XT and why they are identifying peercoins strength

General
1

The current argument in BTC land over Core and XT are a actually an acute demonstration of how PeerCoin is what BTC must be or wants to but can not perhaps be.

Essentially GMAX in his post here points out that BTC has to be Backbone first then maybe it can get TPS.

It is interesting to see Bitcoiners sort of stumble in and still not understand backbone and its prequisite need an importance but tangentially touch on it.

It’s time like these that I am strengthened in my PeerCoin support…

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1158256.msg12200787#msg12200787

[quote=“jubalix”][quote=“gmaxwell”][quote=“AgentofCoin”]Do we want it to handle all world daily transactions,
or do we want protection from current monetary systems and government involvement?[/quote]If we achieve the second, we can have both. But if we only achieve the first, we likely cannot have the second (and wouldn’t find it to be a substantial improvement over the fiat systems we have now, even if).

The reason for this is that if Bitcoin is secure and trustworthy, trustless decenteralized micropayment facilities can be built on top of it and extend Bitcoin’s transaction security with arbritary speed or scale. But if the system is fragle and underminable by attackers (government or otherwise) then it won’t be robust enough to underpin these things.

(and things like micropayment channels were’t my invention, they were recommended by the system’s creator-- thats part of why Bitcoin has smart contracts to begin with.)[/quote]

whats interesting is Peercoin Achieves the second, now by design.

It heads of the whole Block size issue by going for the backbone, which is now becoming the problem for BTC as it tries to be 1 and 2, without being 2 first.

It seems that something like peercoin will take the lions share of large value transactions and BTC is falling into the middle of not being doge Ie doge can handle a high TPS at sacrifice of security [but who cares when your buying an ice cream and dont get hit up huge credit card fees], and not being good as a backbone.

Dont get me wrong I am a hardened BTC supporter, its just the boundary conditions do not support backbone currecy as well as Peercoin and so a debated like this rages.

I have being saying this for some time now, and it has come to fruition.[/quote]

2

bump+1

although a gmaxwell a few post later points out the much debated checkpointing in peercoin as not decentral:

'By, by design, requring the blockchain to be periodically signed by a trusted authority... you have a weird notion of resistance to state attacks.'
3

Quick question, what does TPS mean?

4

Also, I posted this response to Gregory Maxwell…

"This won’t be the case forever. As many Peercoiners know, checkpoints are similar to training wheels. They are an added protection when the network is young. Once minting participation increases and the network strengthens, centralized checkpoints will be removed by Sunny King and Peercoin will be able to exist without them.

The Nu Network, which is one of our Peercoin forks has already removed centralized checkpoints due to its higher participation of minting by shareholders. The participation is higher because of the requirement of shareholders to place votes when minting, which are needed in order to successfully run the network and change the supply of NuBits. Nu has run without checkpointing for almost a year now with no problems and Peercoin will eventually reach this state. It’s just a matter of time."

5

Transactions per second

6

Jubalix, I hope you don’t mind, but I fixed your quote boxes. The way you had it before made it appear that gmaxwell was talking about Peercoin, but it was actually your response to him. I made it clear, so there’s no confusion.

7

I posted this on social media. Please do what you have to, retweet, like, share, etc…



8

no, thats fine thanks

9

I would argue that a bigger block size will be favorable to already existing big Bitcoin miners. I for one will not be able to mine any bitcoins and probably not be able to run a validation node either. So far the XT fork has not gained much traction. I guess its fair to suspect that there is talk behind the curtains between Bitpay, Circle and Bitcoin miners.

If big Bitcoin miners and Bitcoin-to-bank gatekeepers come to an agreement, XT could very well succeed. I doubt that all Bitcoin core developers will migrate to XT and think it’s a fair chance that this whole mess could play out in favor of AltCoins.

If this happens, it means that any crypto currency depending on mining could be susceptible.

Perhaps Peercoin, already being designed as a backbone currency, could benefit from this mess. I was always thinking that mining centralization would sooner or later become an issue for Bitcoin. I would never have guessed that it would be Gavin spearheading it. Go figure.

10

Yes, it very well could. The main problem as mentioned above is Bitcoiners hesitation to the centralized checkpoints in Peercoin’s protocol. It’s possible many would have already made the switch if it wasn’t for this centralized point of failure. I told Sunny in a recent email that it’s possible there could be a mass exodus from Bitcoin within the next year or two. If that happens, all these people are going to be looking for a new home, so we need to be ready. This means we need to work toward removing checkpoints like has already been done at Nu.

11

I listen to World Crypto Network on youtube today. Some dudes on the show said exactly that; they were looking for some AltCoins.

I think Peercoin could learn from this whole mess. From what I gather it comes down to political struggle because there is no way to reach consensus about what to do. Perhaps Peercoin could adopt the voting mechanism NuBits offers, as a way to deal with that kind of situation should it occur?

What did Sunny King respond when you wrote to him about it the potential influx of new users?

12

This should be done in my opinion. Nu has proved that motion voting works. Just look at this history I wrote, which details how much Nu has evolved since launch. Most of this evolution is owed directly to motion voting and achieving consensus on major decisions…

I just sent it to him, so I’m waiting to hear his response. The email wasn’t strictly about this topic though.

