Topic: Zero Knowledge Transactions - page 7. (Read 18678 times)

So now I am asking all those who voted for donating, to please consider changing your vote to "I will not donate" since you can use Shen's solution which is already published.

However, consider that mine may be more efficient and may enable features which Shen's can't do. I mentioned some examples of features I think Shen's can't do at the Reddit post linked in my prior post here. I assume he will reply there and confirm or deny those trade-offs in his design.

I ask you to reconsider your votes, because I need to gauge how much interest there still is in my white paper. Because I need to determine how best to proceed.

Since Monero's cryptographer Shen has produced that solution, then I assume he can implement it in Monero, so they probably don't need me for implementation. The only question is whether they want my design's potential advantages over Shen's. I think if you are talking about being the best anonymous coin, then you want to have the best anonymity and $21k is nothing compared to a $millions market cap.

Then again Monero can just wait until mine is published as open source eventually. This is for you all to gauge your appraisal of "first mover" advantage and whether you think what I have might have advantages that are worth spending some bucks.

The past day as we've been discussing the crowdfunding option, I have become more interested in doing my own coin, because my coin plans are primarily focused on solving the block chain scaling and real-time microtransactions. The anonymity was secondary in my priorities. So I am okay with keeping my anonymity paper for my own coin. It gives me something else unique over all the other anonymous coins.

I am also willing to talk to any other coin about giving them "first mover" on my anonymity algorithm, but again I can't work for peanuts (few $1000s). I'd rather spend my effort on something that can pay reasonably well. So I think crowdfunding my own coin may be the only way to earn what I feel I am worth.

I will await for feedback.

Sorry I mistyped. I meant well-defined in the sense of having a well-defined value or behavior as M approaches zero (which after all is the intent of al this). The point being that reducing both M and T at the same time inherently results in potentially wild price swings and instability, which do not exist if M is left constant.

Also, on the matter of burning being more informational, that can very well contribute to the problems. Game theory is complex and withholding information can have value, so if you force people to reveal information you may discourage them from taking the action (until a cascade or other instability requires them to do so). That is not really the intended outcome here but in game theory analysis, intent doesn't matter, outcomes do.

I'm not going to address the other points individually because I've stated my perspective, and I'm reasonably confident it is more correct (though may err in small areas as my effort to analyze this in precise detail has been limited). I also feel you will understand the issues in time, as you have (somewhat) on the question of sidechains. Thus there is no need to debate point by point. (You will note by the way that I likewise did not extensively debate point-by-point on sidechains and simply let you and others figure out over time what I had recognized earlier.)


In fact this is precisely what burning does. Spin offs do not create manic stampedes. So again we agree the goals but disagree on the analysis of various mechanisms. I'm content to leave it at that.

Also, in the case of a well-executed upgrade, the market will simply assign nearly all the value to the new coin virtually immediately. There is nothing for anyone to do really, other than claim their new coins (or have this done automatically by a wallet) and use them. The old coins will still exit, but become essentially irrelevant. People may wish to sell their old coins for a little bit of extra income, but keeping them as a low-value hedge is also okay to do (again much of this can be automated by wallets). Likewise in a well-executed upgrade everyone will probably just burn right away (though maybe not, as even small risks may encourage waiting, and it is impossible to hedge by holding on to your nearly-worthless old coins as in the other method).

The complex issues only occur with a poorly-executed upgrade, and that is exactly where you need the pricing mechanism of markets to dampen instabilities. In fact someone else on cypherdoc's thread reinvented the same mechanism to deal with the contentious hard fork debate (a block size increase being "a poorly executed upgrade" in my terminology because people disagree about whether it is even an upgrade at all), and he is absolutely correct that there is no other decentralized mechanism for deciding the outcome other than a market, so it is best to recognize that and design it to be orderly. So speculators will need to trade according to the best available information and users can either trade or not at their discretion (assuming prices are efficient it does't really matter what they do).

So if the developer never miscalculates or makes a mistake in strategy or implementation, then this distinction likely doesn't even matter. But misjudgments, and political disagreements are always a possibility, so I think it may matter in practice.

Okay we have resolution!

