Researchers Criticize New DAO Ethereum VC Fund (softpedia.com) 39
Three cryptocurrency experts published a scientific paper Friday detailing seven attacks that could influence how the Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) allocates its Ether funds. An anonymous Slashdot reader writes, "Coincidentally or not, they released their work with one day before funding for the DAO closed, and not surprisingly, Ether's price went down, devaluing the DAO from $150 million to $132 million."
From Softpedia: DAO is a crowdfunded project that works on the Ethereum network, a new crypto-currency network that deals with crypto-currency named Ether, which many experts say is better than Bitcoin's blockchain... Investors can submit funding proposals, on which the DAO users vote by submitting some of their tokens and a YES/NO vote. In the end, based on the tokens and YES/NO votes, the DAO's computer program decides on the outcome.
Softpedia reports that the paper released Friday also suggests a series of mitigations to a design they say will "incentivize investors to behave strategically; that is, at odds with truthful voting on their preferences."
From Softpedia: DAO is a crowdfunded project that works on the Ethereum network, a new crypto-currency network that deals with crypto-currency named Ether, which many experts say is better than Bitcoin's blockchain... Investors can submit funding proposals, on which the DAO users vote by submitting some of their tokens and a YES/NO vote. In the end, based on the tokens and YES/NO votes, the DAO's computer program decides on the outcome.
Softpedia reports that the paper released Friday also suggests a series of mitigations to a design they say will "incentivize investors to behave strategically; that is, at odds with truthful voting on their preferences."
LOL, bitcoin is proven (Score:2, Informative)
Bitcoin's "success" (if you can call it that) is related directly to its algorithm which to this day is unbroken.
Any new system is subject to crazy ridiculous review, obviously. No one, I mean no one accepts this new system for anything. The fact that it made a Slashdot front page is pure greed (in terms of Slashdot whores) and means nothing whatsoever. Sorry I'm just an AC dope with no knowledge. Continue on, morons.
Re: LOL, bitcoin is proven (Score:1)
Bitcoin has nowhere near as robust of a smart contract language that eth has. Eth and bitcoin are really different crypto platforms. Eth can act as a cryptocurrency but it's power lies in its distributed compute platform. I can write a program that executes across the eth chain that cannot be modified by any one node (needs consensus like bitcoin). This paves the way for a way more robust and flexible system to implement things like deadman's switches, drm that will survive long after the content is no
Re: (Score:2)
It's only you. You're probably desxlyic.
Impact (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not everyday that a scientific publication has an impact of $18 million.
It's also not everyday that you see a scientific publication entirely drawn up in Google Docs, let see if they can organize a peer review process this way.
Interesting excerpt from the work:
Among the current DAO investors, there is already a whale who invested 888,888 Ether. This investor currently commands 7.7% of all outstanding votes in The DAO. For a proposal that requires only a 20% quorum, this investor already has 77% of the required YES votes to pass the proposal, and just needs to conspire with 2.3% of the token holders, in return for paying the conspirators out from the stolen funds.
Re: (Score:1)
I completely trust "researchers" who fail to catch that the difference between 7.7% and 20% is not 2.
Re: (Score:1)
Maybe you're the one who is confused/wrong?
Based on that description, there's one investor with "7.7% of all outstanding votes".
But this investor would only need to "conspire with 2.3% of the token holders".
Do you see the difference? One percentage is measuring "outstanding votes". The other is measuring "token holders".
Presumably those 2.3% of the "token holders" wouldn't have only 2.3% of the "outstanding votes".
So maybe that's why the one investor, in collaboration with these other investors who may also
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
I'm pretty sure that DRJlaw's actual mistake is in thinking that the 20% quorum means that 20% of the votes have to be YES, when in reality only the majority of the quorum (anything over 10%) is required to have the proposal funded.
Re: (Score:2)
Yes and no.
Yes, you only require 2.3% of the votes in a 20% participation quorum to be "yes" votes to have a majority of the quorum.
No, in the sense that non-participation in the quorum is, in effect, an implied "no" vote which means that the proper strategy for "no" voters is not to participate in voting on a proposal at all unless the "yes" side can achieve at least a 20% participation rate by itself.
The analysis assumes that the "conspirator" side acts ultra-strategically and the "non-conspirator" side n
Re: (Score:2)
For a 20% quora you need a majority of the votes or 10+% of the total votes. So 7.7% is 77% of the votes needed to be the majority of the 20%.
Re: (Score:2)
I can't wait for this latest tech bubble to burst. (Score:1)
Holy shit, I can't wait for this latest tech bubble to burst. Really, what has it given us that's beneficial? Social media is all about collecting our private data and using it to advertise to us. Web 2.0 is all about destroying website user interfaces and bloating our browsers with all sorts of useless functionality, much of it which can be used to track us. Mobile devices are also about tracking us. Bitcoin is just a waste of electricity, and an enabler of criminal commerce. Linux has gotten worse thanks
Re: (Score:3)
You mean faster computers that actually power incredible computing pursuits? You know, those that actually run difficult algorithms for science rather than spending most of their CPU time on GUIs and making SQL queries in run-of-the-mill business software that you're probably writing for food.
You mean recent advances in machine learning, including a wide variety of applications in computer vision and natural language processing, more or less due to increased architectural support (improved database systems,
Re: Can someone explain this in English? (Score:1)
Distributed computing that requires a majority network consensus of the result from assembler-like opcodes.
It's a bit more complex than that, but that should get you started. Google is your best friend
Harry Belafonte (Score:1)
DAO
Its a day-eee-ooh
Daylight come and we wan go home
Never give a sucker an even break (Score:4, Insightful)
One born every minute.
Someone had a joke and so many missed it (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:1)
Can you name a currency that is backed? And I don't mean by the good faith and credit of the issuing institution, just look at Zimbabwe and Venezuela for examples of how currency backed by "good faith and credit" turns out in the long run.
Go ahead, name a single currency backed by anything that isn't blind faith in the issuer. I'll wait.
Re: (Score:2)
That is kind of the entire point. A currency is based on trust that the issuer can keep promises (and if they don't you know where they live). An unbacked currency has nobody to keep a promise.
Re: (Score:2)
What promises does the USA make about the dollar, and what, exactly speaking, can I do if it decides to break them?
Re: (Score:2)
Can someone say "Arrow's Impossibility Theorem" (Score:3)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] aka "There ain't no such thing as a fair election"...
Compute Coin Hucksterism (Score:1)
Ethereum is a computing token, not a store of value. ETH tokens are consumed doing computing operations, which allows the running of distributed apps. The actual use-case for ETH is small, since examples are sparse and there hasn't been any rapid uptake from the business community at large.
Enter the Decentralized Autonomous Organization, the DAO. This is a pile of money with zero plan, and the game theory incentivizes you NOT to vote, because then your money isn't locked up into a proposal for an indefinite