Fungibility Talk

Autonomi Network Token (incl (e)MAID)
41

Imo, this is why they are non-fungible or at best only pseudo-fungible,

But this is not what it means to be fungible. USD are ALSO completely trackable. Banks and governments can tell where USD has changed hands using serial number tracking. Fungbility is about units of currency, not about who accepts them or tracks them. You must read and understand the definition of the word to understand why this position is in error.

The history DOES NOT matter from the POV of fungibility. Fungibility does NOT demand non-uniqueness, it demands EQUAL INTERCHANGEABILITY! These are NOT the same thing! Every dollar bill has a different serial number. So I ask again, for the third time, do you contend that USD are not fungible? If you answer yes then I contend that you do NOT understand what the meaning of the word is!

Fungibility has nothing to do with acceptance and having a history does NOT remove fungibility. It would only be the case if having a history allowed others to prevent you from using your BTC. But they cannot! They can only say we will not accept. But this doesn’t do anything to your coins! Just like a laundromat not accepting dollars doesn’t mean that USD are not fungible. Finally, Coinjoin COMPLETELY removes the history of coin, so EVEN if you were correct it would be a moot point!

There appears to be a widespread misunderstanding of what fungibility is, how it is attained and maintained. This is why I posted because I’m glad to help you all understand this better and clear up the confusion that the XMR community is spreading to give their coin more users. You do not benefit at all by believing and adopting false ideas and misused definitions for their benefit.

42

You are increasingly talking nonsense IMO.

If you cannot respond civilly without ad hominem attacks then you lose the debate @happybeing. I do not mind winning this way. Of course you have no obligation to continue responding, that is your prerogative. But if you refuse to do so then you are forfeiting the debate you entered with me, which means you lose. I therefore accept this as your admission of defeat, thank you for participating!

And as I’ve explained, even with your whimsical definition of fungibility, Coinjoin and the way UTXO cryptocurrencies operate completely remove the “practical implications” you refer to. NOBODY KNOWS who owns what coins in a UTXO cryptocurrency! This isn’t like ETH with user accounts etc. You have NO WAY of knowing who owns what bitcoin, or what they’ve done with it therefore your “practical implications” are non-functional, and you become the one who speaks nonsense!

I have not ignored anything you’ve said @happybeing, and I’m disappointed that you are now misrepresenting the debate. Although this behavior is commonly engaged in by losing sides when there are not impartial moderators, you must be made aware of the fact that this also means you lose. Again, I am accepting your reply as your admission of defeat and thank you for your participation and making your position known to me.

Freedom to transact IS NOT AFFECTED BY COIN HISTORY AND MONERO DOESN’T GET AROUND THIS! If someone is blacklisting addresses then they CAN ALSO BLACKLIST ALL MONERO COINS! You are NOT helping your case with this line of reasoning.

You should NOT be comfortable using an INCORRECT defintion, as a fellow programmer you should be well aware that definitions are EXTREMELY important in languages and misusing them is bad behavior!

43

By your own explanation, I could only possibly have 1 flawed response :wink:

The point you are making seems to be that the observable token history is irrelevant. But that is simply not practically possible is it.

There is no point in debating semantics - I have long debated people about the definition of capitalism, but words get in the way of the practical realities underneath. If there was another existing word that expressed the idea of having a token with no history that was more apt than ‘fungibility’, then this topic would be so named.

But back to the real debate here. Does history matter? You say no, because you can always find some sucker to take tokens that some others won’t take because the history of the tokens is morally repugnant to powerful people who can enforce a ban. Clearly though, that ‘ban’ limits usability.

You point out that if there was the no ability to censor via history, then they’d simply censor the entire token type. However there are defi exchanges that they cannot enforce such bans upon and these seem to be the future. You may argue that if so, then the ban on individual tokens based on history is also irrelevant … but this is not so. If you are caught in possession of these tokens you might also fall under their ax and you will still find it difficult to transact in jurisdictions these censors control as many people won’t want to risk taking them. Such risks likely decrease the value of the token.

Much of this is speculative economics on both sides of the arguments, so not really a point of debate, just your opinion versus mine.

But there is a clear distinction between coins that have a history and those that don’t. You can say that what such should be called isn’t ‘fungibility’ … but that is simply semantics.

So I see no further point in this discussion. You believe what you believe and I believe what I believe.

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44

By your own explanation, I could only possibly have 1 flawed response

I don’t understand this, can you elaborate further please?

The point you are making seems to be that the observable token history is irrelevant. But that is simply not practically possible is it.

It must be. USD all have history. And the history for UTXO coins is not tied to anyone. And anyway, coinjoin completely removes this history! So there are three reasons why your position is wrong.

