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OpenBazaar is a decentralized Dark Net market that's 'untouchable' by police

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Re: OpenBazaar is a decentralized Dark Net market that's 'untouchable' by police

#51

Post by wyager »

rayiner wrote: post #20
Jukelox wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think your fears are purely speculative and are distracting from what's really going on here. We are witnessing a demand for unregulated markets because regulated markets are way too slow in responding to social changes. Let's face it - governmental decisions are made in the best interest of influential parties, not in the best interests of the individual. Do not protect me from myself.

Nobody is protecting you from yourself. They're trying to protect other people from the damage you can do as an addict, a child pornographer, or a terrorist.

>Nobody is protecting you from yourself. They're trying to protect other people from the damage you can do as an addict, a child pornographer, or a terrorist.

This is patently false. Counter-examples include A) non-addictive, very safe drugs are also illegal B) NYC tried to outlaw large sodas C) unpasteurized milk is illegal.

Re: OpenBazaar is a decentralized Dark Net market that's 'untouchable' by police

#52

Post by higherpurpose »

rayiner wrote: post #20
Jukelox wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think your fears are purely speculative and are distracting from what's really going on here. We are witnessing a demand for unregulated markets because regulated markets are way too slow in responding to social changes. Let's face it - governmental decisions are made in the best interest of influential parties, not in the best interests of the individual. Do not protect me from myself.

Nobody is protecting you from yourself. They're trying to protect other people from the damage you can do as an addict, a child pornographer, or a terrorist.

Everytime you, or someone who thinks like you, about the "Next Big Thing" in Terrorism, Child Porn and Drug Trafficking, replace that "Next Big Thing" technology with the "Internet", and reconsider the argument you were about to make.

I don't think too many people could've envisioned the good the Internet could do in the future, when it was launched. And it's also so much easier to think about the bad ways in which it could be used. Heck, I think the Internet today is still mostly about porn. Does that mean we should ban it because it's only 30-40 percent "useful"?

Look at Popcorn Time and torrenting. Netflix, Amazon, Google, Apple, could all use the same technology to drastically reduce their bandwidth with only a few servers to seed all shows at all time. But there's so much stigma about it from the beginning. Torrenting for legal stuff could be huge. But it's not because people like you yelled from the beginning about how it's a "piracy tool".

So let's try and not repeat the same mistakes with new innovations such as Bitcoin. which was also in the news mostly for drug trafficking in the early days, but fortunately Bitcoin users managed to successful promote and overcome that with the "good uses", and by yelling at sites for continuing to talk about Bitcoin as a "drug tool".

Same goes for OpenBazaar, Ethereum, Storj, Firechat and other innovations that may start gaining adoption.

It's also really unfortunate that the Facebook era + massive US government propaganda against Tor, is also making Tor and anonymity seem like a "bad thing" these days, even though most people on the Internet were "anonymous" in the early days. And guess what - the world didn't collapse!

Re: OpenBazaar is a decentralized Dark Net market that's 'untouchable' by police

#53

Post by abruzzi »

jasode wrote: post #17

I see several comments questioning the legitimate value of a peer-to-peer marketplace. Some cannot see any use other than illegal commerce (drugs, porn, etc). It is true that such illicit trades will take advantage of that network but is it really impossible to envision legal business as the major activity? Yes, cars can be used as getaway vehicles from bank robberies and also smash terrorist bombs into government bu…

While there are absolutely benefit of a system like this for legal sales, the problem is most sellers of legal goods have many existing outlets that they can use. While they might not like the fees, most accept them as the cost of doing business. Since there are few organized marketplaces online for illegal goods, the first adopters (as with Silk Road) will most likely be the black market, which will likely stigmatize the marketplace, making it far less likely to be adopted by legal sellers.

Re: OpenBazaar is a decentralized Dark Net market that's 'untouchable' by police

#54

Post by tirant »

paulhauggis wrote: post #36
expr- wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That depends. Individuals generally need not pay tax for selling their private property.

I'm not sure where you live, but this is not the case nearly everywhere in the US.

It's the case in most european countries, and I am sure also in lots of other places.

Re: OpenBazaar is a decentralized Dark Net market that's 'untouchable' by police

#55

Post by theone11 »

untouchable is such a overused word. everything is touchable. the government just has to order some products and track their origin using the mail system, get enough orders, you find the vicinity, spy on the drop off area and the businessman is bound to make mistakes, we are human after all.

