Bitcoins are experimental beta software. It will be replaced.

jgarzik

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Quote from: markm on September 25, 2012, 01:55:09 PM

Most of them are not taking away mining but, rather, adding more side-rewards for miners, since they can be merged-mined right alongside bitcoin. So they are extra little perks like when you happen upon a bunch of other minerals or metals while mining a mineral or metal.

Correct. Once the initial merged mining pool server setup is created and tested, it is very easy to add new merge-mined alt-chains. Pool users get extra rewards, with no extra work on their own part.

This does not detract from the earlier poster's point that alt-chains are generally worthless or scammy or both.

markm

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Most of them are not taking away mining but, rather, adding more side-rewards for miners, since they can be merged-mined right alongside bitcoin. So they are extra little perks like when you happen upon a bunch of other minerals or metals while mining a mineral or metal.

-MarkM-

dissipate

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Quote from: Desolator on September 25, 2012, 01:44:31 PM

Quote from: ?? on ??

True, change takes time. As a side note, there will be attempts to divide and conquer bitcoin using competing currencies. Be wary of any competitor using any kind of centralised components.

before I sold my rig and took a multi-month break from BTC, there were like 10 competing currencies. I can't imagine what fresh hell it's been dragged into since then. There was some kind of coin related to DNS which to this day makes 0 sense to me despite reading everything about it on a wiki. Then that one mining pool made their own and it crashed in like 3 weeks. Now I hear references to lightcoin and some other coin and all this other crap. So I think we're already there, lol.

Seriously, people! Stop damaging bitcoin by trying to get in on the bottom of a new currency. That's dishonest and totally BS. They're taking away focus and mining and making us look like idiots as they all fail.

A lot of those spinoff cryptocurrencies seem to be targeted at miners who want to get in early and mine a ton of coins. Of course, the economic reality of that situation is that their coins will be worthless if there is no actual demand for them (speculative or otherwise). In my opinion, the best chance for a competing P2P cryptocurrency would be one that was backed by a corporation with significant resources that could hire full time developers. They could open source the cryptocurrency and bake it into their products and allow it to be redeemed for such products/services. If the currency was popular enough, exchanges and secondary markets for it would pop up (as what happened with SLLs). What is not clear to me is what exactly the business model for this scheme would be, however.

Desolator

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Quote from: ?? on ??

True, change takes time. As a side note, there will be attempts to divide and conquer bitcoin using competing currencies. Be wary of any competitor using any kind of centralised components.

before I sold my rig and took a multi-month break from BTC, there were like 10 competing currencies. I can't imagine what fresh hell it's been dragged into since then. There was some kind of coin related to DNS which to this day makes 0 sense to me despite reading everything about it on a wiki. Then that one mining pool made their own and it crashed in like 3 weeks. Now I hear references to lightcoin and some other coin and all this other crap. So I think we're already there, lol.

Seriously, people! Stop damaging bitcoin by trying to get in on the bottom of a new currency. That's dishonest and totally BS. They're taking away focus and mining and making us look like idiots as they all fail.

dissipate

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Quote from: Etlase2 on September 21, 2012, 07:41:48 AM

Quote from: dissipate on September 21, 2012, 04:51:53 AM

Bitcoin is not just software. Bitcoin happens to be a protocol, and as it becomes more popular and entrenched as the de facto cryptocurrency, it will be near impossible to replace it with a new cryptocurrency. It's called the network effect. If people can't be bothered to try a different social network than Facebook, they sure as heck are not going to be bothered to switch to a new cryptocurrency (and certainly not on a whim).

Because facebook was the first social network Roll Eyes

No, it wasn't, but my point still stands. The OP has completely neglected the Network Effect. Yes, there could be technologically superior cryptocurrencies created, and there is indeed still a window of opportunity for such a cryptocurrency to displace Bitcoin, but that window is probably closing fairly rapidly. The OP makes it sound as if immediately upon the arrival of a technologically superior cryptocurrency, Bitcoin will be toast. Sorry, the real world doesn't work like that.

Desolator

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Quote from: paulie_w on September 21, 2012, 08:15:51 AM

@Desolator

here again you start ranting and raving without either of the following things:

- the slightest technical competency
- having read any of the documentation

...which is AWESOME, keep it up bro!

You must have missed the part where I'm right so feel free to shut the fuck up, you clueless moron. I know more than 99% of the people here. I have 1 degree in web design and web programming and the other in .NET software programming. Oh yeah, and I'm head IT manager at a medium sized company part time and own my own repair and custom builds company the rest of the time. And what do you do...at McDonalds?

