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posted by Fnord666 on Thursday March 15 2018, @04:59PM   Printer-friendly
from the blockchain-architecture dept.

"The blockchain method primarily used by those engaging in cryptocurrency transactions is a decentralized mechanism where all the information is stored in blocks, can be viewed and altered by registered users. In the case of Sierra Leone elections, allows the votes to be seen by voters who are registered within the system, in the public ledgers, but only allowed authorized persons to make any changes, this, in turn, prevents the chances of fraud since the voting information is available to all the blockchain users."

URL: https://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Sierra-Leone-Announces-Run-Off-Elections-Becomes-First-Country-With-Blockchain-Powered-Elections-20180314-0013.html

I would personally like it if they would explain the mechanics of their so-called "blockchain" to us mortals.

As I understand a blockchain, it is an extensible data structure that (when used in a bitcoin context) incorporates sequentially applied, recursively structured self-referential checksum mechanisms to counter efforts at tampering with the contents of the blocks; usually, via recursive encryption.

~childo


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  • (Score: 2) by insanumingenium on Thursday March 15 2018, @05:49PM (5 children)

    by insanumingenium (4824) on Thursday March 15 2018, @05:49PM (#653017) Journal
    I have done more than a little research on bitcoin's implementation in particular, and for the most part you have the nail on the head.

    Many users are already dropping maintaining their own copy of the blockchain in favor of third party wallets or reduced validation, it isn't absolutely necessary that every user maintains their own blockchain so much as it is important that most users agree on what is the current longest (and therefore largest proof of work) valid blockchain.

    Though I would add that given the small size of transactions, getting to truly gargantuan proportions will take a long time. Bitcoin is only to ~160GB so far, but it won't shrink without a major redesign.
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  • (Score: -1, Spam) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 15 2018, @05:54PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 15 2018, @05:54PM (#653021)

    A group of men was chatting near the entrance to an alleyway when they heard a woman screaming. They looked around and spotted a man on top of a woman in the alleyway next to them; he was beating and raping her. The group overheard the man say that he was doing this because the woman walked past him casually, and that he was going to let her off with a simple beating and violation. The men became furious.

    How could someone do something like this!? All the men in the group thought that. They could not - would not - let this injustice stand. They needed to stop this travesty, here and now! Finally, the men's anger exploded and they charged at the rapist and took him down.

    The rapist was viciously executed on the spot. His crime? Feminism. What sane person would let a woman who walked past a man casually off with a mere beating and raping? A feminist, that's who! As for the woman, she and her female family members were given the gift of beatings, rapings, and torture; their bloodcurdling screams continued for days before silence finally descended upon their wretched lives.

    Naturally, the group of men became celebrated as heroes in their community.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 15 2018, @05:59PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 15 2018, @05:59PM (#653026)

    As the other AC pointed out, you can run Bitcoin in pruning mode, which saves a lot of space.

  • (Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Friday March 16 2018, @12:42AM (2 children)

    by fyngyrz (6567) on Friday March 16 2018, @12:42AM (#653210) Journal

    Bitcoin is only to ~160GB so far

    But it only accounts for a tiny, tiny fraction of currency transactions that go on in the world. For it to become practical as a non-niche mechanism, is has to scale up enormously.

    Elections probably aren't so bad, though.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 16 2018, @01:33AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 16 2018, @01:33AM (#653258)

      The Bitcoin blockchain should be used to settle a snapshot of the world's transaction history.

      The actual transactions should take place "off-chain", by other means, such as the decentralized Lightening Network.

      It's not helpful to be able to verify your coffee purchase for all time; however, it is helpful to be able to verify the coffee purchases of 1 million people, etc.

      Furthermore, "off-chain" solutions will improve privacy: An individual's transaction history is obscured, because only the aggregate is ultimately stored for all time in the blockchain.

    • (Score: 2) by insanumingenium on Friday March 16 2018, @03:44PM

      by insanumingenium (4824) on Friday March 16 2018, @03:44PM (#653633) Journal

      That was precisely my point, I was agreeing with the above comment that blockchain size is an issue. I added the line about the fact that we are only to 160GB to show that even the most used and abused crypto the world has ever seen has a blockchain that fits in a SD card. Obviously scaling is important, but bitcoin is orders of magnitude from being truly unmanageable yet, and it already inconveniently large.