Shen's white paper is a viable solution, but as far as I can see it has some significant downsides compared to my solution:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Monero/comments/3oi16k/ring_ct_for_monero_a_work_in_progress_comments/cw5h9s0

Quantification, confirmation, and elaboration will come with more work spent on writing down and not just roughing in my head.

How does an equation with two variables become not well formed? And what is the mathematical definition "well formed" in this context? I only know of well-formed as it applies to syntactical errors in a grammar.

If M ever reaches 0, then P doesn't exist because there are no coins on ask.

I fail to see how two variables changing affects the user's interpretation in some catastrophically different way. The user is tracking the percentage of burned coins and the market price, and forming a decision thereof. How is this qualitatively horrific as compared to tracking the price only?

We can reframe your equation to make my point more clear. T = PM. If we hold M constant as you suggest, then the coin network value is still changing via P. If we allow M to vary the coin network value is changing. Whether users sell their coins or burn them, an exodus is going to have the same effect on T. The only difference is whether all the effect must be expressed in P or if it can be expressed in both P and M (and more so in M because of arbitrage on price due to burning).

Citing cypherdoc isn't going to make your argument compelling to me.  


A stock split is not an increase in the money supply if the price goes down on both coins equally and all users hold their same distributions on both coins. But since you argue one of the networks may be more valuable to some users, then those who don't act to protect themselves could see a disproportionate decrease in their total wealth. And the protection strategy is not any less complex than burning. They must still decide when to trade one coin for the other.

You are making the error of equating a gross aggregate such as M, with the distribution of the holdings of M. Many economists make this false assumption.

It is a doubling of the money supply in the sense that unless the new coin expands the demand then the demand is split between two networks of total supply that is doubled. If the users had to do nothing to retain equivalent value, then we could say it is a stock split. But due to the units not being fungible, it is not a stock split and rather a complex game theory of debasement that the users have to expend effort on. Forcing users to expend effort is debasement of their value.

With a burn, the supply remains constant. That doesn't reduce the complexity of the decision, but at least it doesn't give the public perception that the coin supply is growing like crazy.

And most importantly it impacts more information, because rather than the lazy action of just HODLing both, users make their move to be in one coin or the other and not straddling the fence. Given a complex decision that has no clear answer, users tend to do nothing. Thus they would likely not sell either coin. However given the decision of losing their chance to convert to the new coin, they will likely do some research and decide whether the new coin has good features that everyone wants and if yes then convert.

So the burning is more informational about what matters, which is user appraisal of value of the upgrade.


No one will chose not to avail of their ownership of coins in both fucks. Very little market information is impart by giving away for free what is not free. Some might sell their coins in one of the forks trying to drive it away, but the rational game theory is to hold the coins in both networks for appreciation. There is no pressure on either coin's value. Which ever coin grows network value and appreciates faster, is likely to the be one sold first (based on the rational investor selling some on each rake...remember rpietila's teaching about rake).


I want users to impart their preference. I don't want to obscure it.

Allowing people to decide when to make their move, is somewhat balanced because they will wait to see what others do, which penalizes the new coin (which is why I suggested offering a slight incentive for coming over early), because they can't come back with a peg (only by exchange value).


Holding M constant doesn't make the equation linear. That equation doesn't exist in a vacuum. The inputs to price P are non-linear. For one thing the wealth effect is non-linear.

Investors don't think in terms of complex valuations of non-linear systems. It really boils down to do you want them to hold both coins selling the one that appreciates faster (your model) or do you want them to impart their preference sooner (my model).

If you delay (or remove entirely!) imparting that information, you retard the development of the ecosystem. As I said, the difference is analogous to kicking-the-can a.k.a. not marking-to-market.


Yes based on human psychology. People avoid complex decisions. K.I.S.S. The rationally easiest thing to do in your model is HODL both and sell the one that either appreciates the most or is losing value precipitously. Since most are HODLing both, then information propagation is much delayed and skewed by the manic choice of responding to sell only at extremes.


Exactly. That was my point too. It creates discord in the community.


You aren't factoring the psychological choice you've put on the user to make. I argue that the default mode in your model is apathy and then action on manic extremes. I argue that my model encourages research and proaction. I prefer the latter as being a more informed, proactive community.


I set incentives to encourage informational proaction earlier instead of apathy and kicking-the-can to non-informational, manic, mass stampedes.

