Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Filecoin: A Decentralized Storage Network [pdf]

filecoin.io

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 170 posts

Re: Filecoin: A Decentralized Storage Network [pdf]

#51

Post by zzzcpan »

calafrax wrote: post #28
sharemywin wrote: post #13

I still go back to this paper for questions about decentralized storage: http://blog.dshr.org/2017/07/is-decentralized-storage-sustai...

There is another macro-economic issue here: With a decentralized trustless system you have to assume a higher failure rate for nodes than with a central trust based system. If you assume a higher failure rate you have to replicate data more extensively to achieve reliability. If you have to replicate data more extensively then decentralized will always be more expensive than centralized.

You achieve reliability with erasure codes, not with more replication. And failure rates are likely to be identical if not better, since incentives are the same as with hosting companies, but since it is decentralized there are a lot more availability zones.

Re: Filecoin: A Decentralized Storage Network [pdf]

#52

Post by aboodman »

strictnein wrote: post #14

Opening up my hard drive to store unknown materials? Imagine trying to explain any of this to a cop, judge, or jury.

The market probably isn't going to be comprised mainly of individual people. They're going to be farms in russian, china, and anyplace w/ cheap power and proximity to a backbone or population center.

Re: Filecoin: A Decentralized Storage Network [pdf]

#53

Post by aboodman »

JohnJamesRambo wrote: post #20

I'm still confused why I would want my storage to be decentralized. No I don't want my files spread on thousands or millions of computers no matter how encrypted etc.

If it works, it's going to drive the price of storage to near cost. So you'd use it because it will be dramatically cheaper than the alternatives.

Re: Filecoin: A Decentralized Storage Network [pdf]

#54

Post by calafrax »

zzzcpan wrote: post #51
calafrax wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is another macro-economic issue here: With a decentralized trustless system you have to assume a higher failure rate for nodes than with a central trust based system. If you assume a higher failure rate you have to replicate data more extensively to achieve reliability. If you have to replicate data more extensively then decentralized will always be more expensive than centralized.

You achieve reliability with erasure codes, not with more replication. And failure rates are likely to be identical if not better, since incentives are the same as with hosting companies, but since it is decentralized there are a lot more availability zones.

> You achieve reliability with erasure codes, not with more replication

If nodes are not trusted then replication has to play a major roll.

It doesn't matter how you mix up the data. You still have to store it somewhere and if that somewhere is a random untrusted stranger you will need to copy your data to a lot of random untrusted strangers in order to have kind of reliability.

Re: Filecoin: A Decentralized Storage Network [pdf]

#55

Post by lend000 »

hollander wrote: post #48
theschwa wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the problem with them being on random machines? I believe the purpose of Filecoin and other projects like Swarm is to incentives people to store the files long term and in some cases verify that those files are still being held.

What I don't understand is how this will guarantee the existence of these files. How do I know my files are secure? If my files are spread over several machines, and one or several go offline, are reinstalled, whatever. How do I know my files are secure?

They are most likely encrypted with your public key, no?

Re: Filecoin: A Decentralized Storage Network [pdf]

#56

Post by Govindae »

strgrd wrote: post #37
Govindae wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Storage rental is a concept that most people are familiar with. Extending that from physical objects to data isn't a very big step. Of course, storage facilities probably have some regulations to comply with that you won't be following.

Yes, with this logic, storage rental should expand into the sharing economy. You could rent out a room in your house for strangers to store their stuff in. Not a big step at all.

You say that like it's not going to be the next unicorn. You just LOCKER your stuff. We use machine learning AI to process an snapshot and dispatch an appropriately sized box via a car sharing service, the driver packs up your shit, and delivers it to a LOCKER storage contractor. All on the blockchain.

Re: Filecoin: A Decentralized Storage Network [pdf]

#57

Post by idle_zealot »

hollander wrote: post #48
theschwa wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the problem with them being on random machines? I believe the purpose of Filecoin and other projects like Swarm is to incentives people to store the files long term and in some cases verify that those files are still being held.

What I don't understand is how this will guarantee the existence of these files. How do I know my files are secure? If my files are spread over several machines, and one or several go offline, are reinstalled, whatever. How do I know my files are secure?

Presumably your data is duplicated to the point that all nodes containing any particular piece of data are very unlikely to be offline at a given time.

Re: Filecoin: A Decentralized Storage Network [pdf]

#59

Post by theschwa »

hollander wrote: post #48
theschwa wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the problem with them being on random machines? I believe the purpose of Filecoin and other projects like Swarm is to incentives people to store the files long term and in some cases verify that those files are still being held.

What I don't understand is how this will guarantee the existence of these files. How do I know my files are secure? If my files are spread over several machines, and one or several go offline, are reinstalled, whatever. How do I know my files are secure?

I haven't had a chance to dig into this paper yet, but for a similar system Swarm [0], there is a system of insurance and escrow on file chunks, and a system of verifying the hash of piece of the file to see if they still have its contents.

[0] http://swarm-gateways.net/bzz:/theswarm.eth/

Re: Filecoin: A Decentralized Storage Network [pdf]

#60

Post by svara »

This sounds interesting academically, but what I don't understand (I have the same problem with Siacoin, StorJ and Swarm) is:

You could build a Dropbox clone where users have the option of contributing storage to get rewarded with real currency. Why would anyone want to use the decentralized version instead, both as a user and as a contributor of storage?

The decentralized version is going to be much harder to get right for the developers, and why should the users believe that the technology is trustworthy? I just don't see the advantage, but I would be truly interested in hearing what I may be missing.

Post reply on HN