It is not semantics! The definition of fungibility does not presuppose a nonexistent transaction history. And even if it did, coinjoin completely removes this history so even by your definition UTXO coins that have been coinjoined must be fungible!

You say no, because you can always find some sucker to take tokens that some others won’t take because the history of the tokens is morally repugnant to powerful people who can enforce a ban.

This is a complete misrepresentation of my position. History doesn’t matter because UTXO coins are psuedonymous! That means there is no identifying information tied to an address! Neither receiver nor sender! Which means its impossible to generally track coins! Also, history doesn’t matter because standard usage of UTXO coins since around 2013 or so has been to never reuse addresses! And the third reason is because coinjoin exists and coinjoin completely removes a coin’s history!

These are my arguments, please respond to them only and do not put words in my mouth! That will make the debate much smoother.

You point out that if there was the no ability to censor via history, then they’d simply censor the entire token type.

This is true! Monero does not solve this issue since anyone that bans addresses can ban coins! XMR is the least accepted cryptocurrency out of any of the majors! It is not accepted at more than a couple hundred real life stores. DASH and BTC fore example are both accepted at over 10,000 stores. Over 140,000 stores globally accept DASH in fact! Which means that XMR does not solve the problem.

If you are caught in possession of these tokens you might also fall under their ax and you will still find it difficult to transact in jurisdictions these censors control as many people won’t want to risk taking them

Once again, any fud that you can come up with against UTXO coins must equally apply to XMR, there’s no way around this! Removing the history via encryption doesn’t force people to accept XMR and not blacklist it! Your position is illogical.

Much of this is speculative economics on both sides of the arguments, so not really a point of debate, just your opinion versus mine.

There is nothing speculative about my position, nor are my arguments particularly economically based. My argument is quite simple: the XMR community is misrepresenting fungibility in order to gain an unjustly obtained and undeserved position in the space. UTXO coins are not tied to any person’s identity and thus any tracking is completely voluntary (both sender and receiver have to doxx themselves for it to work). Also XMR doesn’t get around selective censorship so the point is moot! Neither of these arguments are speculative nor economic but cryptographic and fundamental.

But there is a clear distinction between coins that have a history and those that don’t. You can say that what such should be called isn’t ‘fungibility’ … but that is simply semantics.

Coinjoined coins have no transaction history nor transaction graph so this point is completely moot!

So I see no further point in this discussion. You believe what you believe and I believe what I believe.

I accept this as your admission of defeat in this debate. Thank you for participating and enjoy the holiday weekend!

45

I believe you are correct but something by definition vs our reality is where I will side with our reality. The fact is that you are right, even cash is dying which makes something like SNT that much more necessary. Bitcoin is fantastic in so many ways but if some coins can be banned or blocked, or Monero completely blocked from exchanges, cash not accepted at some stores it just proves that no currency is completely unaffected by this blacklisting/perceived fungibility issue.

On these networks the tokens are still fungible but given the transparent nature anyone receiving such “tainted” coins could come to a similar conclusion as an exchange.

On Safe Network the token lacks that link ability do those judgements cannot be made, besides perhaps the judgement against privacy preservation itself, in which people will just not use it. Given the network and SafeIDs/users will be as anonymous as one wishes then people should feel more free to use this base utility token as a digital cash and accept it freely as well.

Safe Network token will just like these chains be perfectly fungible to the network itself but lack of link ability and utility in a decentralized data and communication network that values data sovereignty and privacy means there are many alignments with one’s self interest for personal freedom.

So technically or in practice is the main difference I see here.

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46

That’s only true if you intentionally preserve that pseudoanonimity. Pretty sure IP addresses are part of outputs and if you happen to have coins touch other wallets you use to off or onboard, etc then you’ve revealed quite a lot.

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47

I thank you for your reply and insight! I am of the same opinion. The blacklisting issue is important to possibly deal with because governments and businesses can choose to enforce certain standards. But that doesn’t mean anything about fungibility and XMR doesn’t solve the issue either way.

Part of the reason why I stuck around the Safe community is the possibility that the radical ideas behind its development and deployment would force the hand of these entities due to SafeIDs and the like.

Thanks again and I appreciate your insight!

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48

This is a very good point; however, UTXO coins like DASH have since years now implemented bloom filters which obfuscate IP/full node interactions. So your full node wallet connects to the network in an anonymized fashion that allows you to verify your transactions without revealing your IP address or other identifying information. This is actually a legitimate concern with my position and I thank you for bringing it to the discussion.

