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Topic: Bitcoin 2013: The Future of Payments - San Jose, CA - May 17-19, 2013 - page 3. (Read 17417 times)

legendary
Activity: 4690
Merit: 1276
No I didn't. This was discussed after the whitepaper, too. I just don't have time to look for it.

Hmmm.  I see...

hero member
Activity: 784
Merit: 1000
the meaning of your other statement is unusual, other than people working on mining are worthless and will be replaced. But maybe you didn't mean that.

I didn't mean they were worthless. Just that mining will become more and more specialized, and storing the blockchain even more so, but that's OK, because a lot of the peer to peer stuff is done on the clients who can keep miners and blockchains honest by constantly comparing them.

I understand now. Verification is already becoming more specialized and the people are adapting. As long as the process remains in the hands of the people then it will remain a system that I can support. I think the system you are thinking of where everyone is running SPV clients is a long way off. Today pools control the process and people like organofcorti and Meni Rosenfeld do a lot to keep that system honest.

Programmers/computer scientists like to talk about theoretically worst-case scenario, I think that's what Mike Hearn really meant.

And if freedom is of value to a person, it's not unfair for him to participate in the verification himself without being given meaningful economic benefits.

legendary
Activity: 1680
Merit: 1035
No I didn't. This was discussed after the whitepaper, too. I just don't have time to look for it.
legendary
Activity: 4690
Merit: 1276

... Satoshi himself mentioned that eventually we'll likely end up with just a few copies of the blockchain in gigantic data centers, with almost everyone running SPV clients that, ...


I'm not necessarily doubting that he said that, but I've never run across it.  Can you provide a pointer?


Satoshi's white paper:
Quote
It is possible to verify payments without running a full network node. A user only needs to keep
a copy of the block headers of the longest proof-of-work chain, which he can get by querying
network nodes until he's convinced he has the longest chain, and obtain the Merkle branch
linking the transaction to the block it's timestamped in. He can't check the transaction for
himself, but by linking it to a place in the chain, he can see that a network node has accepted it,
and blocks added after it further confirm the network has accepted it.

As such, the verification is reliable as long as honest nodes control the network, but is more
vulnerable if the network is overpowered by an attacker.
While network nodes can verify
transactions for themselves, the simplified method can be fooled by an attacker's fabricated
transactions for as long as the attacker can continue to overpower the network. One strategy to
protect against this would be to accept alerts from network nodes when they detect an invalid
block, prompting the user's software to download the full block and alerted transactions to
confirm the inconsistency.
Businesses that receive frequent payments will probably still want to
run their own nodes for more independent security and quicker verification.

Thank you for quoting the entire passage.

That is indeed convincing.  Convincing that ~rassah took significant liberties in interpreting the whitepaper, that is.
legendary
Activity: 2156
Merit: 1393
You lead and I'll watch you walk away.
the meaning of your other statement is unusual, other than people working on mining are worthless and will be replaced. But maybe you didn't mean that.

I didn't mean they were worthless. Just that mining will become more and more specialized, and storing the blockchain even more so, but that's OK, because a lot of the peer to peer stuff is done on the clients who can keep miners and blockchains honest by constantly comparing them.

I understand now. Verification is already becoming more specialized and the people are adapting. As long as the process remains in the hands of the people then it will remain a system that I can support. I think the system you are thinking of where everyone is running SPV clients is a long way off. Today pools control the process and people like organofcorti and Meni Rosenfeld do a lot to keep that system honest.
legendary
Activity: 1680
Merit: 1035
the meaning of your other statement is unusual, other than people working on mining are worthless and will be replaced. But maybe you didn't mean that.

I didn't mean they were worthless. Just that mining will become more and more specialized, and storing the blockchain even more so, but that's OK, because a lot of the peer to peer stuff is done on the clients who can keep miners and blockchains honest by constantly comparing them.
legendary
Activity: 2156
Merit: 1393
You lead and I'll watch you walk away.

... Satoshi himself mentioned that eventually we'll likely end up with just a few copies of the blockchain in gigantic data centers, with almost everyone running SPV clients that, ...


I'm not necessarily doubting that he said that, but I've never run across it.  Can you provide a pointer?


