From 1d81549408364fb378c9e3476dd33c68b976beb9 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Christian Grothoff Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2016 12:45:55 +0200 Subject: editing section 2 --- articles/ui/ui.tex | 21 +++++++++++---------- 1 file changed, 11 insertions(+), 10 deletions(-) (limited to 'articles/ui/ui.tex') diff --git a/articles/ui/ui.tex b/articles/ui/ui.tex index 18f7e8341..d6828ab95 100644 --- a/articles/ui/ui.tex +++ b/articles/ui/ui.tex @@ -361,15 +361,16 @@ The information in the global public ledger allows everybody to compute the balances in all accounts and to see all transactions. Transactions are denominated in a new currency labeled BTC, whose valuation depends upon {\em speculation}, as there is no authority -that could act to stabilize exchange rates. Adding transactions to +that could act to stabilize exchange rates or force anyone to +accept BTC as {\em legal tender} to settle obligations. Adding transactions to the global public ledger involves broadcasting the transaction data, peers verifying and appending it to the public ledger, and some peer in the network solving a moderately hard computational proof-of-work puzzle, which is called {\em mining}. The mining process is incentivised by a combination of transaction -fees and mining rewards. The latter process also provides primitive -accumulation~\cite{primitiveacc} for BTC.~\cite{nakamoto2008bitcoin} +fees and mining rewards~\cite{nakamoto2008bitcoin}. The latter +process also provides primitive accumulation~\cite{primitiveacc} for BTC. Conversion to BTC from other currencies and vice versa incurs substantial fees~\cite{BTCfees}. There is now an extreme diversity of Bitcoin-related payment technologies, but usability improvements are @@ -385,7 +386,7 @@ possibly include additional metadata to be associated with the transfer and embedded into the global public ledger. The wallet application would then transmit the request to the Bitcoin peer-to-peer overlay network. The use of an external payment -application makes wallet-based payments significantly less +application makes payments significantly less browser-friendly than ordinary card payments, as illustrated in Figure~\ref{fig:bitcoin}. This has led to the development of browser-based @@ -408,8 +409,8 @@ resources to keep this value high. According to~\cite{vice_btc_unsustainable}, a single Bitcoin transaction uses roughly enough electricity to power 1.57 American households for a day. These costs are largely hidden by speculation in BTC, -but that speculation itself contributes to BTC being -unstable.~\cite{jeffries_economists_v_btc,lehmann_btc_fools_gold,lewis_btc_is_junk}. % exacerbating risk +but that speculation itself contributes to BTC's valuation being +volatile.~\cite{jeffries_economists_v_btc,lehmann_btc_fools_gold,lewis_btc_is_junk}. % exacerbating risk % fees hit you 2-3 times with currency conversions % more on massive transaction fees from blockchain.info @@ -417,7 +418,7 @@ unstable.~\cite{jeffries_economists_v_btc,lehmann_btc_fools_gold,lewis_btc_is_ju Bitcoin's pseudononymity applies equally to both customers and merchants, which makes Bitcoin amen\-able to tax evasion, money laundering, and sales of contraband. As a result, anonymity tools -like mixnets do not enjoy particularly widespread support in the +like mixnets do not enjoy widespread support in the Bitcoin community where many participants seek to make the currency appear more legitimate. While Bitcoin's transactions are difficult to track, there are several examples of Bitcoin's pseudononymity being @@ -426,7 +427,7 @@ the development of new protocols with better privacy protections. \begin{figure*}[t!] \includegraphics[width=\textwidth]{figs/paypal.pdf} -\caption{Payment processing with Paypal. (From: W3C Web Payments IG.)} +\caption{Payment processing with PayPal. (From: W3C Web Payments IG.)} \label{fig:paypal} \end{figure*} @@ -434,7 +435,7 @@ Zerocoin \cite{miers2013zerocoin} is such an extension of Bitcoin: It affords protection against linkability of transactions, but at non-trivial additional computational costs even for spending coins. This currently makes using Zerocoin unattractive -for payments, espcially with mobile devices. +for payments, especially with mobile devices. Bitcoin also faces serious scalability limitations, with the classic implementation being limited to at most 7 transactions per second @@ -446,7 +447,7 @@ Amongst these, the Blind Off-chain Lightweight Transactions (BOLT) proposal~\cite{BOLT} provides anonymity by routing off-blockchain transfers through bank-like intermediaries. Although interesting, there are numerous seemingly fragile aspects of the BOLT protocol, -including aborts deanonymizing customers, intermetdiaries risking +including aborts deanonymizing customers, intermediaries risking unlimited losses, and theft if a party fails to post a refute message in a timely fashion. % Of course, Taler itself could be used to provide a side-chain like technology -- cgit v1.2.3