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49

I’d say it’s a step further in a better direction, again for practical reasons but XMR is just a payment network really and if those payments are excluded from a larger system (CEX and e-commerce) I think that is problematic. Why I think it is different for Safe Network is because it is a full ecosystem unto itself. Storage, communication, security, obviously apps and e-commerce or anything else can and will accept this more private and unlinkable native utility token (SNT or whatever it gets called) which lends to the case for broader acceptance and adoption.

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50

Yeah Dash basically adopted a TOR like approach with its Master nodes which was a very cool default to have. Have they been blacklisted? Obviously XMR was the winner amongst other ‘unsavory’ markets so there must be something to say about that.

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51

I’m not arguing about XMR - you are misrepresenting MY position. I’m arguing about the tokens that have an obervable history versus those that don’t … maybe the latter doesn’t exist yet, I don’t know, I think Monero is much harder to track that BTC, you seem to think they are practically identical, but I’m am very skeptical of that. However Safe Network tokens won’t have a traceable history.

You are free to believe the sky is brown. It makes little difference to me and you pointing out such is simply sophistry on your part.

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52

I’m arguing about the tokens that have an obervable history versus those that don’t

But XMR is the only coin that doesn’t have an “observable history” so you are in fact de facto arguing about XMR and I’m not misrepresenting anything in that case. Still, coinjoined coins do not have an observable history so even then your argument completely falls apart.

I think Monero is much harder to track that BTC

This is actually most hype. XMR’s privacy doesn’t work very well according to my research on the matter. Just recently there was something delineated called the OSPEAD attack which allows statistical heuristic analysis to deanon spends even though there is no transaction graph. You can read about it from the XMR community themselves here:

Developer of OSPEAD here. AMA

I’ll just quote a summary for ease of reading:

What I’m saying here is: (1) Fix the statistical issues of ring signatures to the maximum possible extent, or (2) accept that user privacy will be compromised, or (3) move to a completely different model. You may be interested in some recent discussions in #monero-community IRC/Matrix regarding the feasibility and advisability of doing (3) eventually. Meanwhile, I am working on (1). To me, (2) is unacceptable.

Once again, that is the researcher who developed the statistical tools to elucidate the attack on the XMR network, which XMR is uniquely vulnerable to.

This attack was first documented about 7 months ago and has not been fixed. Do note however that it has been possible ever since XMR was released, it just hasn’t been detailed until recently. This is why its so important to get definitions, terms and research RIGHT. Because if you don’t you leave yourself vulnerable to bandaid solutions that don’t do what they say on the tin.

You are free to believe the sky is brown. It makes little difference to me and you pointing out such is simply sophistry on your part.

Actually it is not a belief. Debates have rules, and its kind of like a fistfight. I don’t need you to acknowledge that you have lost in order to defeat you. Proving that you cannot adequately reply is sufficient. It is not a matter of belief at all and there is no sophistry present, at least from my side. Once again I thank you for your participation.

53

See my reply down below, XMR suffers from quite a few bugs that actually completely remove its privacy protection. Basically, XMR was not developed with statistical heuristics in mind and these hueristics allow a determined actor to completely deanon users.

Because of the relatively weak privacy guarantees that XMR provides, limited anonymity set due to low ring size, it is possible to reverse transaction privacy even without a transaction history. The ring size would need to be around 10,000 to prevent this attack (its currently only 11, soon to be 16). Coinjoin that is done well like DASH is impossible to use this attack on because of the large anonymity set.

See this link for the research: Developer of OSPEAD here. AMA

54

This is how I define it.

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55

Nope, not according to my research. The masternode infrastructure is rather unique and interesting. Basically, they’re just full nodes like in other UTXO coins; however, they have two differences from other coins.

  1. They must both prove ownership over 1000 DASH as well as service to the network (performing predetermined tasks) continuously
  2. They receive a portion of the block reward like miners do for their service

Because of these conditions, DASH full nodes can be entrusted with tasks that other coins can’t use their full nodes for because there would be no way to prove they’re not malicious. Full nodes in other coins are run by volunteers which means they can be spun up ad infinitum with little to no cost. A DASH masternode costs around $100,000 by contrast and represents considerable skin in the game.

In fact, I would almost recommend the Safe Network Developers to set up a few masternodes of their own if they have the cash, in order to recieve a consistent and steady stream of funds. 1 Masternode pays between 6 and 8% per annum, which is roughly $6-8,000 of low effort money, since the computer does all the work after you set it up.

This is called by the DASH community “Proof of Service” and it basically guarantees in a sybil resistant manner that these full nodes not only have skin in the game, but also that they are servicing the network and behaving as good actors. There is a parallel to the Safe architecture in here somewhere, but I’m not as familiar as I once was with Safe’s infrastructure details.

