Looking at the code, it seems to basically be solidcoin without maybe only one master-node instead of several master-nodes.
I tried to hack out all proof of work and all checking of checkpoints but then both sides seem to wait for the other to start saying something.
OK, I have finished the thread, that took a while (because there is a lot of info here, thanks guys)
I've been thinking about this a lot lately. The point of PoW in PPC is as a Clock, and an initial coin minter. Without PoW PPC does not know when 10 minutes has elapsed. Checkpoints are there to ensure that nobody does a double-spend before the network gets big enough to defend itself, as well as provide a clock of last resort (IIRC) I believe that sunny-king did mention removing check-pointing in and upcoming build. (note, I'm not reading the code, using my memory of descriptions)
The Clock aspect of PoW makes it almost impossible to move away from, or at least replace. Using an external timeserver would open up all sorts of network vulnerabilities and attacks, same with checkpoint servers, or any other centralized mechanism.
Why not do merged mining with BitCoin for the PoW, so you can keep the fork "pure" and focused on the Proof of Stake aspects?
Initial coin minting needs to be heavily deflationary too, in my opinion, that is another issue I have with PPC. No matter how far I game it out, it keeps looking like mining will ALWAYS be FAR more lucrative than holding, and since transaction fees are destroyed there is no incentive to mine PoW if we tried to just make the existing coin deflationary.
I guess my wish list is:
- Deflationary initial coin distribution that is...
- ... replaced by transaction fees over time, but...
- ... no hard limit on coins since PoS will continue forever.
- Merged Mining with BitCoin for PoW
- Clear direction with milestones,
- and much better communication.
Cabin made a good point on transaction fees, without fees being shared with miners, how do we incent folks to include some transactions over others. We have to assume that we might get more transactions than we can handle at some point and will need to prioritize...
ADDENDUM: While doing a revision of the POS reward scheme, it may also be beneficial to investigate how the incentive structure for including transactions can be optimized. Maybe the block reward can be proportional to the overall destroyed coinage instead of the stake transaction (however, the "likelihood" of generating the POS block should only be determined by the stake transaction)
Then including transactions which destroy significant coinage is beneficial to the miner and it's an incentive to include them instead of leaving them out. The above mentioned exponential modifier can work on the total coinage for the block instead of the stake transaction...
I Disagree with this one, the only benefit from "stake" should be during holding. If you elect to stop holding and move it, it's income stops.
I like the declining aggregate interest idea, but it would just cause folks to move coins around on a quarterly or annual basis to optimize rewards. This would however essentially require that ALL coins be stored online, or come online regularly, so it might be an overall security disadvantage. I think if you bring your wallet back online after 1 year, you should be able to get 1 year of interest, unless this is Proof of Online Stake (POS?) in which case we should actually be checking availability of coins or something. (I think)