Re: OpenBazaar is a decentralized Dark Net market that's 'untouchable' by police

#56

Post by theone11 »

untouchable is such a overused word. everything is touchable. the government just has to order some products and track their origin using the mail system, get enough orders, you find the vicinity, spy on the drop off area and the businessman is bound to make mistakes, we are human after all. there are many ways to skin this cat.

Re: OpenBazaar is a decentralized Dark Net market that's 'untouchable' by police

#57

Post by s_q_b »

doctorfoo wrote: post #49
krapp wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Can a more open platform for sellers without the stigma of illegal activity be realized? Probably not. Cars weren't invented to make bank robberies more difficult to stop. These networks were invented, to a degree which shouldn't be dismissed when considering their acceptance by the mainstream, to make enforcing laws against trading in anything more difficult, if not impossible. I think most people (not most people…

I think you underestimate the average Joe's desire to save a few dollars... The key barriers I see are having to install special software and getting to grips with Bitcoin. Perhaps it is possible to ship a client with some default blacklisting of certain products, sellers etc, if a person wants to avoid stumbling by accident across such stuff. (Maybe even such blacklists would become updated and mandated by law.)

You need to insulate the user from the Bitcoin transaction entirely. It should look to the user like they're paying in local currency. Unfortunately, we're not there yet. We know how to create an automated p2p currency exchange, we think. But nobody's done it yet.

Re: OpenBazaar is a decentralized Dark Net market that's 'untouchable' by police

#58

Post by ertdfgcb »

gwern wrote: post #50

Keep in mind, a lot of people are hyping OpenBazaar more than it deserves or is helpful. The basic question about OB no one has answered is: assuming they get it up and running and with a good security model, why will the mass of black-market - or legal - users ever use it, when using Amazon or something is easier and more familiar? You may say that they'll use it so they don't have to worry about police, except blac…

The users that don't care are almost always the users buying the smallest (personal) amounts, and they usually don't care because they know if they get scammed or it gets lost they only lost $30. The customers who want larger quantities very much do care, and they're the ones who spend real cash.

Furthermore it's pretty common for a dealer who has a good enough reputation to start requiring early finalization. Most of the reason people still used SR2 is it was the easiest place to find their favorite vendor, and the lack of escrow didn't matter because you trust him and/or he requires FE no matter what the market.

As for why people will use OB (I have no idea if they will), cops aren't the only thing to worry about when buying drugs on the darknet (in fact they're close to the bottom of the list). Several marketplaces (including SR2) have been hacked and had all the users money stolen, and a couple have just disappeared with everyone's money. I suspect the selling point will be more like: "Hackers and corrupt admins won't be able to steal your money! Plus it's never down! Plus it's harder to get arrested!".

Re: OpenBazaar is a decentralized Dark Net market that's 'untouchable' by police

#59

Post by dklsf »

jasode wrote: post #40
krapp wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Can a more open platform for sellers without the stigma of illegal activity be realized? Probably not. Cars weren't invented to make bank robberies more difficult to stop. These networks were invented, to a degree which shouldn't be dismissed when considering their acceptance by the mainstream, to make enforcing laws against trading in anything more difficult, if not impossible. I think most people (not most people…

> , I also think it would be disingenuous to state that their use in illegal activities is somehow orthogonal to their purpose. The Haber Process[1] was a new way to manufacture ammonia in large quantities. Fritz Haber was originally motivated by Germany's war objectives to kill people via poison gas and explosives. Germany needed a lot of synthetic ammonia to do that. Now, the Haber process is mass producing fertili…

The motivation for development was actually producing fertilizer, as it says in the article you linked.

Re: OpenBazaar is a decentralized Dark Net market that's 'untouchable' by police

#60

Post by sanswork »

SamPatt wrote: post #41
paulhauggis wrote: post #38

For my business, I order thousands of items on Amazon and Ebay per week. Even with the protections in place, sellers don't ship the items and then never respond/won't refund, I get the wrong items/broken items (and they refuse to let me send it back). Why would I shop anywhere without these assurances?

OpenBazaar uses 2-of-3 multisig, meaning that the buyer doens't send funds directly to the seller but instead sends it to a Bitcoin account that is jointly controlled by three parties; the buyer, the seller, and a trusted third party called a notary. Both parties agree to the notary, and then in order for the funds to be released from the multisig, any two parties must agree on how the funds are released. In a normal…

How will they be able to prove anything though? The seller could send an empty box. They'd have a tracking code then "proving" they'd sent the item. The buyer could claim it was an empty box but the 3rd party wouldn't be able to know if it was or not.

A scammer would just have to ensure they cycle 3rd parties so their actions aren't noticed(or cycle accounts). What's to stop that?

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