Dash, nor any of its subcomponents, can allow Censorship of any kind.

[TheNetworkIsBiggerThanYou]

Platform should not be used as a marketplace for contract killings, terrorism and child pornography (and other things at this level).

No one gets to choose what dash platform is used for besides the people who use it. This is what makes Dash interesting and relevant. Dash as a token is interesting because no one can tell you what to do with it. That's the value proposition. Unconfiscatable money.

If Dash is going to store data it has to also do it in an unconfiscatable way. If you can censor and confiscate some things on the network then you are able to confiscate all the things on the network. In other words you are asking a trustless network for trust. Dash becomes worse than ripple.

Don't even pursue the idea of having black lists or special partially censored MNs. Don't open that pandoras box and normalize censorship in Dash. Application filtering modules for all honest good people is enough. You can build these tools and feel ok about yourself on a moral level. But things are getting crazy in this world. The idea that you would put into the hands of the MNOs the burden of deciding what to censor or not censor would be dangerous. Physically dangerous in that you'd become targets of warring gangs and network states at risk of censorship. The network is neutral. It is the plumbing. It provides a service to anyone who owns Dash. All the rest is up to the app developers.

Let's suppose Dash suicides itself in the name of anti-terrorist, anti-killing, and anti-child porn censorship, will the Dash DAO have been successful in stopping these awful things in any perceptible way? I highly doubt it. We won't be winning any Nobel Prizes for our philanthropic contributions.

That is, unless Dash succeeds at becoming the anti-CBDC. If Dash can remain trustless, decentralized, and permissionless it is one of literally only a handful of possible selections. The upside is extraordinarily massive. Then maybe we'll get our Peace Prizes after World 3 winds down.

There can not be a tool that exists, latent or otherwise, in the Dash Platform design that allows censorship to occur. It creates more risk. It's not pracitcal. It destroys the value proposition of Dash, weakens its brand, and likely crushes the community that has endured hell for this project. To suicide dash merely as an appeasment gesture is totally backwards.

We've discussed the more convincing legal and ethical routes of application layer moderation, censorship etc. That is the play. There can really be no other discussion about this. I realize the irony of this as I've been instructed by you to do that very thing and open up discussion about the unimaginable. If you threaten leaving again and want to be conscientious or whatever, do it now. Many people have also invested their lives into this. If you can't, that's a shame, but the network can do this.

 

[TheNetworkIsBiggerThanYou]

[Note after re-reading this]. Despite the intense tone, I admire Sam. He is brilliant and well intentioned as far as I can tell. I certainly don't have ill will directed at him personally.

Despite Demo being ouuuuut there. He is right. If Dash grows to become a threat or pressured, the developers of Dash will need to go anonymous. It should be embraced as a sign of the network hardening. The DAO certainly doesn't care. And imagining the DAO after having platform upgraded functionality is tremendously exciting.

If Dash platform (without censorship) gets pulled off, Sam and the rest of DCG past and present will very much be worthy of glory.

 

[stan.distortion]

Amen to that!

Those are values that brought crypto into being but a question worth bringing up is traceability. We accept it, being able to follow a coin all the way back to creation if a fundamental component, a basis of trust. Does the same apply to stored data? It probably does, much of that data could need traceability and that's proven an adequate tool for law enforcement etc. so far.

That's not a bad thing imo, a lot of real scumbags are doing time thanks to it but it can also be used to land a retrospective tax bill on anyone who's left a paper trail. It's probably a moot point, coinjoin services are only going to improve as crypto grows.

 

[qwizzie]

For those wondering where this topic is coming from : it is coming from the 'Should Platform run on all nodes or should Platform run only on High Performance nodes' thread. And i think this post of Quantum Explorer (and a few of his later posts) triggered the censorship discussion :

Source : https://www.dash.org/forum/threads/...h-performance-nodes.53374/page-18#post-232783

Source : https://www.dash.org/forum/threads/...h-performance-nodes.53374/page-19#post-232798

The first comment shows a certain degree of willingness towards censorship among developers (no matter the noble reasons behind this), the second comment does not rule out that in case of having a 4K HPM or 10K HPM solution voted in, DCG could end up deciding to place the voting on what types of content can be stored on Platform in the hands of those small groups of HPM's (estimated 450 nodes in case of 4K HPM / 180 nodes in case of 10K HPM).

Which is concerning by itself, as that is not only centralization with regards to the Platform network (node numbers) but also centralization with regards to voting on what type of content can be stored on Platform. It could end up being just a few whales deciding this (specially in the case of 10K HPM).

So the bottomline is that we now have to worry about centralization of the Platform network, possible centralization about what types of content can be stored on Platform (depending on which start option for Platform is voted in) and possible censorship of content on Platform in general.

