46
votes
Accepted
Why doesn't Bitcoin migrate to proof-of-stake?
Proof of Stake is basically a case of having your cake and eating it, too.
PoW is a simple work-around to a coordination problem that was previously thought to be unsolvable. It sort of "cheats&...
- 68.6k
21
votes
Why doesn't Bitcoin migrate to proof-of-stake?
I think there are at least four reasons:
The miners are stakeholders in the bitcoin ecosystem. Mining solves a problem for them. Taking away PoW mining would make bitcoin no longer work for one of ...
- 51.2k
15
votes
Accepted
How is a proof-of-stake block mined at the block level, and how does it accomplish it's goals?
Proof-of-stake mining is similar to Proof-of-work at a technical level. It involves a sort of lottery, similar to proof-of-work, but the difficult of this lottery is weighted depending on how many ...
- 1,120
14
votes
Why doesn't Bitcoin migrate to proof-of-stake?
I think there are some very convincing theoretical arguments to be made, but there is also just a very practical consideration:
Right now, a very large portion of BTC is being held in the cold ...
- 17.7k
10
votes
What other whitepapers are there for coin distribution models like POW (proof of work) and POS (proof of stake)?
I don't know of any such list yet, but no reason we can't start making one. :) Others should feel free to add their findings via an edit.
Proof of Work
Proof of Stake
Proof of Activity
Proof of ...
- 13.9k
8
votes
Accepted
Is the Lightning network a proof-of-stake system?
Calling the Lightning Network (LN) a Proof-of-Stake (PoS) system is orthogonal to the concept usually labeled as PoS.
What we usually describe as PoS is a mechanism to achieve distributed consensus ...
- 68.6k
8
votes
Accepted
What's the difference between PoW and PoS?
The following points try to simplify/abstract:
A cryptocurrency has its own blockchain to store all the transactions that occurred.
A proof of work/stake algorithm are different methods (or ...
- 2,254
7
votes
Accepted
How does Proof of Burn work?
Attention: Ambiguity!
Note that the term (or abbreviation) "PoB" can be used differently. For example, some cryptocurrencies allow users to get some of their coins for provably burning money in ...
- 3,184
7
votes
Accepted
How does a miner get selected in Proof Of Stake?
The minting algorithm for staking is different for various coins; for example, it is different in BlackCoin from Cardano.
There are several approaches to staking, but most of them are susceptible to "...
- 1,012
6
votes
Accepted
What is stopping someone from creating their own "chain" in Proof-of-Stake systems?
This problem is generally known as "nothing at stake" or "costless simulation", where there is indeed nothing preventing anybody from making arbitrarily long chains where they are the only ...
- 15.3k
6
votes
Accepted
In what sense does the security model of proof-of-stake require users to "log on to the internet every few months"
What Vitalik is talking about is the Slasher algorithm that he designed which punishes the block signer if he attempts to create a fork in the blockchain. However the way that slasher works is that ...
- 65.6k
6
votes
Has PoS really been proven secure under comparable assumptions as Bitcoin?
The Ouroboros line of work proves security comparable to Bitcoin's security. The proofs of security in Ouroboros are similar in style to the Backbone proofs of security, which show that Bitcoin is ...
- 1,012
5
votes
Accepted
How do I join the NXT 2.0 (Ardor) distribution if it isn't an ICO? And how does it affect NXT 1.0 holders?
The Ardor launch will happen in 2017, but the distribution of the main ARDR tokens will be based on the Nxt 1.0 balances. And yes, as far as I know it is the first scalable blockchain platform using ...
- 66
5
votes
Accepted
Do you receive interest on Peercoin if you use an online wallet?
If it is a web wallet that holds your private keys, then it is certainly possible that the service is staking your coins for you, but this may or may not be a feature that the developers of the ...
- 13.9k
5
votes
Accepted
What does one need to do to earn Decred through PoS?
