Who are Block Producer of EOS? For What and Why? Tell The Kevin from EOS New York.
Good day Kevin! Tell us what is EOS NewYork — what do you do?
Good day! EOS New York is a Block Producer candidate for the launched EOS mainnet in June. We are a group of diverse professionals spread across the Eastern United States and our goals are to never miss a block, and to always add value back into the EOS Network through a variety of ways.
What is necessary to become a validator?
To become a Block Producer you need to run the EOS.IO software and be elected by the community. The first part is easy, the second part is the difficult half 😊
Why EOS, why did you decide to become a Validator?
My Co-Founder, Rick Schlesinger, and I read the white paper back when it was released in June of 2017. We had been following Dan Larimer for a while through Bitshares and Steemit and knew he had the capability to build successful projects. EOS really looked to solve a lot of issues we felt were stopping cryptocurrency and blockchain technology from being adopted by the masses. It wasn’t until October that we started to seriously consider the idea of becoming a Block Producer. What was shocking to us was that no one was out there currently running. As we thought through what it would mean to become a block producer we realized that this could really be a way to make a positive impact on the world. It would be a way to have our work really matter and to enact positive change. It was at that point we decided to go all-in.
What is the configuration of your computers to support the EOS network? How much will it cost a month?
Below are our launch specifications from this article. These will very quickly change once the needs of the network increase. When one is a Block Producer one has to be efficient with the block rewards that fund your operation. For that reason we aren’t starting off with off-the-charts-high specs because it would be a waste to do it. We’re starting at a reasonable level and will quickly ramp up as necessary. As for costs, we are still sourcing vendors but likely under $20K USD for the first month.
Technical Specifications (Launch):
Block Producing Node
These specs are specifically for launch and are not intended to be long term. We do not estimate heavy use on the network for the first 30 days as private keys are imported and dApps begin to test in live environments. We will scale as necessary as network use increase. We could easily be running 10x the capacity but we value efficiency when it comes to block rewards.
Specifications
OS: Linux Distro
vCPU: 8
RAM: 256–512
Storage: 512GB SSD (blocks), 1TB HDD for IPFS
Network: 1 Gbps (and will scale up as necessary)
Location
In order to scale rapidly and stay agile in the fragile period immediately following launch we will be running our initial producing node in a cloud environment in North America. This environment will also allow us to do additional software and hardware testing which will be used to form the requirements for our future planned co-located and/or owned data center facility.
Security:
We plan on locking this node down using a variety of custom software stacks, built-in unix tools, and industry standards. As this is the flagship node, security is of the utmost importance. We also plan on working together with other block producers and various security professionals to produce a white paper on configuration and securing a producing node.
Non-Producing Node(s):
This node(s) will be a load balanced node(s) used by dApps/users to query the blockchain. These will be publicly reachable via the load balancing node. The idea is to separate and isolate the producing node as much as possible to ensure maximum uptime. The second responsibility of these nodes is to work as a backup to the producing node in case of a security compromise or software/network failure.
Specifications
OS: Linux Distro
vCPU: 8
RAM: 256–512
Storage: 512GB HDD (blocks), 1TB HDD for IPFS
Network: 1 Gbps (and will scale up as necessary)
Location
Resides in the same cloud region as the main block producing node.
Security
These boxes will be public facing so they will be less constrained than the BP node however connections to the BP node will be locked down in case of compromise.
Offsite Backup(s)
These node(s) will be additional standby nodes that are constantly syncing the chain. However, they will reside in different geographical and jurisdictional locations outside of the main Block Producing cloud and other non-producing nodes. These boxes will remain in the cloud however we will be using different providers to allow for handling the catastrophic failure of a specific cloud region or of a specific cloud-provider as a whole.
Specifications
OS: Linux Distro
vCPU: 8
RAM: 256–512
Storage: 512GB HDD (blocks), 1TB HDD for IPFS
Network: 1 Gbps (and will scale up as necessary)
Location
TBD. At least one will reside outside of North America and in other cloud providers than the main BP node.
Security
These boxes will be public facing so they will be less constrained than the BP node however connections to the BP node will be locked down in case of compromise.
You probably know EOS well. What are the advantages and disadvantages of EOS in your opinion? And who can be a competitor?
- Scalable to host real-world dApps
- Fee-less transactions
- On-chain governance, a constitution, and nested Ricardian contracts
- On-chain governance, a constitution, and nested Ricardian contracts
WASM and C++ are the chosen languages which grant access to a wealth of knowledge and established developers but also pave the way for a web based future. - Dan Larimer — he’s a proven visionary
- DPoS over PoS or Pow
- Human usability features such as: time-delayed transactions, account recovery, and human readable addresses.
I’m not aware of any competitors that are close to having a working product.
Disadvantages:
- Much is left to the community to figure out on their own.
Let’s talk more closely about the transaction system
Transactions are worthless. What is the point for producers to include my trance in a block? What does he lose if someone’s transitions are ignored?
This is a PoW mentality. Block Producers are not incentivized through transaction fees as there are none. Block Producers are paid through a portion of the 5% inflation that is built into the software. They only receive this block reward if they are voted in by the token-holder body. This way they are incentivized to behave else they lose their source of revenue.
