Is there anyone that is keeping a record of minted blocks and the average amount of coin age it took to mint them? If there isn’t, is there a way to track that sort of information outside of my own blocks?
The block chain has a record of everything, we just need to figure out a way to parse it and generate that report.
When I accumulated some coins, I was so excited after they earned coin-age to start minting at Day 31 figuring I’d instantly mint a Proof-of-stake block.
It didn’t happen.
Either I didn’t have enough coins, or simply, I wasn’t lucky enough to mint a Proof-of-stake block.
Every few days I’d open my wallet for 5 minutes, wait for a block to be minted, it wouldn’t happen, and I’d give up frustrated.
This happened for the first 60 days of coin-age.
Then one day I got frustrated, and said, “screw it”. I left my wallet available in minting mode for a full 31 hours, and guess what? I minted a block, I earned free peercoin by minting coins based on my proof-of-stake, and I was excited to realize the system really works!
So the answer is:
a) Have a lot of coins, or…
b) Have a lot of coin-age earned, or …
c) Be patient for more than 5 minutes, and leave your wallet in a minting mode for more than 24-48 hours before expecting to mint your own proof-of-stake block
If you can do all 3, then you definitely will mint your own PoS block and mint new coins in your wallet.
Or check out my experimental calculator here: http://www.peercointalk.org/index.php?topic=809.msg18345#msg18345
It would be great to receive some feedback whether your minting time (being online) is close to the calculator’s one.
I’m not too optimistic that all the answers are in the blockchain, as it only stores successful mints. That’s like only looking at the winners of the lottery how much chance you have to win.
But still hope Ben surprises me one day 
Very interested in this. In my personal expirience I mint about 2-3 times more blocks then I should mint (assuming 100% of peercoin holder do PoS).
For Example (this are ofcourse not my numbers): When I whould own 1% of all peercoins I whould mint 2-3% of all PoS blocks.
As a result of this I assume that over 50% of all Peercoins do not do PoS and/or the coins are transfered t often. This makes PoS much less secure. Not 51% of all coins are needed to have 51% of PoS hashing power. Something about 5-10% of all coins (and let them mature for 90 days) should be enough to be able to double spend.
Can someone confirm these numbers?
[quote=“MUTO, post:5, topic:1952”]Very interested in this. In my personal expirience I mint about 2-3 times more blocks then I should mint (assuming 100% of peercoin holder do PoS).
For Example (this are ofcourse not my numbers): When I whould own 1% of all peercoins I whould mint 2-3% of all PoS blocks.
As a result of this I assume that over 50% of all Peercoins do not do PoS and/or the coins are transfered t often. This makes PoS much less secure. Not 51% of all coins are needed to have 51% of PoS hashing power. Something about 5-10% of all coins (and let them mature for 90 days) should be enough to be able to double spend.
Can someone confirm these numbers?[/quote]
I think that is what Ben is trying to get out of the blockchain.
But based on the few experiences we have I think we have a very low share of coinholders minting actively, I elaborated a bit more on that in the PoS thread I referred to in my previous post.
If everyone reports back that they mint 2 or 3 times more than my calculator, I’m happy to adjust my calculator based on experience awaiting extracts from the blockchain.
I think the rule of thumb may be simply this…
If every one who owns mintable Peercoin with +30 days coin-age mints them, then the average you could expect is 1% coins earned/year based on proof-of-stake.
BUT
If most eligible minters with stake, refuse to open their wallets and mint, then existing minters will mint more blocks as a result.
So based on that, yes, in theory it is possible mint more than 1% / year if the rest of the stake holders aren’t opening their wallets and minting.
Minting works on a first-come-first-minted basis. Whomever is >30 days in coin-age, is lucky enough, and can use their existing stake to generate a minted block, then they WIN
If John Doe, who also has old coins, with huge coin-age > 30 days, never opens his wallet, then he loses out on generated proof-of-stake blocks.
So if you have stake, have coins, they are older than 30 days, then let your minter make you money. Forget about Joe Doe who might have the same chance, but he leaves his wallet closed.
Edit I think the reward calculation prevents you earning more than 1% even if you were the only one minting.
[quote=“MUTO, post:5, topic:1952”]Very interested in this. In my personal expirience I mint about 2-3 times more blocks then I should mint (assuming 100% of peercoin holder do PoS).
For Example (this are ofcourse not my numbers): When I whould own 1% of all peercoins I whould mint 2-3% of all PoS blocks.
As a result of this I assume that over 50% of all Peercoins do not do PoS and/or the coins are transfered t often. This makes PoS much less secure. Not 51% of all coins are needed to have 51% of PoS hashing power. Something about 5-10% of all coins (and let them mature for 90 days) should be enough to be able to double spend.
Can someone confirm these numbers?[/quote]
Honestly almost every week I see someone theorizing about 51% attack, what I would like to see is someone to post a successful double spend or a 51% attack on peercoin. Has anyone done it?
I know that with blockchain.info (for Bitcoin), you can see if there are attempts at double-spending, but I’m not sure if there are similar tools for Peercoin yet. Maybe bkchain.org can add something, if there isn’t already a function to display it.
[quote=“ppcman, post:7, topic:1952”]I think the rule of thumb may be simply this…
If every one who owns mintable Peercoin with +30 days coin-age mints them, then the average you could expect is 1% coins earned/year based on proof-of-stake.
BUT
If most eligible minters with stake, refuse to open their wallets and mint, then existing minters will mint more blocks as a result.
So based on that, yes, in theory it is possible mint more than 1% / year if the rest of the stake holders aren’t opening their wallets and minting.
Minting works on a first-come-first-minted basis. Whomever is >30 days in coin-age, is lucky enough, and can use their existing stake to generate a minted block, then they WIN
If John Doe, who also has old coins, with huge coin-age > 30 days, never opens his wallet, then he loses out on generated proof-of-stake blocks.
So if you have stake, have coins, they are older than 30 days, then let your minter make you money. Forget about Joe Doe who might have the same chance, but he leaves his wallet closed.[/quote]
@PPCMan and @MUTO
Maybe I’m misunderstanding you guys, but as far as I’m aware it is not possible to mint more than 1%/year on average. Even if you would be the only one on the network minting. You would only be able to create a block when you have at least 30 days coinage in a transaction in your wallet and it would always be 30/366 (or something close) of 1%.
As soon as Joe Doe who keeps their wallet closed for years, opens their wallet they still get their 1% per year. If many people structurally don’t mint we would see less inflations as a whole (a percentage of the 1%).
@sakhan, I think it’s technically not easy even if you can 51% on PoS. E.g. what will happen when a miner creates a PoW block. I guess you have to start over again with your PoS attack. To me it appears as long as blocks are being creating by PoW, a sustained PoS attack (e.g. more than 5 or 6 blocks) might not be possible without also attempting a PoW attack at the same time.
But have to admit that I’m a noob with 51% attacks on blockchains And maybe we shouldn’t make anyone any wiser over here…
Edit: if orphaned blocks is an indicator of 51% attacks you might check this page out: http://bitinfocharts.com/ppcoin/
Yes, that is true you can only get 1% “reward” per year when minting. What I have talked about is the number of PoS blocks.
PoS blocks have always priority before PoW blocks.
Even if you were the only one minting, you would still have to have a huge amount of mature coins to attempt to take over 51% of the proof-of-stake blocks.
While stake blocks have a positive bias, it’s not a guaranteed thing, so proof of work blocks would be more prevalent (like it was in the early days of the Peercoin network, before there were enough stakes to make up the majority of blocks solved).