Quote from: poofknuckle on November 14, 2014, 04:21:53 PM

Quote from: bitcoinrocks on November 11, 2014, 06:38:20 PM

Disappointed to learn this about OpenBazaar:

http://forum.openbazaar.org/index.php?p=/discussion/105/need-a-permanent-node-to-set-up-a-store

That is not decentralization for me.

If true, that sounds a bit... risky. If you need to run a node in order to sell your items, then you are a target, possibly an identifiable one. This is exactly the structural flaw that SR, SR2, etc have. If you rely on a server, you will be found and taken down/prosecuted. The blockchain solves this particular problem.

Hey folks, Sam Patterson here, I'm the operations lead on the OpenBazaar team. There's been a few misconceptions about OpenBazaar in this thread I'd like to clear up, and I'm happy to answer questions.

On the node issue: Yes, you need to either run a node yourself or connect to someone running a node in order to see the network. Right now, there aren't third party services for you to connect to through the web. However, this will undoubtedly occur at some point, and so users who don't care about decentralization will connect to a "gateway node" to conduct business, and people who don't trust third parties will run their own.

Also, running a node isn't like running a server. It's a small program that you can easily run on your own computer, easier than running a full Bitcoin node. It's very similar to a bittorrent client.

It's been suggested several times that OpenBazaar doesn't have code out yet. That's inaccurate, we're actually on our third beta release now. You can read more (and find the Windows version) here:

https://blog.openbazaar.org/beta-3-0-tabriz-is-released/

We're not claiming this is ready for real trade (though many items have been bought and sold on it) but if you check out our GitHub (on develop branch) you'll see that we have one of the most active projects in the entire Bitcoin ecosystem:

https://github.com/OpenBazaar/OpenBazaar/tree/develop

We're excited about what has been built so far, and the wonderful support we've gotten from the community. We hope that by Spring 2015 we've have a platform that the Bitcoin community will be able to fully embrace as the primary way to conduct business within the Bitcoin economy.

Oh, and to answer the original question of the thread: No, there's no way to invest in OpenBazaar. This is an open source project to unleash free trade on the world, it's not a way to get rich for the devs. No fees like other platforms, no need to be tied to a single altcoin like other platforms.