I don't read every last little thing about the bitcoin protocol and software because I'm busy doing work at work. But I was correct in that a small group of people can randomly change "the protocol" because it doesn't really exist. This isn't some protocol that hard wired into hardware.

paulie_w

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@Desolator

here again you start ranting and raving without either of the following things:

- the slightest technical competency
- having read any of the documentation

...which is AWESOME, keep it up bro!

cbeast

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Let's talk governance, lipstick, and pigs.

I think there must be a new "Bitcoin 2.0" thread every couple of months. Fact is, there are already several alternate cryptocurrencies to enjoy and many in development. Find the one you like and support it.

Etlase2

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Quote from: dissipate on September 21, 2012, 04:51:53 AM

Bitcoin is not just software. Bitcoin happens to be a protocol, and as it becomes more popular and entrenched as the de facto cryptocurrency, it will be near impossible to replace it with a new cryptocurrency. It's called the network effect. If people can't be bothered to try a different social network than Facebook, they sure as heck are not going to be bothered to switch to a new cryptocurrency (and certainly not on a whim).

Because facebook was the first social network Roll Eyes

Quote from: markm on September 21, 2012, 05:01:32 AM

Browsers actually include gopher still don't they? Wasn't one of the selling points of the early browsers that they did all the usual stuff like gopher and ftp plus also had this newfangled web thing too? Did they ever drop gopher support?

-MarkM-

I don't remember netscape ever supporting gopher natively. Lynx probably did, but lynx was text-based so ehhh

phatsphere

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Quote from: markm on September 21, 2012, 05:01:32 AM

Did they ever drop gopher support?

yes, but things like "extensions" or "plugins" save those, who really need gopher.

google told me this: http://gopher.floodgap.com/overbite/

markm

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Browsers actually include gopher still don't they? Wasn't one of the selling points of the early browsers that they did all the usual stuff like gopher and ftp plus also had this newfangled web thing too? Did they ever drop gopher support?

-MarkM-

dissipate

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Quote from: 🏰 TradeFortress 🏰 on September 19, 2012, 07:20:56 AM

There are a lot of flaws with bitcoins, and it pioneered cryptocurrency. But do we still dial up to BBSes today? Use gopher? No, it has being replaced by the world wide web. Bitcoins will be replaced, don't put your life savings in.

Bitcoin is not just software. Bitcoin happens to be a protocol, and as it becomes more popular and entrenched as the de facto cryptocurrency, it will be near impossible to replace it with a new cryptocurrency. It's called the network effect. If people can't be bothered to try a different social network than Facebook, they sure as heck are not going to be bothered to switch to a new cryptocurrency (and certainly not on a whim).

BkkCoins

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firstbits:1MinerQ

Quote from: Desolator on September 20, 2012, 04:22:06 PM

That's why I'm a little concerned that the entire network is in the hands of a couple people who wrote the one and only client software. Didn't they publicly release the code too?!?! There should be as many bitcoin clients as torrent clients at this point. For safety reasons, someone write another one! lol.

Maybe you should learn a bit more about Bitcoin. There are quite a few clients around now. That doesn't really matter because it's the protocol that is important. If a client tries to generate transactions not accepted by other clients or by miners the transactions don't get accepted into blocks. They get dropped. All the clients I'm aware of are open source software and you can get the source and read it yourself. Most of them are on GitHub, easy to checkout, fork and modify. You can create your own client if you want. But it has to work according to what others will accept or - as we've been talking about here, you end up forking with some group of users using your own new protocol. See DevCoin, NameCoin, LiteCoin, BkkCoin, etcCoin.

markm

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Nothing has improved upon IRC yet as far as I know, except maybe MUDs with channels between them if you like MUDs.

(Sure a MUD adds a whole bunch of crap many users might not have use for, but at least it does that at the server end not, like browsers, hogging the user's resources.)

-MarkM-

byronbb

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HODL OR DIE

Quote from: jgarzik on September 19, 2012, 03:51:56 PM

Quote from: byronbb on September 19, 2012, 02:13:07 PM

I have always been amazed by the resiliency of IRC.

IRC ops, you mean. IRC itself is easy to DoS.

DDoS on networks is handled manually. Most ISPs refuse to host IRC servers. etc.

I meant its 2012 and irc still exists.

robbonz

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Quote from: 🏰 TradeFortress 🏰 on September 19, 2012, 07:20:56 AM

There are a lot of flaws with bitcoins, and it pioneered cryptocurrency. But do we still dial up to BBSes today? Use gopher? No, it has being replaced by the world wide web. Bitcoins will be replaced, don't put your life savings in.

