Soon, You'll Be Creating Steemit Accounts By Hatching Eggs - After You Mine Some Stuff
This is not a joke. After I just announced yesterday that you will be able to generate new Steemit accounts (potentially anonymous accounts) by mining a special type of token, a new paradigm is discussed by the developers of the Steem blockchain, in Github.
What you see in the screenshot below is just a tiny bit from a very interesting discussion happening today on the repo:
So, instead of mining a token that you will spend in order to create an account, you will now generate an "egg", that will be "hatched" into an account via a different process. Each PoW reward will be then translated into this "egg", which means you can have many "chances" at creating new accounts, or many "eggs" waiting to be hatched (if I understand this correctly).
The conversation - albeit quite complicated even for the regular Steemit aficionado - is important because it establishes a new pattern and, as a witness, I think it's important to follow it.
Much of the information is just at the model stage, meaning this stuff may not even come to production, but the theoretical approach is fundamental not only for the security of the blockchain, but also for potential "bad moves" that can, or cannot be performed, by rogue witnesses.
What is basically happening right now is that the anonymous accounts generated by mining are laid out. What I understand:
- witnesses should not be allowed to control the "egg queue" in any way
- a throttle system should be put in place, limiting the rate at which new "eggs" can be hatched both related to time (per day) and to actor (per witness / regular account)
- under this system, a new account can be created for somebody else, in which case the owner and active keys of the newly created account must be invisible to anyone except to the owner of the newly created account (much more complicated than it sounds)
As you can see, this is difficult stuff. It's the kind of stuff that happens 90% of the time behind the curtain made of pompous statements and marketing campaigns and which actually keeps the entire cards castle from falling down.
I will follow this conversation closely and update if there is some new consistent development on it.
I'm a serial entrepreneur, blogger and ultrarunner. You can find me mainly on my blog at Dragos Roua where I write about productivity, business, relationships and running. Here on Steemit you may stay updated by following me @dragosroua.
https://steemit.com/~witnesses
If you're new to Steemit, you may find these articles relevant (that's also part of my witness activity to support new members of the platform):
SAME AS CLASH OF KINGS GAME, YOU HATCH A DRAGON EGG FOR 21 DAYS AND THEN IT NEEDS ANOTHER 3 MONTHS THEN AFTER THAT YOU GET RED DRAGON...
OK, WHEN MY EGGS ARE HATCHING WHERE TO KEEP THE NEW HATCHED CHICKEN ? CAN I EAT THEM AFTER FEW WEEKS
never thought i would hatch eggs :-) But how you get an egg in the first place ? just like i do not understand the token.
You mine, just like you mine Bitcoin or Ethereum. But instead of being rewarded with a token, you get rewarded with an "egg", that you can choose to hatch later on into an account.
Well i think that this is a very wrong move and i will explain why...
We all want Steemit to grow as a platform and mainly this means to have more and more users that are active and add great value to it. But how we can attract new users if the process of making a new account is becoming harder as a process and honest to be even hard to understand.
I think making a new account (the sign up) should be a very easy and simple task to do at least if we want our platform to be the Reddit of the blockchain...
This is the clash of 2 paradigms: the one in which the user signs up for an account in a centralized entity and the one in which the user signs up for an account in a decentralized entity.
In the first case (Facebook, Twitter) the cost of acquisition is assumed by the platform owner, because the user is also the merchandise that gets sold. Also, there is no control that the user can exert in a centralized organization. So you will get a tons of incentives to join, because without you the platform itself has no business.
In the second case (Steemit) the user pays for being part of a decentralized organization, thus owning a stake in it and being part of the governance. This cost was supported by Steemit INC since the beginning, and it's still supported by it. But if we expect the kind of growth Reddit has, we need a different mechanism, simply because Steemit will run out of tokens to spend for users, hence, the mining workaround: you will be able to mine an account, starting with hardfork 20. The way Steem works as a blockchain, requires a specific Proof of Something in order to prevent abuse (it's a thing involving the concept of "bandwidth").
So, in a decentralized organization, where the user has control over his privacy and is part of the governance mechanism extra steps must be taken to ensure the fabric is solid and it doesn't allow for boo-boos. I salute this conversation and all the steps taken to prevent abuse.
Well explained and thanks a lot for the replay.
I read as well and i think even one of your blogs where was mention that starting with hardfork 20 (Velocity if i remember correct), we will be able to mine for an account... and i think this is a great move!
Do you know by any chance if mining will be limited just for mine an account or all the account will be able to mine?
Mining will be available only for creating new accounts. You won't be able to generate STEEM by mining, AFAIK.
Thanks for sharing the ongoings of github for us none github aficionado as always. Appreciate the time you take to share and to help break it down.
Interesting stuff! I wonder how open this is to abuse (I'm on an imaging abuse roll it seems).
I dollow u and i always vote your post
Keep posting
I like eggs
posted is very beautifull and usefull. thank you
Outstanding post and narrative. Thank you for sharing!