What Sets Us Apart: Filecoin’s Proof System • Hacker News Board

Re: What Sets Us Apart: Filecoin’s Proof System

#11

Post by darkcha0s » Thu, Mar 05, 2020, 9:36 PM UTC

momack2 wrote: post #8

imglorp wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They needed to compensate providers of storage for IPFS. The challenge is how to prove that a provider has your block and that they aren't double dipping, ie claiming redundancy when they only are storing one copy.

Exactly. IPFS has millions of end users and hundreds of apps storing data on the decentralized network, creating demand for decentralized persistence of that data. Current solution is to either run your own IPFS node or pay a pinning service to run a node persisting your IPFS data for you - but even better to have a highly resilient marketplace of storage nodes that can store redundant copies!

Where are you getting “millions of end users” from? A quick google search doesn’t return anything, and that seems a lot for a relatively unknown project

Re: What Sets Us Apart: Filecoin’s Proof System

#12

Post by lalaland1125 » Thu, Mar 05, 2020, 9:36 PM UTC

wmf wrote: post #6

lalaland1125 wrote: post #2

Like so many cryptocurrency projects, Filecoin just seems like a solution in search of a problem more than anything else. What exact problem is Filecoin trying to solve that's not possible with current infrastructure? It seems like the decentralization adds a lot of overhead and complexity for no benefit. The main argument that I hear is that somehow Filecoin will be cheaper than centralized competitors. However, ser…

If a decentralized system is using spare resources that are literally free it could theoretically be cheaper than a business that pays for hardware. It will be interesting to see if that works in practice.

One issue is that you are always paying for power. Some back of the napkin calculations indicate that Backblaze's prices are low enough that it's not worth it to compete unless you are getting more than 1 terrabyte per 30 watts as otherwise the power costs alone would kill you. That's going to be a pretty hard target to hit with "spare free resources" (not to mention hardware degradation and capital costs).

Re: What Sets Us Apart: Filecoin’s Proof System

#13

Post by p1necone » Thu, Mar 05, 2020, 9:56 PM UTC

lalaland1125 wrote: post #12

wmf wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If a decentralized system is using spare resources that are literally free it could theoretically be cheaper than a business that pays for hardware. It will be interesting to see if that works in practice.

One issue is that you are always paying for power. Some back of the napkin calculations indicate that Backblaze's prices are low enough that it's not worth it to compete unless you are getting more than 1 terrabyte per 30 watts as otherwise the power costs alone would kill you. That's going to be a pretty hard target to hit with "spare free resources" (not to mention hardware degradation and capital costs).

You're always paying for power regardless of whether you're offering your unused drive space on a distributed system.

Re: What Sets Us Apart: Filecoin’s Proof System

#14

Post by klodolph » Thu, Mar 05, 2020, 9:58 PM UTC

lalaland1125 wrote: post #12

wmf wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If a decentralized system is using spare resources that are literally free it could theoretically be cheaper than a business that pays for hardware. It will be interesting to see if that works in practice.

One issue is that you are always paying for power. Some back of the napkin calculations indicate that Backblaze's prices are low enough that it's not worth it to compete unless you are getting more than 1 terrabyte per 30 watts as otherwise the power costs alone would kill you. That's going to be a pretty hard target to hit with "spare free resources" (not to mention hardware degradation and capital costs).

Agreed.

Cloud storage is a commodity race to the bottom. Cloud providers want you to use their storage systems because it means that you’ll also use their more profitable associated services in order to save money on egress. Accumulate enough data, and you’re locked in because of the high cost to migrate. Because IO dominates so many workloads, you already get a bunch of bytes for cheap when you are running a cloud storage provider. It’s already dirt cheap and potentially a loss leader (I suspect).

So, I have a hard time seeing how “spare free resources” are going to be competitive when you factor in the network, capital costs, power, etc. Then there’s some unknown legal risk that you are e.g. accepting money to distribute child porn to people, just like there’s a legal risk associated with running a Tor node (not commenting on whether this is just or not).

Just my opinion. Not speaking on behalf of anyone here.

Re: What Sets Us Apart: Filecoin’s Proof System

#15

Post by klodolph » Thu, Mar 05, 2020, 9:59 PM UTC

p1necone wrote: post #13

lalaland1125 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One issue is that you are always paying for power. Some back of the napkin calculations indicate that Backblaze's prices are low enough that it's not worth it to compete unless you are getting more than 1 terrabyte per 30 watts as otherwise the power costs alone would kill you. That's going to be a pretty hard target to hit with "spare free resources" (not to mention hardware degradation and capital costs).

You're always paying for power regardless of whether you're offering your unused drive space on a distributed system.

Hard drives consume less power when idle, like CPUs.

Re: What Sets Us Apart: Filecoin’s Proof System

#16

Post by paulproteus » Thu, Mar 05, 2020, 10:00 PM UTC

It seems that Filecoin fundamentally relies on a proof-of-work type system called "sealing." The article calls it "an intense amount of work" that you must do in order to host a file. Does anyone have any estimates or comparisons for the CPU/energy consumed?

Re: What Sets Us Apart: Filecoin’s Proof System

#17

Post by NickBusey » Thu, Mar 05, 2020, 10:02 PM UTC

darkcha0s wrote: post #11

momack2 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. IPFS has millions of end users and hundreds of apps storing data on the decentralized network, creating demand for decentralized persistence of that data. Current solution is to either run your own IPFS node or pay a pinning service to run a node persisting your IPFS data for you - but even better to have a highly resilient marketplace of storage nodes that can store redundant copies!

Where are you getting “millions of end users” from? A quick google search doesn’t return anything, and that seems a lot for a relatively unknown project

IPFS is by no means 'relatively unknown'. It is used in dozens of projects. See: https://github.com/ipfs/awesome-ipfs

Re: What Sets Us Apart: Filecoin’s Proof System

#18

Post by aakilfernandes » Thu, Mar 05, 2020, 10:04 PM UTC

Whats missing is proof of delivery, and thats the most important thing. I'm not just paying AWS to store my files, I'm paying them to deliver my files.

Maybe this could work as an alternative to glacier. But even then, I doubt it. I'd take Amazon with an SLA any day of the week.

Re: What Sets Us Apart: Filecoin’s Proof System

#19

Post by ajhurliman » Thu, Mar 05, 2020, 10:05 PM UTC

lalaland1125 wrote: post #2

Like so many cryptocurrency projects, Filecoin just seems like a solution in search of a problem more than anything else. What exact problem is Filecoin trying to solve that's not possible with current infrastructure? It seems like the decentralization adds a lot of overhead and complexity for no benefit. The main argument that I hear is that somehow Filecoin will be cheaper than centralized competitors. However, ser…

Storing and serving files a lot cheaper and more reliably than current cloud providers seems like something people actually want.

Re: What Sets Us Apart: Filecoin’s Proof System

#20

Post by whyrusleeping » Thu, Mar 05, 2020, 10:05 PM UTC

paulproteus wrote: post #16

It seems that Filecoin fundamentally relies on a proof-of-work type system called "sealing." The article calls it "an intense amount of work" that you must do in order to host a file. Does anyone have any estimates or comparisons for the CPU/energy consumed?

Its currently looking at about 4 hours of single core CPU time, plus 2-3 hours more of using many cores for a 32GB sector.

The difference between sealing and an actual proof of work based network here is that once you've sealed a sector, you don't have to keep computing anything that expensive. If you seal 1TB and thats 1% of the network, you should win 1% of the blocks (ignoring network growth) without further sealing work required. I tend to think about it like a (calculus) derivative of PoW.