You want to encourage the users to do nothing. No research. Kick the can. Delay. Wait for price manias to force their hand.


Why do socialists always prefer a little short-term stability at the cost of manic, mass stampedes later.

Do not give away for free what is not free.

Do not pretend fungibility for that which is not fungible.

Hard forks are stressful. There is no way to get around that. Thus upgrades will likely need to be very compelling. And they should be. Otherwise don't bother. Many other things to work on in software.

As much as possible try to design the block chain to accommodate extension and change without a change to protocol.

@TPTB_need_war. Othe was simply providing you with some information in the first place, that :p didn't strike me as offensive in any way. Also, the fact that he doesn't like you and doesn't like your attitude doesn't imply you two can't have a civil discussion and mutual respect like he stated. FWIW: I am sincerely appreciating your peer review and hope you can continue the discussion with Shen.

Pop it fast, the suspense is almost over I think. I doubt there will be any sincere public apologies coming from gmaxwell and othe.

Betting on reputations doesn't always work out, especially when they've doggedly disrespected the accomplishments of another person because they were done 15 years ago and they weren't math (well actually I programmed some math and physics in my development role for Art-O-Matic and for Corel Painter, but that wasn't cryptography).

In the case of burn, as you indicated in your previous message, the money supply of the old coin is shrinking at the same time the network value is shrinking. Thus old coin price P=T/M where T is the value of the old network and M is the money supply of the old network. As people migrate (burn) you have T and M both approaching zero (but not necessarily at the same or even a constant rate) and P is not well formed and highly unstable as M shrinks. (Even cypherdoc understood this!) By contrast, in the case of a spin-off that obsoletes the old network, you simply have P=T/M where T approaches zero and M is fixed, so this expression is well formed, and P is simply a clear measure of value where the market will naturally absorb speculative fluctuations between old and new, allowing stability and transparency.


This is an illusion. Prior to the spin-off (in fact prior to it even being conceived!) the future coins are embedded the old coins. But after the spin off it is not. You can even imagine a analogy of an metal coin being physically cut in two. Each of "old (post)" and "new" represent "half" of "old (pre)", and you can't make an equivalence between old (post spin-off) for old (pre spin-off), since it is physically a smaller asset. So there is no doubling of money supply, only a reconfiguration, as with taking one ounce gold coins and splitting them each into two half-ounce coins.


To the contrary. It is that people may continue to use the old coin without creating an instability that would in turn both (at different times) encourage and discourage switching that makes this more of a (stable) meritocracy than burning. People simply choose how they value the old and new networks. If the value stays with the old, then the developer has not done a very good job of making "upgrades" that other people actually perceive as such!

Another way to see this is to consider that a two-way peg is also a meritocracy in the sense there is no asymmetry that might serve to influence users to structurally prefer one side of the peg or the other. But since you are not proposing a two-way peg then it is clear there must be an asymmetry.


Investors express their choice in the spin-off model in the value they decide to attach to each of the new assets (as above, the original version of the "old" coin simply ceases to exist). If you do not allow this (because you want to force users to choose) then you are introducing an irreversible choice which has a value that is non-linear, complex and very likely unstable.


Can you actually prove this takes longer? I don't think so. I actually kind of suspect the opposite (but can't prove that either).


This does not retain value for the old coin, thus you lose confidence. Why should I buy your new coin when you just destroyed the value of your old one? With the spin-off model, value and confidence are retained for existing investors. It is simply an upgrade with no reset of distribution (again assuming it is actually an upgrade!).


Now I think you are recognizing that the burn model can actually discourage upgrading and you are trying to "fix" that by creating a time penalty. But, again, you are trying to force an outcome instead of letting people freely choose the "upgrade". If people resist burning that tells you something about your so-called upgrade. You don't need to corral them by creating a time penalty.


Of course people vote in the market! That's what people do every time they make a trade of anything. They are voting that what they buy is more valuable than what they sell.

The problem is that when you embed the options, you create non-linear valuation and instability. The spin-off model removes the optionality from being internal to the coin value by making access to the new network unconditional and non-perishable. People still of course have the option (i.e. vote) whether to use the new network or not. In fact that is essential to giving it a value at all.

