Bitcoin Core developer (Peter Todd) - critique of maidsafe

Thanks David. I think have a basic understanding of how the xor space and concensus system works (your Google video is still the best/easiest explanation I think), but the attack Peter Todd was referring to as requiring proof of redundancy seems to be more about whether swamping the network with vaults can undermine this (e.g. if the vaults are on one server, or belong to one entity which might turn them off). This then comes down to the 50% (bitcoin) or 75% (SAFE) resilliance threshold, for which SAFE’s main strategy seems - correct me if not - seems to be to keep bad actors below this threshold. Hence discussions on growing big quickly, Proof of unique human, account captchas etc.

I took your statement about “proof of redundancy” to be something more than I think it is, which is I think something I already was aware of, rather than something new I picked up and wanted to learn about.

I don’t want to draw you into explaining this unless it really is something I haven’t grasped and can then use to go and explain to critics including Peter Todd. I followed him up on reddit but he has not responded. I really appreciate you taking the time you do to answer the way you do BTW.

For now if you can just confirm “proof of redundancy” is not new in the sense I thought, but pretty much as I’ve described here, that will suffice. If not, I’d love to know more but it can wait! :slight_smile:

Yes pretty much, I see swamping with nodes to be equivalent to having a great big server holding chunks for many nodes. Our approach is we do not care how the node gets the data and maintains it, as long as it does. I see the Google attack like a massive influx of nodes, whether they hold the data or can get it fast enough seems to me not relevant.

If they had 75% of the network, then they could perhaps switch off and disallow access to 3 of the 4 chunks, but the network would make another three copies. If higher than 75% then they could start removing data if that data was not cached and held by offline nodes then it could be lost.

Possibly another section for the attack part of systemdocs? I think it is fundamentally another sybil attack, if anyone can get a huge number of nodes then as in nature that mammoth would eventually win given enough nodes and time. The other part of the attack, where a huge influx would earn safecoin for providing lots of nodes, to me is fine, but if it was apparent this was happening (it would be in many ways IMHO and not all technical) then it would be destructive and that player would do similar damage as bitcoin 51% attack and devalue any earnings they made.

The key is not being able to have many intruding high ranked nodes appear all at one time, this is where the rank calculations help a lot. Like new nodes are infants and when they grow up we listen to them.

If an attacker created lots of nodes to attack, then by the time the nodes were in a state to attack they should have earned a lot of safecoin, so again it is a bit self defeating or at least expensive. How expensive will be a combination of the costs of the nodes (they are designed to use already running power to already running computers so data centres should be less profitable per machine in many cases) and of course the value of safecoin at the time the attack is possible. This becomes harder though as 76% of the network on the day the attack starts is hopefully way less by the time the attacking nodes are capable. So growth is good and scalability is designed for. This is perhaps a big difference with many systems out there, but again its part of a much bigger answer really :smile:

To control a bit of data may be significantly more difficult though, we are trying to get some numbers on that by considering a churn free, non growth and static network that we can knock nodes off of, which is the only way we can get close to numbers.

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Great, thanks David - that adds to my understanding so worth your time I hope!

BTW I read all these and some sinks in, but I also keep a list of links to many of them so that I can refer back, maybe write something up one day, point others towards them etc.

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Sounds like you’re really doing a good job helping spread the word and educating the critics on various forums. I just want to say I’m sure i and many others appreciate the good work. I try myself on masterxchange and hopefully get through to some but I find many are just trolls whose objective is purely to obfuscate and wind up. I worry that this aspect can get to David and team, as it’s exhausting to constantly explain to people - who in the main aren’t listening and don’t ask things in order to become more informed but to find another aspect to attack, which goes on in a circular fashion. Anyway, I think we the community need to start doing all the answering and leave the devs to do all the coding as far as possible. It must be dis-heartening as well as exhausting and I think we need to take a load off. I for one would prefer the devs to take a week off and try to relax a bit. I worry about mental exhaustion and the team needs protecting from this. You deserve a break guys.

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@dirvine Hopefully what I was saying translated. I wasn’t trying to imply that the Maidsafe team is dodgy. Just that there are a lot of projects where people will dodge questioning with philosophy, politics, and circular logic. Or, sometimes, flat-out false statements. My impression of the Maidsafe team has been that you guys are genuine, sincere, but occasionally have trouble speaking broadly to a less technical audience. Eventually, that has to be addressed. Although honestly, if you’re confident in your system and can tell people that you have solutions to these problems, then keep it up! That’s all you can do. I’m not advocating you spend your time explaining the whole project to people. Just say “We are trying to accomplish X, Y, Z. We believe we have a system that we can build that does these things. We’re working on constructing it.” Which is what you’ve been doing.

