof of work. > If there are incentives to mining other than the block reward, the security assumption provided by hashrate majority is lost and blocks producers cannot be trusted. amazing, so you do understand this and yet you keep saying PoW is wasteful. if security is the product of PoW, then PoW is wasteful only if security is worthless.
j0hnM1st 8y ago
> There are plenty of consensus protocols that don't waste energy but I think it's important to understand why PoW relies on an unproductive algorithm. DPoS consensus used by Bitshares/STEEM & EOS seems to the most advanced among the models and they also have the highest TPS
- polynomial 8y ago
  Replacing mathematically provable cryptographic assurances with a human fallible cabal of BPs hardly seems like an advancement. In any case, Bitshares TPS was less due to DPoS and owed more to the limitations of what tx were supported. Ethereum chose to support greater contract flexibility which turned out to be what the community of users wanted more, at least then. We've yet to see a real solution to the problem of having to tradeoff performance for decentralization (while keeping security.)
- decentralised 8y ago
  All consensus protocols make tradeoffs between three properties: - Finality Latency: how fast is a block finalised after it’s been proposed - Decentralisation: how many consensus-forming nodes can exist in the network - Resource Overhead: how many blocks per second do consensus-forming nodes need to verify dPoS protocols sacrifice decentralisation and compromise in resource overhead for apparent performance, ie many transactions processed by a few very powerful servers. The game-theory and security aspects of a blockchain like its censorship resistance, immutability or who can produce the next block are also relaxed to a level that many blockchain professionals consider unacceptable. Case in point the formation of cartels is incentivised by the dPoS delegation of vote mechanism. Corruption is baked in. I wrote a short intro to consensus protocols a while back if you're interested in knowing a bit more: https://medium.com/@jpa_of_snc/consensus-casper-and-cryptoeconomics-in-15-minutes-or-less-c7ca2427bf88 https://medium.com/@jpa_of_snc/consensus-casper-and-cryptoec...

keymone 8y ago

PoW isn't wasting anything. PoS is not cheaper that PoW. this myth just won't die..

decentralised 8y ago
I don't think you understood what I wrote. PoW is wasteful in that the vast majority of the product of it's algorithm (hashes) is discarded. This means that block producers can be trusted because they wouldn't be spending energy / electric power to produce blocks for any reason other than gaining the block rewards, which they can only get if the block is valid. If PoW did some sort of useful work (gene folding, seti, etc) then there would be no reason to trust block producers since all of their blocks are useful and therefore they can be "mining" for reasons other than obtaining the block reward. Hope that helps.
- keymone 8y ago
  i don't think you understand the technology at all.. > PoW is wasteful in that the vast majority of the product of it's algorithm (hashes) is discarded do you know what "PoW" means? it's 3 words: proof, of, work. what you consider "discarded" and "waste" is the Work in PoW. miners convert energy into blockchain security and every block signature is the proof that certain amount of energy was spent to find it. if there was another "useful" activity (gene folding, seti, etc) it would have created additional "value" for miners, making mining more valuable, creating incentive for more miners to mine and subsequently raising the difficulty to mine matching the additional "value" from "useful" activity. it's trivial econ and i really do hope it helps you better understand what you're arguing about.
  - decentralised 8y ago
    We might be arguing about the meaning of words here but the work in PoW is it's output and the hashimoto algorithm in PoW discards all computed hashes that fail to meet the difficulty requirement. I suppose you know how consensus algorithms work, but if you don't I'd suggest you start by reading this https://medium.com/@jpa_of_snc/consensus-casper-and-cryptoeconomics-in-15-minutes-or-less-c7ca2427bf88 https://medium.com/@jpa_of_snc/consensus-casper-and-cryptoec.... If cryptoeconomics is interesting to you I can also recommend the best list of learning resources available, here: https://github.com/jpantunes/awesome-cryptoeconomics https://github.com/jpantunes/awesome-cryptoeconomics The concept of a useful PoW algorithm has been debated a number of times and the consensus view is what I wrote earlier: If there are incentives to mining other than the block reward, the security assumption provided by hashrate majority is lost and blocks producers cannot be trusted. I'm a blockchain developer for a couple of years now, and I often write about it as you can see by the links I shared above. (edit: typos)
    - keymone 8y ago
      > arguing about the meaning of words here isn't that the most important thing? > work in PoW is it's output and the hashimoto algorithm in PoW discards all computed hashes that fail to meet the difficulty requirement you've used few specific words in your comments: "work" and "product". i agree that work in PoW is hashing and most of hashes are discarded, but product of PoW is the signature that satisfies the difficulty. if finding the signature didn't require going through lots of energy - it wouldn't have been proof of work. > If there are incentives to mining other than the block reward, the security assumption provided by hashrate majority is lost and blocks producers cannot be trusted. amazing, so you do understand this and yet you keep saying PoW is wasteful. if security is the product of PoW, then PoW is wasteful only if security is worthless.

j0hnM1st 8y ago

> There are plenty of consensus protocols that don't waste energy but I think it's important to understand why PoW relies on an unproductive algorithm. DPoS consensus used by Bitshares/STEEM & EOS seems to the most advanced among the models and they also have the highest TPS

polynomial 8y ago
Replacing mathematically provable cryptographic assurances with a human fallible cabal of BPs hardly seems like an advancement. In any case, Bitshares TPS was less due to DPoS and owed more to the limitations of what tx were supported. Ethereum chose to support greater contract flexibility which turned out to be what the community of users wanted more, at least then. We've yet to see a real solution to the problem of having to tradeoff performance for decentralization (while keeping security.)
decentralised 8y ago
All consensus protocols make tradeoffs between three properties: - Finality Latency: how fast is a block finalised after it’s been proposed - Decentralisation: how many consensus-forming nodes can exist in the network - Resource Overhead: how many blocks per second do consensus-forming nodes need to verify dPoS protocols sacrifice decentralisation and compromise in resource overhead for apparent performance, ie many transactions processed by a few very powerful servers. The game-theory and security aspects of a blockchain like its censorship resistance, immutability or who can produce the next block are also relaxed to a level that many blockchain professionals consider unacceptable. Case in point the formation of cartels is incentivised by the dPoS delegation of vote mechanism. Corruption is baked in. I wrote a short intro to consensus protocols a while back if you're interested in knowing a bit more: https://medium.com/@jpa_of_snc/consensus-casper-and-cryptoeconomics-in-15-minutes-or-less-c7ca2427bf88 https://medium.com/@jpa_of_snc/consensus-casper-and-cryptoec...