Anyway, this allows them to perform transaction locking instantly and prevent doublespends even before a transaction is included in the next block. What’s more, this allows them to do something called Chainlocks, which makes the blockstate immutable and makes DASH the first and only proof of work cryptocurrency to be completely immune to 51% attacks! That’s right, DASH is more secure than Bitcoin even though they have far less energy invested in mining.

It also allows them to perform coinjoin in a completely decentralized and trustless manner, noncustodially! There are over 4200 masternodes from my last check and these are randomly selected to also randomly select other participants to facilitate a mix. It really is quite impressive.

For comparison, ZEC, another major privacy coin only has 300 full nodes. I believe XMR only has around 900 or so. Bitcoin Cash has only around 1500 nodes at my last count. So DASH, by providing incentives for running a full node is able to outstrip other major coins in node implementation and provide decentralized coinjoin services at the protocol level! This is second only to Maidsafe in utility and cleverness in development imo.

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56

I’d say this is a very good definition. Because Bitcoin and other UTXO coins are protocols, so long as the protocol itself doesn’t limit interchangeability, I contend that they completely fulfill this definition. Exchanges and businesses have no say on whether or not you can use your Bitcoin interchangeably, so that shouldn’t factor into the discussion. Just like your local laundromat rejecting bills and only accepting coins doesn’t make US dollars any less fungible. Agree or disagree?

57

Straw man argument - logical fallacy.

And you choose ones that serve your position. You aren’t actually listening to others arguments and keep repeating your and using fallacious logic to do so.

It’s clear you aren’t hear to get closer to the truth, just to bully others to accept yours. I’m blocking you now. Good luck with your “fake debate”

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58

How is it a straw man? It is the exact same scenario. A business or rather large group of businesses deliberately choose not to accept US Dollars. Yet everyone agrees that US Dollars are fungible. Its the same thing and I challenge you to prove your assertion that this argument is a strawman.

You aren’t actually listening to others arguments and keep repeating your and using fallacious logic to do so.

This isn’t correct and represents the third or fourth time that you have made unsourced accusations against me.

Every reply I make is in direct contention to those I debate, including you. Just because you dislike and cannot reply to my responses does not mean I’m not listening to your arguments and it is disingenuous for you to say so.

Being dishonest in debates is an automatic loss in any real debate so you solidify that you have been defeated here and I appreciate you giving me an easy win in this way, so thank you.

And you choose ones that serve your position

Which rules have I chosen? I haven’t chosen any rules these are standard rules for a debate. If you enter a debate and refuse to legitimately counter your opponent you automatically lose. I didn’t make that up and again, I challenge you to prove your assertion.

It’s clear you aren’t hear to get closer to the truth, just to bully others to accept yours. I’m blocking you now. Good luck with your “fake debate”

Running away from a debate with your tail between your legs is also an admission of loss, so once again I thank you both for admitting your defeat and for your participation. Sad to see you block me but most victories are not without cost so I begrudgingly accept. Enjoy your weekend!

59

Note, I am posting this in protest of the Moderator @JPL moving the discussion from the original thread to here.

If I wanted to post in this thread I would have and barring any violation of the rules (there were none) I believe it is a rather egregious and offensive action to forcibly move my comments based on the whim of a single OP (who is not a moderator nor has been given any right to dictate where others can and cannot post). In my opinion they have no right to do this.

My comments are all relevant to the original thread and are directly in contention to the original poster’s narrative. Also, the discussion was lively and enjoyed by multiple members with none expressing a desire or need for it to be moved elsewhere, aside from the OP. I’m also unaware of any rule allowing an OP to dictate who can or cannot reply to their thread, if I’ve overlooked such please point it out to me.

Incidentally, this is a tried and true tactic of censorship that the XMR community has been well-known to engage in in other debates across the internet. They move discussions, hide criticism and bribe/cajole moderators to take their side in debates by strictly or even directly misinterpreting the rules in their favor. These tactics are unfair, dishonest and implicate both the XMR community and the moderators who engage in them as being abusive and unfair as well as engaging in censorship.

Moving and hiding discussions are acts of censorship and are NOT befitting of a decentralized network that claims to be for freedom and freedom of speech.

Therefore, I formally protest this decision and request a moderator review of the action @dirvine, @anon40790172, @JPL, @jlpell, @neo, @Sascha

60

I agree with @JPL’s decision to comply with @danda’s request. The discussion is not helpful or that relevant to the purpose of the original topic, and can be linked to without undermining your arguments.

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