All posts of this type are part of this highly clever money making scheme...

Step 1: Sell bitcoins
Step 2: Go on forum, and "discredit" bitcoins
Step 3: Observe massive price crash
Step 4: Buy back bitcoins
Step 5: Profit!?!?

Good luck buddy, you're gonna need it.

adamstgBit

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Trusted Bitcoiner

Quote from: Desolator on September 20, 2012, 04:22:06 PM

Quote from: Piper67 on September 19, 2012, 10:54:41 AM

Precisely... and the original protocols are still alive. It's quite possible to improve upon them,

That's what I don't get. If anyone could arbitrarily alter the protocol, they could rewrite it to route 10% of all transactions to themselves Tongue

So can't the protocol never be altered ever without shutting down bitcoin and starting over with a new chain? Who could alter the protocol and how?

The way I understand it, the writers of the bitcoin client software could just rewrite the code to say whatever they want and say that is the new protocol. As long as it doesn't contradict existing blocks, it would technically "work." But if there were 3 bitcoin clients and 1 decided to do things differently, their data would get rejected by everyone who has the other 2 and thus the network as a whole. That's why I'm a little concerned that the entire network is in the hands of a couple people who wrote the one and only client software. Didn't they publicly release the code too?!?! There should be as many bitcoin clients as torrent clients at this point. For safety reasons, someone write another one! lol.

(of course then if there were 100 clients, any one of them could be rigged to steal your wallet so if you want to use an alternative client, you have no idea if it's legit or not)

think about like this
bitcoin protocol 1.1.0 - works fine everyone loves it
bitcoin protocol 1.1.1 - works even better everyone loves it
bitcoin protocol 2.0.0 - not everyone agrees to this change... buttcoin protocol 1.0.0 is created! some stay with bitcoin and other move to buttcoin.

the protocol can be altered, but everyone has to agree on it, if anyone disagrees then a fork can be created.

so far the forks we've seen have nothing to do with a disagreement in protocol change, its just some guys looking to make money by starting a bitcoin fork.

I do not think the protocol will ever be changed so much so that people start to disagree and create forks.
honestly i dont give a @#$& how it works as long as it keeps its core properties.

I say dont be afraid of protocol changes, embrace them for what they are; Improvements.

Desolator

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Quote from: Piper67 on September 19, 2012, 10:54:41 AM

Precisely... and the original protocols are still alive. It's quite possible to improve upon them,

That's what I don't get. If anyone could arbitrarily alter the protocol, they could rewrite it to route 10% of all transactions to themselves Tongue

So can't the protocol never be altered ever without shutting down bitcoin and starting over with a new chain? Who could alter the protocol and how?

The way I understand it, the writers of the bitcoin client software could just rewrite the code to say whatever they want and say that is the new protocol. As long as it doesn't contradict existing blocks, it would technically "work." But if there were 3 bitcoin clients and 1 decided to do things differently, their data would get rejected by everyone who has the other 2 and thus the network as a whole. That's why I'm a little concerned that the entire network is in the hands of a couple people who wrote the one and only client software. Didn't they publicly release the code too?!?! There should be as many bitcoin clients as torrent clients at this point. For safety reasons, someone write another one! lol.

(of course then if there were 100 clients, any one of them could be rigged to steal your wallet so if you want to use an alternative client, you have no idea if it's legit or not)

Seal

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Quote from: felipelalli on September 19, 2012, 09:38:36 AM

Quote from: 🏰 TradeFortress 🏰 on September 19, 2012, 07:20:56 AM

There are a lot of flaws with bitcoins, and it pioneered cryptocurrency. But do we still dial up to BBSes today? Use gopher? No, it has being replaced by the world wide web. Bitcoins will be replaced, don't put your life savings in.

Come on.

Quote from: dancupid on September 19, 2012, 10:52:49 AM

Bitcoin isn't software, it's a protocol like email.
Google didn't invent their own email protocol when they developed gmail - infact gmail would be useless if it used it's own protocol because you would only be able to communicate with other gmail users. The BBC would not be able to send an email to a gmail user from an @BBC.com email address.
Protocols are very resilient - even when they become outdated because they are just protocols without a hidden agenda.

... in technology, the first decent implementation of almost any standard that is adopted by a majority will always succeed.

jgarzik

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Quote from: byronbb on September 19, 2012, 02:13:07 PM

I have always been amazed by the resiliency of IRC.

IRC ops, you mean. IRC itself is easy to DoS.

DDoS on networks is handled manually. Most ISPs refuse to host IRC servers. etc.

Topic: Bitcoins are experimental beta software. It will be replaced. (Read 4811 times)