Quote from: RHorning on December 07, 2010, 07:32:20 PM

Let's cut this down to the core of what is wanted here: The desire is to create some sort of distributed public database with some kind of cryptographic controls to both timestamp, certify that the information has not been tampered or modifed unless through proscribed rules and protocol, and that effort to store the data be associated with Bitcoins so far as charging for either access to that database or more importantly to put information into that database.

The perception and growing consensus is that the only way to accomplish this task is to shove it all into transaction blocks. If you can find another solution to this problem, I'm totally open to a solution. The best alternative is a separate block chain and hence independent currency which as creighto and others have suggested is not likely to succeed. Saying that the whole notion here is stupid isn't going to get this issue to go away and it may get worse as well.

The root problem with adding this stuff to the block is the size of the transaction, but if a separate p2p database were developed, references could still be added via the scripting system to definitively timestamp the exterior references without adding a great deal of data to the blockchain itself. This would likely result in a slightly higher standard transaction rate due to the increased size of the transactions. This is similar to timestamping a private recordbook by taking it to a notary public to notarize your signature behind several pages of handwritten words without whitespace. This is exactly what a lot of union reps will do using a hardbound record book for meeting notes with the company reps. Following the meeting, the union rep will take the hardbound record book down to a notary (not associated with any union) to be notarized so that the company reps can't claim that the records were falsely scribed after the fact. They can still claim that they never said it, but to claim that the union rep's book is a forgery puts them in direct conflict with the legal affidavit of a professional who has a reputation to defend.

A similar system could be used to timestamp photos, video or any other "IP" content, no matter where that content is stored, by including a hyperreference to one or more sites that hold the orginal content, along with a secure hash of the content. I imagine that use of the higher functions that the scripting would permit would require a transaction fee anyway. Some transactions will always be free, but like Satoshi has said, that's charity. If you need the scripting functions, you are going to be paying something for the priviliage anyway.