Satoshi's white paper:
Quote
It is possible to verify payments without running a full network node. A user only needs to keep
a copy of the block headers of the longest proof-of-work chain, which he can get by querying
network nodes until he's convinced he has the longest chain, and obtain the Merkle branch
linking the transaction to the block it's timestamped in. He can't check the transaction for
himself, but by linking it to a place in the chain, he can see that a network node has accepted it,
and blocks added after it further confirm the network has accepted it.

As such, the verification is reliable as long as honest nodes control the network, but is more
vulnerable if the network is overpowered by an attacker.
While network nodes can verify
transactions for themselves, the simplified method can be fooled by an attacker's fabricated
transactions for as long as the attacker can continue to overpower the network. One strategy to
protect against this would be to accept alerts from network nodes when they detect an invalid
block, prompting the user's software to download the full block and alerted transactions to
confirm the inconsistency.
Businesses that receive frequent payments will probably still want to
run their own nodes for more independent security and quicker verification.

Thank you for quoting the entire passage.
legendary
Activity: 3598
Merit: 2386
Viva Ut Vivas

... Satoshi himself mentioned that eventually we'll likely end up with just a few copies of the blockchain in gigantic data centers, with almost everyone running SPV clients that, ...


I'm not necessarily doubting that he said that, but I've never run across it.  Can you provide a pointer?


Satoshi's white paper:
Quote
It is possible to verify payments without running a full network node. A user only needs to keep
a copy of the block headers of the longest proof-of-work chain, which he can get by querying
network nodes until he's convinced he has the longest chain, and obtain the Merkle branch
linking the transaction to the block it's timestamped in. He can't check the transaction for
himself, but by linking it to a place in the chain, he can see that a network node has accepted it,
and blocks added after it further confirm the network has accepted it.

As such, the verification is reliable as long as honest nodes control the network, but is more
vulnerable if the network is overpowered by an attacker. While network nodes can verify
transactions for themselves, the simplified method can be fooled by an attacker's fabricated
transactions for as long as the attacker can continue to overpower the network. One strategy to
protect against this would be to accept alerts from network nodes when they detect an invalid
block, prompting the user's software to download the full block and alerted transactions to
confirm the inconsistency. Businesses that receive frequent payments will probably still want to
run their own nodes for more independent security and quicker verification
.
hero member
Activity: 784
Merit: 1000
All these slowpoke responses, maaku's project is probably the single most thing that's happening on the technical side, yet people hardly paid attention Undecided Luckily, Vorhees came to the rescue....
legendary
Activity: 2156
Merit: 1393
You lead and I'll watch you walk away.
Finally, someone I respect discussing the subject.

 Cry

Wait, are you saying you don't appreciate Meni Rosenfeld because he doesn't focus his attention on the client side of Bitcoin? I'm confused?

No, I'm saying www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iwu-6GxBHN4

I'm still a little confused! I get the Rodney Dangerfield connection but the meaning of your other statement is unusual, other than people working on mining are worthless and will be replaced. But maybe you didn't mean that.
legendary
Activity: 1680
Merit: 1035
Finally, someone I respect discussing the subject.

 Cry

Wait, are you saying you don't appreciate Meni Rosenfeld because he doesn't focus his attention on the client side of Bitcoin? I'm confused?

No, I'm saying www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iwu-6GxBHN4
legendary
Activity: 1400
Merit: 1013

... Satoshi himself mentioned that eventually we'll likely end up with just a few copies of the blockchain in gigantic data centers, with almost everyone running SPV clients that, ...


I'm not necessarily doubting that he said that, but I've never run across it.  Can you provide a pointer?

The closest thing I've seen to such a statement is Mike Hearn staying that the system could operate with 6 or so copies of the full block chain owned by large entities.  Maybe he didn't state who owned them though, and I am not going to put words into his mouth by claiming that he thought it was a good idea.  He can speak to that himself if he's so inclined.


Wow, centralization at its finest. I'll make sure I pass that info around at the next PorcFest.
The system could operate with zero copies of the complete block chain. Really all the network needs is a validated UTXO set and enough recent history to handle reorgs. The only difficult part is calculating "enough".
legendary
Activity: 2156
Merit: 1393
You lead and I'll watch you walk away.

