Darkcoin's Competition
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as the dust settles it gets clearer that there are no alternatives at the moment
XMR is a valid competition. Blockchain bloat is not a valid cause of concern to the investor types. XMR is also undergoing nice development work just like DRK.
However, it really depends on what Evan's plans are for RC4 and beyond. He could do a Ring Signature port if needed, but I believe he might have even better enhancements lined up. The path would be
CoinJoin+ -> RingSig+
I agree XMR, even though a Bytecoin fork, at least has a real technical proposition behind it. There are clear whitepapers that show what they are trying to do. I dont invest in XMR for the following reasons:
1. Their protocol is completely different from Bitcoin I think that is a huge obstacle for real world adoption in the next 3 years at least. There is no proven record of what happens when a Cryptonote blockchain scales so merchants, larger exchanges and big investors are least likely to adopt it mid -term.
2. There are still technical challenges they need to overcome, like making it user friendly and basic aspects of the GUI wallet that are a given with Bitcoin forks.
3. If Darkcoin RC4 proves to be as anonymous as Cryptonote or even close to it, XMR reason for existence will be hard to justify giving its challenges. So I guess we will see.
Based on this I think Darkcoin is a better investment even if I needed to decide where to invest right now.