Unique selling point of peershares

I did a presentation on Peercoin yesterday, and received a question about peershares I didn’t have an immediate answer on. Someone suggested that both mastercoin and ripple already offer this functionality.
Am I correct in assuming that these other solutions are incomplete, and will not provide certain mechanisms like automatic distribution of dividends?

Just some aspects that crossed my mind regarding mastercoin and ripple.

Mastercoin is relying heavily on Bitcoin (by piggybacking on Bitcoin’s block chain) which makes Mastercoin vulnerable to Bitcoin protocol changes in a way that is no threat for Peershares (background info: http://www.coindesk.com/developers-battle-bitcoin-block-chain/)

Ripple is no decentralized crypto currency, but a product of a company (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ripple_Labs).
If Ripple decides to end its business, what happens to the XRP?
I don’t know, but I do know that Peeshares can’t be ended that way.

So both may offer similar functions as Peershares, but on a completely different basis.
One might say that Peershares uniqueness is its independancy from companies and no intrinsic technical dependancy from a decided crypto coin (which currently is Peercoin).
Using Peercoins to payout dividends is a choice of implementation, not a technical requirement.

Scenario: If there’s a day when Peercoin dies, Peershares must switch to a different crypto currency for dividend payout (and all existing implementations need to be adjusted).
That will create some stress. Dividend payouts will be paused.
But it will not kill Peershares, nor will it kill a company funded on Peershares.
If Bitcoin dies, all Mastercoin related stuff that is injected in Bitcoin’s block chain has come to an end. Mastercoin will be more heavily impacted by that as Peershares can ever be from the end of Peercoin.

[quote=“Tea42, post:1, topic:2306”]I did a presentation on Peercoin yesterday, and received a question about peershares I didn’t have an immediate answer on. Someone suggested that both mastercoin and ripple already offer this functionality.
Am I correct in assuming that these other solutions are incomplete, and will not provide certain mechanisms like automatic distribution of dividends?[/quote]

We were discussing some of these points in IRC yesterday. Counterparty allows you to issue shares and distribute dividends(in any asset type). So, yes they do intersect with our use cases.

I think the primary differentiator here is we are PoS based, and the technology uses a separate block chain. I think technologies like Counterparty may end up interfering with the basic technology of Bitcoin. I think that this interference is anticipated by some, and the Side Chains project was a response to that.

Peershares poses none of these risks, and the possibilities are much greater. It’s a more ambitious project.

-jmz

Thanks! I’ll use this information in a next presentation. The organizer of the meetup asked me to come back a next time and tell more about peershares. I had to be very short about it yesterday, because I ran out of time :confused:

Pls record it if you can and send it to @SirCoinGame. He seems to be doing video work for the project lately.

-jmz

Just curious, what was the context of this presentation?

It was a general bitcoin meetup in Amsterdam. I was one of about 8 speakers (in dutch). Irritant asked me to fill in for him that evening. I’d prefer not to link it directly since the page states my name and everything.

I can start with a concept peershares presentation and link it here, and alter it based on comments etc. Then if I do another presentation there I’ll send the video. It will probably only be useful in the Netherlands since it will probably be in the dutch language…

[quote=“Tea42, post:7, topic:2306”]It was a general bitcoin meetup in Amsterdam. I was one of about 8 speakers (in dutch). Irritant asked me to fill in for him that evening. I’d prefer not to link it directly since the page states my name and everything.

I can start with a concept peershares presentation and link it here, and alter it based on comments etc. Then if I do another presentation there I’ll send the video. It will probably only be useful in the Netherlands since it will probably be in the dutch language…[/quote]

Do share it and we can help you refine it! :smiley: I think JMZ said it best. The aspect of Peershares that’s most intriguing (to me, at least) is having your own blockchain. You’re not subjected to the whims of another protocol or company. It’s also easy to set up yourself, currently only requires you to edit a couple lines of code before compile. I’m not a code guru and I managed to start my own Peershares blockchain just by following instruction on the github wiki. If you need any references you should check it out. http://github.com/Peershares/Peershares/wiki

Next thing I know - I’m setting up the client on other virtual machines, sending shares around, pushing out dividends. Once it’s all set up it’s as easy as managing a mailing list. It’s really cool stuff, and nice to know you’re not at the mercy of external forces. That’s what cryptos should be about, right?

Those changes can probably be parameterized so that you could make the changes from command line options or the config file, without even recompiling.

Those changes can probably be parameterized so that you could make the changes from command line options or the config file, without even recompiling.[/quote]

Yup. I’m sure the devs will come up with a much easier way in the future.

-removed-
(opens online in google docs)

This is an unfinished draft version, feel free to comment on anything. I used the Peershares part of the Peercoin presentation by river333

Also, I used a pic from Overkillcoin (the ppc one) to display proof of stake. I hope he doesn’t mind.

I know that Peershares is not finished yet, but is there a target set for how to make the software business-friendly? If I’m a business owner, what is the procedure that I follow to use Peershares? Can it be as simple as:

  • download software
  • click ‘create new blockchain’
  • enter company name, number of shares, address etc etc
  • click ‘generate’
  • Distribute the automatically generated client software to my shareholders (or put it on website for download)
  • sell and distribute shares

Also, does anyone know what it costs to issue shares in the current (3rd party) system? How much money will businesses save if they use Peershares?