... Satoshi himself mentioned that eventually we'll likely end up with just a few copies of the blockchain in gigantic data centers, with almost everyone running SPV clients that, ...


I'm not necessarily doubting that he said that, but I've never run across it.  Can you provide a pointer?

The closest thing I've seen to such a statement is Mike Hearn staying that the system could operate with 6 or so copies of the full block chain owned by large entities.  Maybe he didn't state who owned them though, and I am not going to put words into his mouth by claiming that he thought it was a good idea.  He can speak to that himself if he's so inclined.


Wow, centralization at its finest. I'll make sure I pass that info around at the next PorcFest.
legendary
Activity: 4690
Merit: 1276

... Satoshi himself mentioned that eventually we'll likely end up with just a few copies of the blockchain in gigantic data centers, with almost everyone running SPV clients that, ...


I'm not necessarily doubting that he said that, but I've never run across it.  Can you provide a pointer?

The closest thing I've seen to such a statement is Mike Hearn staying that the system could operate with 6 or so copies of the full block chain owned by large entities.  Maybe he didn't state who owned them though, and I am not going to put words into his mouth by claiming that he thought it was a good idea.  He can speak to that himself if he's so inclined.

legendary
Activity: 2156
Merit: 1393
You lead and I'll watch you walk away.
Finally, someone I respect discussing the subject.

 Cry

Regarding Peer to Peer, I always thought the part relating to verifying and relaying transactions was the peer-to-peer aspect, with things like mining and storing the blockchain being much less so. Satoshi himself mentioned that eventually we'll likely end up with just a few copies of the blockchain in gigantic data centers, with almost everyone running SPV clients that, although don't mine, still check transactions for validity, still relay them, and can still check the integrity of the blockchain database and compare it between providers to make sure it's legit.

Wait, are you saying you don't appreciate Meni Rosenfeld because he doesn't focus his attention on the client side of Bitcoin? I'm confused?
legendary
Activity: 1680
Merit: 1035
Finally, someone I respect discussing the subject.

 Cry

Regarding Peer to Peer, I always thought the part relating to verifying and relaying transactions was the peer-to-peer aspect, with things like mining and storing the blockchain being much less so. Satoshi himself mentioned that eventually we'll likely end up with just a few copies of the blockchain in gigantic data centers, with almost everyone running SPV clients that, although don't mine, still check transactions for validity, still relay them, and can still check the integrity of the blockchain database and compare it between providers to make sure it's legit.
legendary
Activity: 2156
Merit: 1393
You lead and I'll watch you walk away.
0.8 is ultraprune. Synchronization is a lot faster with 0.8 than before, but there are still a lot of other fixes that need to be implemented to really solve the block chain bloat 'problem'.

So you can't really say the problem is solved but it's very close.
legendary
Activity: 905
Merit: 1012
0.8 is ultraprune. Synchronization is a lot faster with 0.8 than before, but there are still a lot of other fixes that need to be implemented to really solve the block chain bloat 'problem'.
legendary
Activity: 1764
Merit: 1002
SD has always had transaction fees.

When Mike Hearn and others are cavalier about block chain bloat, it's because there are existing solutions being worked on. The process started with the 'ultraprune' branch that became 0.8, and will continue to improve. If all of the proposed optimizations are implemented, bitcoin can and will scale to VISA-level transaction processing, while being runnable on a commodity PC. It doesn't make sense then to devote valuable conference time to rehashing issues where we already know the work we need to do.

this sounds impressive!
legendary
Activity: 2156
Merit: 1393
You lead and I'll watch you walk away.
SD has always had transaction fees.

When Mike Hearn and others are cavalier about block chain bloat, it's because there are existing solutions being worked on. The process started with the 'ultraprune' branch that became 0.8, and will continue to improve. If all of the proposed optimizations are implemented, bitcoin can and will scale to VISA-level transaction processing, while being runnable on a commodity PC. It doesn't make sense then to devote valuable conference time to rehashing issues where we already know the work we need to do.

I didn't know that. I'm not a gambler so I didn't really follow it that closely. Didn't Pieter develop ultraprune a long time ago? Why is it taking so long to implement?
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