It is okay that we disagree on this point for now, but I'm reasonably confident that after you think about this some more you will eventually recognize that the embedded option is the source of instability, rather than allowing uncoupled market prices to naturally absorb differences in demand. Indeed you are attempting to use the instability to force, or at least encourage, investors to upgrade, thus behaving in a way other than meritocracy.

This thread is about to require some popcorn.

Obviously which I can always detect when someone doesn't like me. And apparently you didn't read:


Btw, I am sure it is broken, unless I am missing something very much non-obvious to me. It appears he hasn't thought through the implications of the fact that you can't reference the outputs and the inputs in separate LWW signatures unless you link them externally, but then you've linked them publicly so there is no point in having a ring.

He seems to think that he has linked them somehow anonymously in the MG sig and we are trying to explain to each other our views on that, so we can determine which one of us is correct. But I already pretty confident which of us is correct.

I think you fail to respect that I feel I already have a fully written solution and not adding sections as we discuss. He was very much not ready to publish this and has apparently not combed back over the logic after writing the full paper. I have the advantage of having tried various designs and thrown them away because I broke them.

Now again I may be missing some key point about the MG sigs, so I am still trying to determine what this magic might be that I don't see yet.

Grownups don´t brag that they broke something without waiting for an answer multiple times.
How about just being mutually respectful?


I don´t play political games, i simply dislike you and your attidude.

For the :p when taken together with your attitude displayed up thread and the nature of the link on your signature as I quoted. And now you play more such political ego games. How about just being mutually respectful? That is what I wish grownups would do.

The "oh boy" is more of trying to paint my logical reply as if I am thin skinned. Don't worry I can handle the shit slinging. I was just pointing out that we could be nice instead.

I am smug for posting a reddit link?

Oh boy, grow up.

You are so smug. Hold on.

You got your reply :p

https://www.reddit.com/r/Monero/comments/3oi16k/ring_ct_for_monero_a_work_in_progress_comments/cw5h9s0

Okay I posted my math proof that Shen's paper is broken:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Monero/comments/3oi16k/ring_ct_for_monero_a_work_in_progress_comments/cw3xr6t?context=3

For the context:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Monero/comments/3oi16k/ring_ct_for_monero_a_work_in_progress_comments/cw3f955?context=3

I will await his reply. It is possible I am missing something, but it sure seems straightforward to my eyes that he hasn't linked the Ij to Im where 0 < j < m.

This was my point at very start in the first post at the second link above. The advantage now is I have been able to articulate symbolically within the symbolism of his paper.

I wrote "burn" so burning to the new coin, meaning the old coin is burned. If spin-off was proposed to perform as you say, then it is not the same as what I was thinking and writing about.

If the old coin will be worthless or nearly so, then negative feedback and instability issues remain. And I don't like the idea of doubling the money supply every time you upgrade, because people will continue to spend and use their old version coins, so I think we will find they will retain value and ecosystem. It seems antithetical to a meritocracy to create such doublings of the money supply on the whim of every dev that wants to offer an upgrade. We could have 10 upgrades going on simultaneously. The only rational system seems to be the one where investors have to make a choice and express their choice. Otherwise there is no choice, they just avail of all the 10 upgrades at once and endure the lingering uncertainty as it takes a longer to determine which fork has the market support (since voting by burning was not enabled).

The altenative is just create a new coin for the upgrade and let anyone trade for it on the decentralized exchange, but then the developers will need to dump these old version coins into the market thus accelerating its price decline, thus creating a stampede into the new coin, which seems it will raise apprehension towards upgrades and fragment the social contract. Whereas, by burning the old coins, the money supply of the old coins drops to compensate for its loss of participants, so that scarcity increases. This should moderate the price drop on the old version, since after all it can be burned to a new version coin at any time. However it does seem there should be some time penalty on delaying to burn. So maybe it is better to give slightly more in conversion for those who burn earlier and slightly less to those that burn later. Something to think about.


Incorrect if you consider the possible designs that might be different than what we have now. I wrote that if the old coin has a protocol, then respecting that protocol is fundamental to consensus. So if you define the protocol (with a correct game theory) such that miners are enforced to merge mine any registered burn to targets that meet certain minimum requirements such as minimum % of burn to avoid DoS attack on the feature (administered decentralized), then what I wrote works decentralized.

When I say I have some other magic up my sleeve, it seems people do not believe me. That is fine. There will be a time to reveal all.