In defense of PR: In my experience, the films that fail are the ones where the artist claims her work is so brilliant, it doesn’t fit into any genre. It can’t be boxed! But unfortunately, it can. And the public will box it for you unless you take control of the narrative. There’s no cosmic system balancing good and evil, nothing that protects those with good intentions. People can derail you. They can campaign better than you. The truth doesn’t prevail, the best storytellers do. This has all happened before, this will all happen again.

I’ve noticed it’s hard for tech people to accept that socializing is an art, and a powerful one. These people can control public narrative. They’re charismatic, good with people, and good storytellers. That doesn’t make them dishonest. Computers can be used to create virus and people can use charisma to be manipulative. It doesn’t require a PR department to lie about things. Just don’t be a dirtbag, be transparent, and do it eloquently.

But really, PR companies are blah. I’m not really suggesting you hire a firm for a product that doesn’t even exist yet (or ever, really). Use people who can write cohesively, who can communicate cleanly, and who share your enthusiasm and ideals.

The people who can communicate always win. VHS vs BETA. AC vs DC. The better tech doesn’t always win. We like to pretend it does, but it doesn’t. It’s the one that communicates it’s intentions the cleanest. It’s only manipulation when you lie.

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No worries @russell I know you well enough to understand what you meant. Defo no offence take at all.

On this point though ?

Obviously personal ideas, I am not saying do not communicate it is vitally important and I 100% agree, but …

Hitler was a great communicator in fact many dictators and terrorists are. Many scams are way better communicators that actual companies and do a lot of harm.

In terms of VHS / Betamax I hear this all the time. In fact a couple of years back I went to a meeting that was presented by a Harvard Marketing guy who was giving a lecture. He used that point and I pulled him up for it. BetaMax was a significantly better product in terms of film etc. but it was just that, it had huge problems using different tapes where VHS struck the magic size of tape, one that could fit a movie on. So the quality was less, granted but it is an apples and oranges comparison I think. A more accurate use of this ‘war’ would be to say the most expensive and higher quality product does not always win.

No matter how well the BETA crowd communicated they could no PR a movie size tape and that was very costly.

I think on AC/DC it was not the PR it was the significantly deeper pockets (as well as many PR stunts killing animals to show danger etc.). I think Tesla was completely outmaneuvered by significantly more ruthless businessmen and bankers for short term gain. There were not many PR outlets in those days anyway :slight_smile:

Google is a great example of a PR less company even Facebook etc. seemed to have beginnings with tiny amounts of PR (in fact Google actively resisted it). Now they are short term profit seeking entities it all changes. This is the stock market thing though and another story.

I have found PR companies are like many salesmen, they are great at selling themselves and are dangerous. There are genius and dedicated people in those fields to though, so I do not mean to be disingenuous, but to me it is a huge dangerous arena fraught with lies and deceit.

So again @russell I a in complete agreement about communicating, but sometimes the honest mistake making fumbler is accepted over slick advertisements and soundbites. So I think we need to be very careful., It is why I created a blog (oh when I get time again) so that I could be a dangerous open say anything person that is not speaking for a company or project, but just honest thoughts.

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Sure, but that doesn’t seem like a good reason to avoid being a solid communicator. In fact, seems like its all the more reason to be good at it. Right? There’s good and bad sides of everything, even with Maidsafe’s potential technology (as has been discussed ad nauseam in the forum).

Another PR example: How about Nixon vs Kennedy and the famous television debate where Nixon had a cold, looked awful, and more than likely lost the election from just that?

Sometimes I notice the tech community acts in binary extremes, and I just don’t think that’s a great idea, because they’ll just get streamrolled by good communicators. It’s a craft like any other (lord knows I’m not one of them). It’s why stupid slogans can win campaigns. And instead of pretending it doesn’t work and we’re all better than it, why not use it? We’ll never get beyond that because its in our core programming as people.

Regardless of whether or not you believe you’re speaking for just yourself, you’re speaking for the organization. Case and point:

You’ll be seen as the figurehead until you disappear completely from view and become a red herring like Satoshi Nakamoto (but don’t disappear, you’re great haha). We’re social pattern recognition machines that build narrative in our minds and then talk about it. If there isn’t a narrative structure, we’ll force one. Same reason why there are so many conspiracy theories: our brains need reason and structure in a universe of chaos and meaninglessness.

So why not ensure that we express our ideas correctly instead of letting someone else express them incorrectly? I say make the best product you can while someone who understands the project communicates it to the public the best they can. It’s only manipulation when you’re not being honest, the same way software is only a virus when it’s knowingly programmed that way.

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PR is too often a synonym for manipulation and deceit.

Communication is better, but has become a synonym for spin and PR.

Communication of values would be good. Stay true the values and you keep yourself honest providing honesty is one of them, and knowing that it is is why I’m here. End the bullshit: PR, advertising (99% of it), spin etc.

“Just the facts ma’am” ← click :slight_smile:

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