Voting by each user generates a transaction? That is, the fact of a voice is fixed by a tranche. What prevents current nodes from simply accepting some of the votes for other nodes in order to remain producers? Even if they still get some reward for this.
-This is an interesting question. First, remember that transactions are only “ignored” if 15/21 Block Producers agree that it should be ignored so this is unlikely. If a group of Block producers ignored votes as transactions they’d surely be ousted as corrupt. If all else fails the chain would need to be forked. But again, why would they destory their own revenue source? Even if they are voted out they become a backup node which still can be profitable. Arbitration is also an available option to remove BPs
Do those who vote issue? Or do they vote purely out of a desire to improve the ecosystem?
Token holders are not paid for their votes but they are incentivized to vote. The actions of the block producers can affect the worth of the EOS token so if they vote badly or not at all it is a risk
What is the use of nodes to improve their computing power? Does it somehow affect their rewards?
All Block Producers are incentivized to continuously improve their network capacity because they are paid half through block rewards and half through the standby pool. The standby pool pays out to each node once a day based on the number of votes they have. The more votes the large the withdrawal.
About BFT. As I understand, producers can sign blocks, or they may not sign. If 15 nodes are signed, then the block is immediately considered to be valid and we can use it and do not wait for other blocks. Why nodam sign someone else’s block? Do they receive emissions for this?
The main reasons we can see for not signing a block is the time to process a transaction is too high or the transaction will use an exorbitant amount of a resource. Allowing BPs to determine this means they can optimze blocks to maximize transactions where possible. This will allow for higher TPS. Essentially large (resource) transactions can be made to wait for the betterment of the network. Incentiving good transaction etiquette will go a long way to making the network a better environment for all.
The BFT itself solves one of the main disadvantages of eos from the point of view of the White Pepper of the TON(TELEGRAM) (it is necessary to wait 45 seconds to consider the block to be valid) and, as I understand it, everything is positioned so that almost all the blocks will be signed by 15 nodes. But in order for the nodes to sign a block, they must check its transits, and therefore execute them. This means that in fact they all (at least) will do the same job and we do not have 21 nodes, but one and a half. This is true?
A transaction can be considered confirmed with 99.9% certainty after an average of 0.25 seconds from time of broadcast… The aBFT algorithm provides 100% confirmation of irreversibility within 1 second” from the white paper. The 15 Producers are needed for irreversible blocks which happens mostly like a checkpoint
Vitalik Buterin, is very perspicacious and expresses his thoughts about the epos in particular the EOS ecosystem and the whole idea of Daniel, what can you say? you saw this twitch on the Twitter?
We saw the exchange and thought it was very civil. They are two brilliant contributors to the ecosystem and are glad that we can all benefit from their public debate. We think Dan adequately explained our position as well.
Are you as a producer, legally registered? How does this happen?
We will be legally registered over the next few weeks. It has been a difficult process and we aren’t ready to share everything yet. What I can say is that we are not legally registered in New York. We are an international company.
What tools do Block Producers have against censoring the network? Well, for example, if FBI comes to you and asks you to block the list of addresses (ignore their transactions), which are supposedly engaged in criminal activities. What does the current US legal practice say about this?
All Block Producers are expected to follow their local laws. The network as a whole won’t be effected by a single block producer having issues with their local government. If a Block Producer is asked by the FBI to censor the network they simply won’t be able to. If the government then demands they shut down operations they will be forced to comply and the network will just elected another top 21 BP to replace them.
How’s the weather in New York? 😊
I’d say it’s cold but I bet it’s colder where you are! Summer is right around the corner though and I’m excited for my baby daughter to have her first summer 😊
How do you people talk about crypto currency? What do ordinary people say around? Are there many conversations about the growth and fall of the market and whether it is broadcast on news on TV?
Cryptocurrency is largely misunderstood. The core concepts are ignored, the market is irrational, and people are just buying tokens as investments. EOS New York will strive to educate the US and surrounding areas on what EOS is and why it’s not just “an altcoin”.
How soon in your opinion will the crypto currency become a real future for all?
I think that blockchain will take over. But will cryptocurrency like Bitcoin? Not for a while. I can see a strong case for stablecoins to replace fiat money at a government level before Bitcoin or another store of value replacing fiat. One big issue is the scalability of cryptocurrency solutions. Right now very few networks besides ones created by Dan Larimer can sustain a transaction-per-second level that would support applications that would survive mass adoption.
Well, in conclusion, the price of bitcoin by the end of the year? ) we will beat new peaks?
If so, what should be affected?
I don’t know the price of bitcoin right now 😊 let alone what it will be at the end of the year. I think that if Bitcoin can’t figure out how to scale faster than 3–7 transactions-per-second it will be replaced by something else that can.
Thnx you Kevin. We are very grateful to you for your time, this interview will be useful for the whole community. We’ll be in touch!
I want to say a big thanks to CryptoBred Team! to FlyHigh and MaO and uMnoc for helping with the questions
I’am happy to help !)
If you’d like to learn more about us feel free to send me questions or check out our website, twitter, or steemit,
https://steemit.com/@eosnewyork
Thanks for letting me answer these for you and thank you for your patience!