Decred has a hybrid Proof-of-Work/Proof-of-Stake model, which means that block rewards are shared between the miners and the stakers (and the developers), with PoW mining earning the larger portion of ...
5
votes
Accepted
Why do we need to chain the blocks (creating blockchain) in a permissioned blockchain?
I think you might already know the answer, based on your question. The "chain of blocks" has value in Bitcoin because of the proof of work. It is also provides a data structure that can be used in an ...
- 7,228
5
votes
How much more energy efficient is PoS (proof of stake) than PoW (proof of work)? Are there any figures on this?
When providing an equivalent amount of security, I don't believe PoS can be more efficient than PoW. I do understand how it may appear this way on the surface, but I think deeper consideration shows ...
- 17.7k
4
votes
How does Peercoin (or other PoS) prevent timestamp forging effecting hash attempts or random minting?
The general problems you are describing are inherent flaws in PoS, but you've caught onto some of the basic principles that are going to impact the security and integrity of the cryptosystem.
...
- 15.3k
4
votes
Accepted
Is Ethereum essentially Bitcoin with Turing-complete Script?
Is Ethereum essentially Bitcoin with a Turing-complete scripting language and, if I understand correctly, where the script to be executed (not its hash) is placed in the Ethereum blockchain?
That's a ...
- 29k
4
votes
Accepted
In Proof-of-Stake, can the same miner mine a block multiple times in a row?
Can the same miner / address / person be chosen to create multiple blocks in a row
Yes, a single entity can mine multiple blocks in a row with no ill effect.
are there some mechanisms preventing [...
- 15.3k
4
votes
How is a proof-of-stake block mined at the block level, and how does it accomplish it's goals?
Here are some closely related observations on the topic that might help other newbies like me to understand PoS. I spend a couple of hours trying to put things together and to be honest coming from ...
- 41
4
votes
Accepted
How are gridcoin transactions validated?
Gridcoin is a proof-of-stake coin. Transactions are bundled and signed like any other blockchain, but with proof-of-stake the chance to sign is determined by coin balance and the time since your last ...
- 104
3
votes
Accepted
What happens if the transaction interrupted during proof of stake?
It's unclear what the question is.
If by "transaction" you mean solving a PoS block, then you cannot relay this new block to the network if you're offline, so the network participants will continue ...
- 786
3
votes
Accepted
In Proof-of-Stake, can a block creator fudge the block hash?
Absolutely. ECDSA signatures at not unique, they can always be permuted by the signer at will by re-signing with a new nonce. The creator of the block can also choose to reorder or omit transactions ...
- 15.3k
3
votes
Accepted
Minimum how much bitcoin may I get per week if I stake 0.05BTC?
Bitcoin uses pure PoW (proof of work) mining, so you can't really "stake" your 0.05BTC. The only thing that will determine how much bitcoin you may get, will be your computing power, measured in ...
- 401
3
votes
Why is POW/POS absolutely necessary to run public distributed ledger?
You can't do this due to the Sybil Problem. There is no way of proving a node is an individual participant in the system, you can't prove that a node existed at any point in time (or didn't), and ...
- 15.3k
3
votes
How does proof-of-stake "mining" work?
Proof of Stake uses fundamentally the same process as Proof of Work, but with a few key differences.
In Proof of Work miners are searching for a hash of the transactions in mempool + data from the ...
- 447
3
votes
How does Proof of Burn work?
Think of the burning Bitcoin to create XCP in such a way: You take $1,000 of 20 dollar bill to the US Treasury Department, and US Treasury Department burns it, and mints 250 notes of 4 dollar bills ...
- 31
3
votes
How does Proof of Burn work?
With proof of burn, instead of pouring money into expensive computer equipment, you 'burn' coins by sending them to an address where they are irretrievable. By committing your coins to never-never ...
- 31
3
votes
Accepted
How to make PoS system work?
If you want a system with centralized trust, I suppose you could do a 100% pre-mine, and have some checkpoints to 'lock' this, and have all nodes verify against the checkpoint coming from a trusted ...
- 401
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