 

[TheNetworkIsBiggerThanYou]

yeah i think there cannot be a vote on any of the platform options until this censorship specter is taken off the table

 

[kot]

yep. No one blames Oracle for storing e.g child porn or criminal data in Oracle-produced databases. And they don’t care about the content - they are in storage business and produce databases.
If a criminal robs a bank and escapes in aFord car, with a trunk filled with bags of banknotes, no one blames Ford company for the robbery.
Platform should follow the same pattern. Just clearly state what the platform is and put appropriate disclaimers in the t&c.
You can literally copy-paste what Oracle uses.

 

[xkcd]

I agree, there can be no censorship in Platform, if the devs don't have the stones to code an open system that can be used in anyway possible, then they better code it up so it is impossible to store large amounts of arbitrary data.

 

[GrandMasterDash]

Of course I agree but the problem is, we have a governance system that will force our hands. Imagine the FBI submitting a proposal "asking" for the removal of content. And imagine the content as being undeniably immoral. I could easily imagine an overwhelming Yes vote, and my evidence is previous proposals for Dash Iran. Some may say conjecture but the word was, it was due to US sanctions and most MNOs didn't have the balls to defy, or not enough anonymity.

One day we might face the question of dismantling the current governance system until we can guarantee anonymity. But then, I can't imagine that happening either.

 

[TheNetworkIsBiggerThanYou]

Of course I agree but the problem is, we have a governance system that will force our hands. Imagine the FBI submitting a proposal "asking" for the removal of content. And imagine the content as being undeniably immoral. I could easily imagine an overwhelming Yes vote, and my evidence is previous proposals for Dash Iran. Some may say conjecture but the word was, it was due to US sanctions and most MNOs didn't have the balls to defy, or not enough anonymity.

One day we might face the question of dismantling the current governance system until we can guarantee anonymity. But then, I can't imagine that happening either.

you can't vote code into existence. If the system is incapable of censorship than the vote would be meaningless.

 

[GrandMasterDash]

you can't vote code into existence. If the system is incapable of censorship than the vote would be meaningless.

We will see then. I'm more than sure MNOs are weak enough to vote for censorship and there are plenty of Sams in the world to appease authority.

 

[qwizzie]

Source : https://www.dash.org/forum/threads/...h-performance-nodes.53374/page-22#post-232932

In case of DCG indeed deciding in the nearby future that only 10K HPM or 4K HPM can vote on what types of content gets stored on Platform :

23 individuals 10K HPM -> 60% voting majority -> only 14 individuals needed to determine what types of content gets stored on Platform
34 individuals 4K HPM -> 60% voting majority -> only 21 indivuals needed to determine what types of content gets stored on Platform

Another way of looking at this (most likely a more correct way) :

180 nodes 10K HPM -> 60% voting majority -> only 108 yes votes (or no votes) needed to determine what types of content gets stored on Platform
450 nodes 4K HPM -> 60% voting majority -> only 270 yes votes (or no votes) needed to determine what types of content gets stored on Platform

 

[vazaki3]

View attachment 11497

Source : https://www.dash.org/forum/threads/...h-performance-nodes.53374/page-22#post-232932

In case of DCG indeed deciding in the nearby future that only 10K HPM or 4K HPM can vote on what types of content gets stored on Platform :

23 individuals 10K HPM -> 60% voting majority -> only 14 individuals needed to determine what types of content gets stored on Platform
34 individuals 4K HPM -> 60% voting majority -> only 21 indivuals needed to determine what types of content gets stored on Platform

Another way of looking at this (most likely a more correct way) :

180 nodes 10K HPM -> 60% voting majority -> only 108 yes votes (or no votes) needed to determine what types of content gets stored on Platform
450 nodes 4K HPM -> 60% voting majority -> only 270 yes votes (or no votes) needed to determine what types of content gets stored on Platform

You are wrong.
Look at the following table, and redo your calculations for the 10k case. The same for the 4k, you will get the table here.

Row	Name	Node(s)	Technique	Votes?	Date created
1	binance	270	Manual	No	-
2	weejohnny	229	Manual,Blockchain,TemporalAnalysis	Yes	-
3	bluewhale	128	Manual	Yes	-
4	bottles	120	Manual	No	-
5	masterblaster	103	Manual,VoteHistory,TemporalAnalysis	Yes	-
6	august	089	Manual	No	-
7	spirit	082	Manual	Yes	-
8	crowdnode	072	Manual	Yes	-
9	gerry	052	Manual	No	-
10	genesis	042	Manual	Yes	-
11	tendies	034	Manual	Yes	-
12	randy	032	Manual	No	-
13	axe	027	Manual	Yes	-
14	BrazHelpAllo	026	Automatic	Yes	Sun Feb 27 02:05:54 PM UTC 2022
15	toby	025	Manual	No	-
16	DIFSHelpMall	024	Automatic	Yes	Sun Feb 27 02:05:54 PM UTC 2022
17	xnx1v	023	Manual	No	-
18	strider	022	Manual	No	-
19	euvo	019	Manual	Yes	-
20	incuplatElec	015	Automatic	Yes	Sun Feb 27 02:05:54 PM UTC 2022
21	grower	014	Manual	No	-
22	coloBrazElec	011	Automatic	Yes	Wed Mar 9 01:26:33 PM UTC 2022
23	barny	010	Manual	Yes	-