Yup fully decentralized but don't conflate that with not being able to design protocols that self-organize the future.


The concept that not having to vote in the market and being able to play all options at no cost, is the epitome of instability, because it is obfuscation. Transparency is required for stable markets. Delaying the market adjustments only exacerbates the lack of fitness because of the obfuscation. As I am sure you would notice too, that is analogously what is happening now with the kick-the-can politics and financial gimicks (QE and no mark-to-market). To state something I am sure you are aware of, the lack of fitness is in the misallocation that debt causes by distorting the signals of where the true market value is, and ditto not knowing which financial institutions are really bankrupt and when they will default.

We both started making world a better place before decentralized ledger was even invented! CK is not religiously attached to a new and largely unproven system, yet some of its core components are (eg. Monero is a cryptocurrency).

I don't in detail the protocols of your system. I would just think if at all possible it is best to have the protocols run decentralized, so there is no controlling entity at all.

I am not stating you shouldn't leverage an existing crypto currency rather than rolling your own. Maybe Monero doesn't have the block chain scripting features you need in order to decentralize your protocol? In any case, I am probably not the person to talk to about this but rather your users, devs, and Monero devs I suppose.

My only point was to emphasize that I prefer decentralized protocols where there isn't any controlling entity at all, if at all possible. I assume many others have the same preference, since its seems to be one of the fundamental tenets of decentralized currency.

Crypto is mostly open source and you have plenty of contributions still inside you. The trick is figuring out a way to contribute and see much of the upside to your work.

Payment for services is certainly good for cashflow, but the risk is on the person making the payment, so they would expect the upside on their consulting investment to be many, many times greater than their cost.

So, you are giving away large upside, in return for short-term reward. Strikes me as a poor trade-off for someone with your skills, but paying the rent sometimes means you have to give up stuff cheaply.

Perhaps you can sell your invention, or possibly use it elsewhere, and then, with immediate financial needs met, you can find some other venture to create your own massive upside.

edits for typo

Oh I don't feel bad about that. I honestly feel joy for rpietila and I feel joy for myself for all the opportunities I have in front of me. I've been a millionaire (inflation-adjusted) in 2001 and I've been so poor (in 1990s) that I couldn't afford to buy meat. I just want to make sure I still have enough funds so I can continue enjoying the excitement and wonder of creating and maybe getting back to wealthy again if that is what is meant for me. Actually creating and enjoying life (and not being sick!) is the most important priority for me. Money is just a means to that end and some things I want to do money can't buy (e.g. the knowledge to create).

I've felt more joy for Risto when he started being open minded to investing in high risk altcoins and he stopped being surety for newbie investors. That period was difficult for me and I was thinking today that I let a lot of frustration fly at Monero because I perceived it as being too closed off and too limited by a few rich guys who copied Cryptonote and mined it out themselves. I felt it was not open to competition and thus I felt stifled by the concept. In any case, I like the idea of burning to upgrades, because anyone can compete to provide the upgraded fork. The free market is more in control. If is way for me to participate and compete for my creative value in the free market, then I am happy.

And I realize some of my assumptions early on about Monero may have been entirely wrong or exaggerated. I didn't write that to open a hornet's nest but simply to explain what was going on in my head at the time.

Edit: I also realize it isn't my place to dictate to any one what they do. Any way, I was just writing about what I felt at the time, not that being a valid justification to criticize any one publicly. The best way to make a statement is to compete with actions and not unkind words. Sometimes easier said than done.

As Risto said, we've all been learning. When I first came to these forums in 2013, I posted Bitcoin : The Digital Kill Switch. My attitude was that crypto currency was the coming 666 or NWO system. So coming in I had an attitude that I would be up against entrenched interests who would be in support of the Great Harlot or World Government (religious or non-religious interpretation). This is why I inherently didn't trust Gmaxwell for example and I questioned everything even those things I didn't understand well yet, such as ECC. Later as I observed Gmaxwell create CT and fight against mining centralization, my view towards him became much more open and favorable. This has been a process for me, just as it has been for all of you. Also I had some very turbulent stuff going on in my life during this period of 2012 - 2015 which complicated the task of keeping a level-headed, well researched, well rested, open mind. We do what we can do. We are just human.