Perhaps the destination address of the block reward could be used as a proxy to distinguish different nodes?
If this is impossible then my scheme would require some other identification method, e.g. generation of a bitcoin address used specifically for node identification purposes.
EDIT1:
Thanks for the various links. I've never heard of goldcoin but it looks like they make use of IP address for peer identification:
1. Ip address is used for peer identification.
I would prefer using bitcoin address for identification (of a node, in my case) because of its pseudonymous nature. Nodes would have the ability to change identities as often as they want but would be incentivized to maintain a stable pseudonymous identity. The bitcoin address used for node identification would not necessarily be the same address used for payout.
There are two defenses that I would envision against Sybil attacks: the first is the "ante" I described in earlier posts (in the form of small PoW and/or some small amount of bitcoin required before contributing a block), thus raising the cost of launching a Sybil attack; and the second is to harness a social network layered on top of the mining network. According to this idea, nodes would have the option (and only a very small percentage of nodes would do this!!) of making known their real-world identities. If the network were to be the victim of a 51% attack, then the bad actors could be forked away from the good actors, with the social network providing the backbone for the "trusted" fork; the pseudonymous nodes could choose which fork they wished to follow (eg, the one with the greatest number of nodes controlled by real-world trusted entities, or the other one. This method assumes that the majority of your trusted nodes do not join China or EvilCorp XYZ in their bid to take over the network.) (At first glance, this paper in the footnotes to the wikipedia article describes something similar to what I am thinking:
http://www.csd.uoc.gr/~hy558/papers/sybilguard.pdf although I have only skimmed the paper briefly.)
EDIT2:
Also, I would strive not to change the inflation schedule. Perhaps the extra reward I am talking about could be carved out of the existing reward?? ...
OR: perhaps the ante would involve, not only a PoW, but also a small payment in bitcoin, and that is what is used to fund my whole scheme. No change in the inflation schedule necessary!
You're talking about giving a bigger (or smaller) reward as incentive or punishment for individual blocks. That is a change in the inflation schedule.
The idea would be to keep the 21M limit that is projected to be attained in 2140 and to stay on the same schedule. Rewards would be reshuffled based on a few rules but not in a way that changes the final total or the general trajectory. (Bear in mind I am brainstorming!! ...)
If you are trying to design anything related to bitcoin and you haven't read the bitcoin whitepaper (
https://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf), then you are wandering in a dense dark forest with your eyes shut. You're just going to keep bumping into trees and hurting yourself. Take the time to read it, then take the time to ask questions and make sure that you really understand both the original whitepaper as well as the final design of bitcoin (which has some significant differences from the original whitepaper).
https://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdfI have read the whitepaper maybe twice since I discovered bitcoin in 2011 and make no pretense that I grokked all of it. I make no pretense that I am smarter than all the people who do this full time. Getting comments like those in this thread helps me know where to focus my energy and I am appreciative.