[quote=“Tea42, post:1, topic:2306”]I did a presentation on Peercoin yesterday, and received a question about peershares I didn’t have an immediate answer on. Someone suggested that both mastercoin and ripple already offer this functionality.
Am I correct in assuming that these other solutions are incomplete, and will not provide certain mechanisms like automatic distribution of dividends?[/quote]

Hi Tea42,

Your presentation was appreciated by a lot of guys over at the meet-up. The guys who did ask this question was not able to see the difference between “bitcoin” and the “bitcoin protocol”. So even if you had this information at that time there was no way of convincing him.

I had more interest in the other question that was asked about the so called “known bug” in POS minting. So far I found out that it is not a general bug in POS minting but just in the scamcoin called NVC. However Im not completly sure yet.

Anyway it was nice to meet you, and if you ever consider working in a crypto-company, feel free to give me a call or visit our website.

Cheers!
Jop Hartog

[quote=“Tea42, post:11, topic:2306”]https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bx_tGC3WX7EdRHZlUDUxb3diSGc/edit?usp=sharing
(opens online in google docs)

This is an unfinished draft version, feel free to comment on anything. I used the Peershares part of the Peercoin presentation by river333

Also, I used a pic from Overkillcoin (the ppc one) to display proof of stake. I hope he doesn’t mind.

I know that Peershares is not finished yet, but is there a target set for how to make the software business-friendly? If I’m a business owner, what is the procedure that I follow to use Peershares? Can it be as simple as:

  • download software
  • click ‘create new blockchain’
  • enter company name, number of shares, address etc etc
  • click ‘generate’
  • Distribute the automatically generated client software to my shareholders (or put it on website for download)
  • sell and distribute shares

Also, does anyone know what it costs to issue shares in the current (3rd party) system? How much money will businesses save if they use Peershares?[/quote]

I took a look over your slides on Google docs and I think it’s pretty accurate. Some things that I would point out:

Slide 4 - I don’t think it necessarily has to be one blockchain per company. There’s really aren’t any rules as to how many blockchains you can start. Also I think you spelled dividends wrong :P.

Slide 6 - With cost reduction you could probably discuss the reduction in time to begin using it. If you have an idea that you want to start an IPO for you could conceivably setup your own blockchain in an hour or so, and have all your shares sold by the afternoon. If there’s enough interest of course :). Is there another such system that allows for such speed and flexibility? Of course people as well. You won’t need as many people managing the process, and as you’ve already mentioned you don’t really need a 3rd party to make it all work.

I’m guessing you have some notes somewhere to expound on these talking points?

Yikes, I did misspell dividends!..

Thanks for the comments! I’ll update the link with a new version when i’ve put some more time in it. I’ll make similar notes as river333 did in the ppc version so it’s a complete story, with room for additions from the speaker.

Another question about security:

Is it correct that signing blocks of a peershares blockchain does not yield reward? If that is true, there would be no reason why someone would try to sign a lot of chains at once, so no security measures like slasher would be needed.

But, if that is true, what is the incentive for shareholders to keep their clients online and minting?

@Tea42 The Peershares template has the same block reward system as Peercoin. http://peercoin.net/minting This is the Peercoin site with information on rewards, but I believe the information applies the same. Just substitute coins for shares.

@Tea42: To follow-up with what SirCoinGame added, because Peershares are a template, each offering could use a different distribution scheme if they wanted to. For some businesses or organizations, it may make sense to keep the mint reward at an average of 1% per annum.

For others, who want to maintain the security of the network themselves, they may drop that reward to zero, fully expecting that people will only transact with their shares when they want to move investments around (and, as long as they – the offerers – can convince the investors that the security of the network is maintained). In a third situation, the offers may allow the minting reward to go significantly higher than it does in the base installation – either to increase the decentralization, or, perhaps, because they have a rational reason to use the shares in an inflationary manner. In that last case, it’s possible that the base distribution of shares (via PoW) was very small, and they want to then allow the early investors access to larger amounts of shares via minting for the next couple of years.

This last scenario I’ve given some thought too, because it’s counter-intuitive if you’re offering these to a public audience (in many cases), but potentially useful if you’re using these shares for internal transactions between decentralized business units of the same parent organization. It’s a type of business structure that isn’t widely used today, because of many of the challenges associated with accounting and transparency, but with a block chain-based system, it’s possible to allow those business units to effectively compete with each other for the minting rewards which in turn will make the security of the whole organization’s finances more stable and protected.

Finally, there’s also no reason to believe that a team cannot custom-craft their offering to work in the complete opposite way, either. With the right development effort, a Peershares block chain could be designed to reward minting by flipping the reward – a successful minted block doesn’t yield a gain, but instead, it could reset some form of deflation that would occur. I’ve not given a lot of thought to this model, and don’t (yet) feel that I have a deep enough understanding of deflationary monetary policy (or other, more “exotic” economic tools like demurrage) to figure out how it could be used, but I know that it is definitely an option.

@Tea42: I just tried to open up the Google Doc that you linked, and I’m getting this message:

We're sorry. You can't access this item because it is in violation of our Terms of Service.

Any idea if this is widespread, or is it just for me?

@Ben: eeks. It’s not just you, I get the same error…
SirCoinGame, Ben, tnx for the info! I’ll fix and update the presentation somewhere this week, hopefully I can get it finished around the weekend.

This is a new draft version, in pdf on imgur: http://imgur.com/Vr7wHbH
Now I’ve uploaded it I think I should make some more slides with possible use cases and scenario’s, instead of the short list.