News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by avenoir on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:03PM (#14454608)
This is just an FYI for anyone thinking about using Coinbase for their trades. Coinbase makes you periodically re-verify your identity. This process used to be manual. It is 100% automated now and it rarely works (look at Coinbase community forums for more on this). I've had a support ticket open regarding this issue for 3 weeks now and the only response I've gotten so far is "As we experience rapid growth, we are also experiencing a high volume of support requests and we regret not being able to answer your inquiry in a reasonable amount of time." I don't have any serious money tied up in Coinbase, but if i did I would be freaking the fuck out right now with this appalling support service.
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by justinclift on Thursday June 01, 2017 @09:43AM (#14460134)
As a data point, this seem to be the discussion area mentioned by avenoir:

https://community.coinbase.com/c/coinbase/id-verification

Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by droidist2 on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @08:00PM (#14456873)
Periodically re-verify your identity? For what purpose?
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by DennisP on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:02PM (#14454589)
Nice! A few comments...

I think XRP is down to about 60% founder control, they've been giving it away to strategic partners.

Ethereum Classic doesn't have anything to do with Cryptonote. It's a straight fork of Ethereum.

I don't think Golem or Augur are actually in production yet, they're just tokens on Ethereum that will play a role in the actual systems once those are live.

Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by arcaster on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:04PM (#14454617)
Yeah, XRP doesn't have much utility for the average user. Also noticed the gaping error citing that Ethereum Classic implements crypto-note.

If you want to look at a token that's about as close to a complete scam as tokenly possible, look no further than Gnosis. The GNO token doesn't actually directly translate to an asset that can be used on their prediction market come launch. Even more, investors only control 4.5% of the GNO tokens in existence, granted this was all done AFTER Gnosys had more than enough existing funding. Cash grab, plain and simple.

Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by kilimchoi on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:09PM (#14454665)
So did the investors sell their GNO tokens?
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by simonebrunozzi on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:12PM (#14454682)
AFAIK, they can't for the first 12 months after the ICO sale (which happened a couple of weeks ago).
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by jankotek on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:32PM (#14454822)
> Ethereum Classic doesn't have anything to do with Cryptonote. It's a straight fork of Ethereum.

Other way around. Ethereum is a fork of ETC ;-)

Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by kilimchoi on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:05PM (#14454622)
Thanks for the correction. I updated it. Feel free to make a pr if you see anything else that should be added or removed.
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by Jenya_ on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:17PM (#14454725)
About instant transactions in Dash. They did not implement yet a critical feature which would make instant transactions useful for merchants.

Currently a merchant is not able to declare his receiving Dash address as "Instant transactions only". Without this feature merchant is forced to trust that his customers would always use instant transactions.

https://www.dash.org/forum/threads/we-need-merchants-using-d...

Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by gnarcoregrizz on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:19PM (#14454741)
A comment regarding bytecoin: it was exploited with a double spend bug which allowed the unlimited minting of new coins, a lot of which I'm sure were dumped on poloniex. See some details here: https://getmonero.org/2017/05/17/disclosure-of-a-major-bug-i...

I'm surprised polo still has it listed

Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by kilimchoi on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:21PM (#14454755)
wow. Dashcoin seems to be affected too
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by arcaster on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:02PM (#14454600)
You should consider differentiating "tokens" from crypto-currencies backed by their own unique blockchain implementation. For example, Golem is a token built on Ethereum, however, it's not really a true "crypto-currency", rather a payment layer for Golem's "fog" computing platform.
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by flipp3r on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:21PM (#14454758)
> Stellar Lumens Cons: "No mining available. 95% of Lumens were given out"

95% were given out? Maybe I'm misreading this but only 9.66B/102.94B XLM has been given out. (To people who own BTC or XRP. It's basically a living advertisement for XRP.)

The creators still own 93.28B XLM. They own approx. 90% of all XLM.

Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by kilimchoi on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:22PM (#14454770)
Feel free to make a pr correcting this. I was going off what they said on the website.
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by flipp3r on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:25PM (#14454783)
The stats are from their own website btw; https://dashboard.stellar.org/
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by gruez on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @01:54PM (#14454527)
Ethereum cons: smart contracts get hacked
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by desdiv on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:42PM (#14454893)
Ethereum pros: security researchers who find bugs in smart contracts are rewarded handsomely and instantly
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by AstralStorm on Thursday June 01, 2017 @03:28AM (#14458570)
And if they reward themselves too much, the blockchain is forked again?
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by arcaster on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:07PM (#14454638)
Developer Cons:

Some write shitty smart contracts.

Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by DennisP on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:03PM (#14454602)
A lot less often now that best practices are better understood, and people insist on public security audits.
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by pikzen on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:09PM (#14454664)
Ethereum cons: when smart contracts do inevitably get hacked, founders pretty much force the community's hand when it comes to forking because they just lost their VC money. Code is law, except when it's not practical for them.
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by hsod on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:17PM (#14454730)
Why is "hacking a smart contract" OK but "hard forking in response" is not?
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by pikzen on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:58PM (#14455002)
Because it is a matter of original message. The Ethereum devs have had one mantra from the start: code is law. What is written in the code is what the developer means. There's no room for interpretation.

But, somehow, when someone did something allowed by the code, it turns out it wasn't in the spirit of the law, and so should be forked.

Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by splintercell on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @06:31PM (#14456458)
> The Ethereum devs have had one mantra from the start: code is law.

Oh great, now I can actually say something to my ethereum loving brother in law, btw do you have a source for this? Because when I try to search for any resource on the internet from before 2016 where Ethereum developers said that "code is law" I can't find it.

Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by knopkop on Thursday June 01, 2017 @07:55AM (#14459502)
"applications that run exactly as programmed without any possibility of downtime, censorship, fraud or third party interference."

https://www.ethereum.org/

Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by hsod on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @04:47PM (#14455776)
Isn't the blockchain, and therefore the hard-forking mechanism, also code?
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by fdik on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @03:01PM (#14455026)
None of them can solve the micropayment problem.

GNU Taler can.

Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by brentis on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @10:26PM (#14457523)
Fascinated by Golem (GNT) when coupled with an orchestration layer http://blog.streamr.com/2017/05/golem-plus-streamr-equals-he...
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by kilimchoi on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @03:05PM (#14455051)
OP here, feel free to make a pr to correct any errors or if you want to add any new information.
Re:Overview of top cryptocurrencies by dang on Wednesday May 31, 2017 @02:39PM (#14454863)
This is not a Show HN. Please read the rules:

https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html