13

speaking of exodus, the btc halving 48 weeks from now could help miners switch to ppc mining(if price level is attractive enough), helping to increase to hash rate and hence to lower the inflation to 2-3%

14

The coinbase reward halving will be very dangerous for Bitcoin - even more than the plummeting price already is.
If you want to know why, read here:

In difference to recent significant price drops in Bitcoin's history the situation might be more complicated now. It mght be more complicated, because Bitcoin mining is no longer something that single enthusiasts do on their GPU rigs, FPGAs or Avalons. Bitcoin mining has been converted to a business. A business that needs to generate revenue. That revenue is generated by mining and an appropriate combination of selling the Bitcoins to cover costs (purchase, operating, etc.) and keeping the Bitcoins for speculating purposes. With plummeting prices there's a point at which the mined Bitcoins don't even cover the cost of operating the mining devices. Somewhere close to that point the mining devices need to be shut off.

The thing is: the block chain is secured by the PoW mining. The difficulty drops as a result of turned off miners.
But the mining hardware is still there, available, with who-knows how many PH/s (in case of a Bitcoin mining data centre that was shut down).
That is not only a threat for other coins that have a SHA256 PoW, it poses a thread to Bitcoin itself.

This threat is based on the scenario in which a mining facility operator might be desperate by having invested hundreds of thousands of USD, maybe even millions and not knowing how to cover the costs.
It would be good for that operator to at least cover the costs of building that facility.
Assuming that the mining would have been done by selling a part of the Bitcoins and keeping some for speculation that could be achieved by selling those kept Bitcoins.
That might be an explanation for this downward spiral we see at Bitcoin’s price for some time now.
Dropping prices cause more Bitcoins to be sold until there are no left in the pockets of that operator.
Now begins the real threat - not for the operator and not in terms of selling pressure at the markets.
That operator now has an incentive to use the hardware for attacking the network trying to cover his loss.
If it’s just a small mining data centre with only a few PH/s, that wlll hardly be successful.
If it’s a big one it will be dangerous.
This is the ugly face of the combination of centralization and the need for expensive specialized mining hardware. The little guy can’t do anything to leverage the effects of big mining data centres going wild.
Under normal circumstances big players have no incentive to go wild. Instead they have an incentive do to the best to protect their investment.
Under extraordinary cirumstances it might be different.

That’s sad but true.

You can downvote me to hell now.
You can do so, because you hate what I say.
You can do it because I made you afraid.
But you can hardly do it, because all of it is nonsense and lacks comprehension.

Source: Reddit - Dive into anything

15

In case we have a similar consensus issue (hard fork) with Peercoin, would we fare any better than Bitcoin does now?

Nu’s motion approach has proven very successful, but Nu took great care in placing their DAC in responsible hands. Peercoin is said to have one of the best ownership distributions, especially among proof‐of‐stake coins is my perception. I have some concern the same voting system as Nu wouldn’t suit Peercoin for whatever reason. Would love to hear arguments both ways.

At least with Peercoin, the owners already vote, not people with fluctuating incentive (miners vs price).

Edit: Turns out there’s a good thread about this! Cryptoblog - notícias sobre bitcoin e criptomoedas! (“Implement motions and transaction fee voting in Peercoin”)

Yes, it very well could. The main problem as mentioned above is Bitcoiners hesitation to the centralized checkpoints in Peercoin’s protocol. It’s possible many would have already made the switch if it wasn’t for this centralized point of failure. I told Sunny in a recent email that it’s possible there could be a mass exodus from Bitcoin within the next year or two. If that happens, all these people are going to be looking for a new home, so we need to be ready. This means we need to work toward removing checkpoints like has already been done at Nu.[/quote]

Is centralized checkpoints a point of failure and not just a sort of rollback snapshot in case of emergency (from other successful attack on the network)?

16

Yes it is, because it means we need to trust Sunny King or hope nothing happens to him. People outside our community don’t want to have to trust him and really nobody should have to. It’s doubtful he would do anything to harm his own creation, but if anybody ever found out who he was, they could harm the network. This is why so many people stay away from Peercoin and will continue to do so until we do away with checkpoints altogether. If we did, I imagine many would finally make the jump to Peercoin.

17

If we did, I imagine many would finally make the jump to Peercoin.[/quote]

I would definitely invest more!

18

The only reason why I’m still invested in Peercoin is because of all those Bitcoin issues. Time will tell if they can solve them and if not Peercoin is still there.

Having said that I think the checkpoint system needs to go, but not without having implemented a simple voting system. The NuBits system isn’t perfect and suitable for Peercoin I believe, the discussion about Frequency voting (https://discuss.nubits.com/t/frequency-voting/2509) is interesting and might be something for Peercoin to implement.

19

It was the issues with Bitcoin that made me interested in Peercoin too. This whole blocksize debate just makes it so clear. I think it is inevitable that Bitcoin will stop being distributed and become less decentralized. Mining centralization will see to that.

I don’t think anyone invested in Peercoin has any problem with check-pointing?! Timing for the removal is another question I guess. At this point Sunny King has a whole lot to loose should he mismanage the check-pointing. He has a lot to win not abusing it and eventually removing it.

20

and how exactly will they attack BTC??? turn their machines on and improve hash security.

I mean maybe cause a difficulty issue but for BTC hmmm maybe not.

The other problem is anyone left in the game can afford to upgrade, and withing a few months, anyone not upgrading is irrelevant