 

[qwizzie]

The top 5 whales have much higher Nodes, which is why the individuals with regards to 60% voting majority is incorrect in my calculation ?
But what about the number of nodes that DCG estimated for 10K HPM and 4K HPM (180 nodes and 450 nodes), are the necessary votes (yes / no) for a 60% voting majority that i calculated, also wrong ?

Or is the last part correct ?

180 nodes 10K HPM -> 60% voting majority -> only 108 yes votes (or no votes) needed to determine what types of content gets stored on Platform
450 nodes 4K HPM -> 60% voting majority -> only 270 yes votes (or no votes) needed to determine what types of content gets stored on Platform

 

[vazaki3]

The top 5 whales have much higher Nodes, which is why the individuals with regards to 60% voting majority is incorrect in my calculation ?

Yes. In order to calculate correctly, you have to take into account the number of nodes/votes that every individual holds. How the votes are distributed? Is it gaussian distribution? Is it smth else? If you manage to simulate the distribution, you can make predictions for the future. Unfortunately mnowatch does not preserve the history of the clusters table, so either you ask me or @xkcd to develop it, or you take snapshots of it regularly. But initially, and in order to make things easier, assume that the distribution will always remain as shown, so after assuming this you can proceed in your calculations.

Also how many masternodes the above table shows? You have to calculate it also. Do the sum.....

But what about the Nodes that DCG estimated for 10K HPM and 4K HPM (180 and 450), are the necessary votes (yes / no) for a 60% majority also wrong ?

The DCG estimation was based on an old mnowatch table. The table above is the latest.

 

[qwizzie]

For 10K and according mnowatch.org table for whales with 10 nodes or more, i calculate 138 nodes (not DCG estimated 180 nodes)

10 : 1
11 : 1
14 : 1
15 : 1
19 : 1 (5x1 =5)
22 : 2
23 : 2
24 : 2
25 : 2
26 : 2
27 : 2 (6x2 = 12)
32 : 3
34 : 3 (2x3 = 6)
42 : 4
52 : 5
72 : 7
82 : 8
89 : 8
103 : 10
120 : 12
128 : 12
229 : 22
270 : 27

Source : https://www.dash.org/forum/threads/...low-censorship-of-any-kind.53410/#post-232944

 

[vazaki3]

For 10K and according mnowatch.org table for whales with 10 nodes or more, i calculate 138 nodes (not DCG estimated 180 nodes)

10 : 1
11 : 1
14 : 1
15 : 1
19 : 1 (5x1 =5)
22 : 2
23 : 2
24 : 2
25 : 2
26 : 2
27 : 2 (6x2 = 12)
32 : 3
34 : 3 (2x3 = 6)
42 : 4
52 : 5
72 : 7
82 : 8
89 : 8
103 : 10
120 : 12
128 : 12
229 : 22
270 : 27

Source : https://www.dash.org/forum/threads/...low-censorship-of-any-kind.53410/#post-232944

So 5 individuals control the 60% of the voting majority and can censor the database.

Row	Name	Node(s)	Technique	Votes?	Date created
1	binance	270	Manual	No	-
2	weejohnny	229	Manual,Blockchain,TemporalAnalysis	Yes	-
3	bluewhale	128	Manual	Yes	-
4	bottles	120	Manual	No	-
5	masterblaster	103	Manual,VoteHistory,TemporalAnalysis	Yes	-

Correct?

 

[qwizzie]

Yep : 138 nodes 10K HPM -> 60% voting majority -> only 83 yes votes (or no votes) needed to determine what types of content gets stored on Platform.
Which happens to be precisely what the last 5 whales (with the most nodes) have combined.

103 : 10
120 : 12
128 : 12
229 : 22
270 : 27

 

[vazaki3]

5 individuals can censor the Database. Is this what we want?

And what about the agents?
How difficult is for them to contact the 5 individuals, and force them to censor?
This last question is the most important one.

 

[Bridgewater]

looks like HPMN will be a boon for mnowatch. It'll have more data to confirm its cluster guesses. We may even see some HP collaterals created from inputs of multiple "individuals" posing as standalone clusters.
And formerly non-correlated 1K individual nodes can now be identified as 10K clusters if they combine to form a HPMN.

 

[Bridgewater]

Fear of being identified by mnowatch as a multi-MN operator might already be a cause of low voter turnout. I guess that chilling effect would also extend to HPMN participation too, unfortunately.