Quote from: kuroman on January 09, 2014, 01:25:10 AM

Thanks for your reply, as I explained before the Idea is great, but the problem is how are you going to implement it, code wise I mean, and are you going to do it pool side or on the source code and on the blockchain directly? this is the point I'm trying to explane, it's hard if not impossible to code such a solution, also punishement was never a good solution it always drive people of, with such a system, I think the best would be to reward to loyal people, and this can be done pool side relatively easly but this will again need a cordination between all the pools to have set parameters and qualification for such bonus that everyone would like.

The thing about BTC/LTC, is that they are well established, and pretty stable, there is no alternative to BTC/LTC combo, you trade cats for either then to fiat and not the other way around, and there will always be people mining BTC/LTC because it's a sure value and well estblished, Cat is still young 2 weeks old or so, it needs at least a couple of months to mature and reach such a true stability and when that's happen, you can have a true loyalty system because the coin it self will be really relevant. So to resume I think a reward loyalty system would be good and would enter in the case of the long term project of making this coin valuable and relevant, a punishement system I'm affraid will have negative effect and push off people from joining, (some people wants to try other alternative from time to time without having to pay a price for that for example)

I appreciate your constructive feedback to my ideas, and am happy to have the opportunity to address your questions/concerns.

Implement at Pool vs. Coin Codebase I think it would be easier and less controversial to implement the idea at a pool first. Since no other coin has implemented the idea, it is quite appropriate that it should raise a lot of questions and skepticism - if it is a bad idea, then that needs to come to light - and if it is innovative and something to revolutionize cryptocurrency - then it's only fair it should meet the same sort of resistance and opposition as any other innovation that threatens the status quo. And in today's cryptocoin scene, coin-hopping profiteers are a big part of the status quo.

Difficulty of Coding I plead guilty to having been too lazy to write a white paper on the subject, and perhaps presenting the idea in a way which made it appear more complicated than it needs to be or is. I should perhaps rectify this omission, and for this I apologize. To summarize, whether at the coin or pool level, we identify and lock in the wallet ID (or pool user ID) of those who have been mining while a recent difficulty level was high, and recognize them with network-wide consensus as loyal miners. When and only when difficulty is exceptionally low, these loyal miners get to mine and receive more reward than the default amount to compensate them for their work during difficult times. Others may mine, but receive the default reward amount, which is less than what loyal miners get, but that is correct because the extra amount loyal miners are getting is delayed compensation for high difficulty work. This arrangement is designed to keep out coin hoppers, and stabilizes coin difficulty adjustments to the point where despite minor coin status, the coin could re-implement 2016 block retargeting, and the code implementing this could be back-ported to Bitcoin without any negative effect.

Punishment vs. Reward I think I can show this to be a semantic issue - if we think in terms of coins earned per megahash-minutes contributed, we can talk purely in terms of rewards and not punishments. Loyal miners would temporarily see lower profitability during high difficulty times, but would be compensated with temporarily enhanced profitability during easy difficulty times, averaging things out for them. Others who start mining when difficulty is low, receive the standard, default amount of reward, which is not excessively profitable - just the normal amount profitable. The new miner does not see profitability that is any lower than what the loyal miner was just recently receiving. So it evens out. The miner is free to stay, and they would very quickly be in the same position as the miner who was there before. Looked at in this way, there is no punishment intended or involved. Or, we can just as easily say we currently have a system where people who choose to mine while the difficulty is high is specifically being singled out to be punished with low profitability. And from this viewpoint, we can say we need to do everything possible to eliminate this illogical punishment. We continue the argument - we really do actually value miners who keep the coin alive during high difficulty times, and they should not be punished for that. I hope you can see that at least there is a possibility that whether something is considered a punishment or reward can change depending on which way you look at it.

Creating More Coins vs. Curtailing Coin Production I think when it comes to coin hoppers, there is no getting around the need to temporarily curtail coin production per block when difficulty gets ridiculously easy, because there is no way of getting around the fact that the value contributed by an easy block or mining an easy block, is demonstrably less value to the coin than doing this work for a difficult block. Declaring by fiat (in code) that whether the block was easy to solve or difficult to solve - they should always under every circumstance be rewarded equally - is really at the root of why coin hoppers feel incentivized to act as they do. It can be viewed as a fiat declaration to create unnecessary inflation specifically to reward coin hoppers. There is really no logical reason why this fiat declaration should not be revisited/revised, if we can improve the coin difficulty stability and enhance its value in the process. There is nothing inherently sacred about this assumption. If fewer coins are produced during an particularly easy block by default (but a higher number of coins is awarded to people who have earned the extra by contributing during difficult times - purely to compensate for their work during difficult times), everyone is receiving exactly what they have earned, and everyone can make a rational decision of how to conduct their mining based on the new incentives this sets up. There is no discrimination - everyone is equal.

I agree with you that CAT is young, and I do not necessarily expect to see my suggestions implemented immediately (especially since I am not in a position right now to whip up the code....that could change, with a bit of inspiration anything is possible)

- and I hope I have been successful in clarifying some aspects of my proposed mechanism, so it perhaps does not seem quite as impractical as it might have seemed at first. And I appreciate the opportunity to contribute ideas and possible value to this coin.

Thank you,

Etblvu1