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Blockchain at Berkeley

blockchain.berkeley.edu

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Re: Blockchain at Berkeley

#51

Post by icebraining »

DennisP wrote: post #48
icebraining wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But that's just an hash chain, it has existed for longer than the blockchain. For example, all digital invoices in my country are hash-chained, to prevent the merchant from swapping one for another, and this standard was published before Bitcoin.

That sounds interesting. What is the standard called? I'd love to read more about it.

SAF-T: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAF-T

It's not that special, each invoice gets assigned as hash of (invoice number + total amount + date of emission + hash of previous invoice). Besides having to send that XML file to the IRS each month with all the issued invoices, the hash also gets printed on the invoice given to the client (paper or PDF), so it gets tricky to change the past without getting caught.

Re: Blockchain at Berkeley

#53

Post by ufo »

simias wrote: post #30
xg15 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you talk about the general idea of an append-only distributed database with no central point of control, I agree with you. However the proof-of-work/auto-adjusting-difficulty method of asserting truth still seems horrible to me from a technical perspective. Politically, I don't want to live in a world where this principle catches on and an ever-growing % of energy production would be spend on solving meaningless m…

Yeah the proof of work is probably the less elegant aspect of it all, I can agree with that. But theoretically you could replace by any other function that's difficult to compute but easy to verify. Maybe it's just a solution in search for a problem.

I don't understand how that would fix proof of work. The whole point is that the voting power is proportional to how much computational power you are willing to burn away, in order to protect against Sybil attacks.

Re: Blockchain at Berkeley

#54

Post by simias »

ufo wrote: post #53
simias wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah the proof of work is probably the less elegant aspect of it all, I can agree with that. But theoretically you could replace by any other function that's difficult to compute but easy to verify. Maybe it's just a solution in search for a problem.

I don't understand how that would fix proof of work. The whole point is that the voting power is proportional to how much computational power you are willing to burn away, in order to protect against Sybil attacks.

I was thinking that eventually we may discover a proof of work that would actually compute something useful instead of burning electricity away. One can hope at least.

Re: Blockchain at Berkeley

#55

Post by kobeya »

icebraining wrote: post #45
kobeya wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree those are essential. Federated chains like Elements Alpha are also considered block chains but lack many of those properties. I think it really is the case that a "block chain" is merely a singly linked list with hash linkages.

But that's just an hash chain, it has existed for longer than the blockchain. For example, all digital invoices in my country are hash-chained, to prevent the merchant from swapping one for another, and this standard was published before Bitcoin.

I don't disagree with anything you said. Even generously most of the "blockchain" hype is an excuse for cryptography that has already existed without application for some time.

Re: Blockchain at Berkeley

#56

Post by eru »

yosito wrote: post #38
akhosla wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Haha, thanks for the feedback. We're gonna redesign soon so we'll make sure it's performant next time. :)

May I suggest HTML? It's a revolutionary new technology developed by CERN that's accessible on virtually all web browsers.

That's not-invented-here at Berkeley.

Re: Blockchain at Berkeley

#57

Post by arthurcolle »

simias wrote: post #54
ufo wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand how that would fix proof of work. The whole point is that the voting power is proportional to how much computational power you are willing to burn away, in order to protect against Sybil attacks.

I was thinking that eventually we may discover a proof of work that would actually compute something useful instead of burning electricity away. One can hope at least.

Ethereum

Re: Blockchain at Berkeley

#58

Post by [deleted] »

nugget wrote: post #34
jameskegel wrote: post #23

There's a lot of pessimism in the comments here, and I feel like I'm the only one interested in where this will go. I can identify with what some of you are saying, but it is still interesting regardless. Distributed tech has some of the most fascinating projects right now. Here's a few examples: Distributed file storage: Sia [1] and Storj [2] are both using blockchain tech to form a dropbox-like atmosphere where you…

I like the concept of Sia but wouldn't the coin value be 1) loosely tied to Dropbox et al storage costs and 2) deflationary over time as storage costs are continually decreasing?

[deleted]

Re: Blockchain at Berkeley

#59

Post by xg15 »

arthurcolle wrote: post #57
simias wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was thinking that eventually we may discover a proof of work that would actually compute something useful instead of burning electricity away. One can hope at least.

Ethereum

I'm not savvy in the technology, but are the contracts actually executed as part of mining?

Re: Blockchain at Berkeley

#60

Post by ptenk »

jameskegel wrote: post #23

There's a lot of pessimism in the comments here, and I feel like I'm the only one interested in where this will go. I can identify with what some of you are saying, but it is still interesting regardless. Distributed tech has some of the most fascinating projects right now. Here's a few examples: Distributed file storage: Sia [1] and Storj [2] are both using blockchain tech to form a dropbox-like atmosphere where you…

I'm pessimistic. Bitcoin's main use case is purchasing drugs, gambling, laundering and ransomware payments. Remittances and micropayment are a far distant second. Monero's main use case is even better money laundering than Bitcoin.

SIA and Storj's first users, if ever adopted, will be criminals, aka Pedophiles looking to store and share CP without fear of getting caught. I'm going to guess no one uploading anything legitimate is going to use Sia and Storj over AWS, Dropbox and Box.

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