Syscoin is a cryptocurrency that enables instant payments to anyone in the world, regardless of location. Like all alt-coins, Syscoin uses peer-to-peer technology to operate without any central authority. Released under the MIT license, Syscoin has grown to become a blockchain protocol, built off bitcoin's but extending its capabilities, that offers complete solutions to a robust user base comprising individual developers and corporations. Blockchain Foundry, the company behind Syscoin, has since released Blockmarket, one of the first fully working decentralized marketplaces and the first one built entirely on the blockchain, where syscoin, among other cryptocurrencies, is acceptable tender. Syscoin currently trades on multiple digital asset exchanges and has a market value of more than US$407 million.
Video Syscoin
History
Origin
The blockchain as conceptualized by Satoshi Nakamoto back in 2008 envisioned a peer-to-peer electronic cash network that would prevent double-spending. A year later, the blockchain became an integral part of bitcoin, serving as the latter's public ledger of transactions. Although Nakamoto's reference client mentioned a decentralized marketplace service, the subsequent implementation did not implement this due to a lack of resources.
Syscoin was initially described in a 2014 draft whitepaper that envisioned Decentralized Marketplace Creation, Decentralized Smart Contracts and Documents, Decentralized Certificate Issuance and Transfer, and Decentralized Data Storage and Retrieval, as among the services that it will offer upon its release.
Syscoin aimed to bring Nakamoto's vision of a decentralized marketplace back into the blockchain, among the other commercial-grade services it aims to deliver to clients. Other services that Syscoin aimed to provide include secure data storage and transfer, and unique user aliases that link their owners to the services controlled by the alias.
The early Syscoin wallet was superseded by the release of Blockmarket Desktop 1.0 on September 16, 2017, marking the culmination of Syscoin's vision of a fully decentralized marketplace with a desktop GUI based on the blockchain.
The planned release of Blockmarket Web, a fully web-based version, and Blockmarket Professional in 2018 takes that vision one step further, as more advanced seller stores become a reality.
The Syscoin codebase is publicly available on GitHub. Windows and Mac versions of Blockmarket Desktop are currently available and can be downloaded from https://github.com/syscoin/blockmarket-desktop-public/releases. Linux, including Ubuntu, Fedora, and Debian, will be supported in future versions.
Syscoin 1.0
Syscoin's first iteration, Syscoin 1.0, was a scrypt algorithm, proof-of-work altcoin based on Litecoin that built additional features on the blockchain, including a completely distributed marketplace; digital certificate issuance and authentication; merge mining with any scrypt-based coin; and service fee regeneration. Some of these services were available upon launch but only accessible through a command-line interface.
Development work on Syscoin 1.0 started in March 2014, but it was only publicly announced on 16 April 2014 at 12:15pm PST on Bitcointalk. Presale began on 19 July 19, 2014 at 0.00000465 BTC/SYS, with Moolah.io as escrow agent. ICO price was .00000518 BTC/SYS. Full launch was announced on 16 August 2014. The ICO raised 1500 BTC of which 250 BTC was used for "buy support." Moolah (Ryan Kennedy aka Alex Green) stole the remaining 750 BTC. Syscoin has been in litigation against Moolah since October 2014 to recover the stolen BTC.
Syscoin 2.0
Syscoin 2.0 added a graphical interface, the Syscoin QT Wallet, and additional features to the Syscoin decentralized marketplace. Additional features include price-pegging, arbitrated escrow, encrypted messaging and Bitcoin as a payment option. Syscoin 2.0 switched algorithms to SHA-256 and became merge-mineable with Bitcoin.
Syscoin 2.0 was launched on May 1, 2016 at 12:15pm PST. The Syscoin QT Wallet has since been superseded by the BlockMarket Desktop. Although support for the Syscoin QT Waller is being continued, additional features available on BlockMarket Desktop will no longer be made available on the old wallet. However, developers who need access to console commands may still do so by using the QT Wallet.
Blockchain Foundry
The Syscoin development team created Blockchain Foundry in August 2016, to spearhead the development of merchant-focused platforms based on the Syscoin blockchain and platform. On 22 December 2017, Blockchain Foundry announced that it had gotten a C$3.3 million non-brokered private placement financing. Blockchain Foundry plans to have an IPO on a major Canadian stock exchange by the 1st Qtr 2018.
BlockMarket Desktop
After months of testing and an extensive security audit, Blockchain Foundry released Blockmarket Desktop v.1.0, the first of a series of e-commerce application releases and an upgraded version of the Syscoin QT Wallet, on September 12, 2017. Buyers and sellers using Blockmarket Desktop have a choice of using Syscoin, bitcoin, and zcash in the marketplace. Currently, Blockmarket Desktop runs on Windows and Mac PCs.
The most recent version of BlockMarket Desktop, v.1.1.4, features an innovative authentication library that secures off-chain data via blockchain signatures. BlockMarket Desktop will add more payment processors with the release of v.1.2 in 1st Qtr 2018. A later version will also add support for Syscoin Masternodes v.1.0.
BlockMarket Web
Blockmarket Web is the next planned Blockmarket-branded product, slated for release in 1st Qtr 2018. Blockmarket Web will provide all the functionality of Blockmarket Desktop without the need to install software. It will also support Syscoin Masternodes v.1.0.
Maps Syscoin
Technical specifications
Syscoin uses the Dark Gravity Wave v3 (DGW) difficulty algorithm, and has an 888-million maximum coin limit, a 60-second block time, and is proof-of-work SHA-256 merge mineable. Syscoin 2.0 had a block reward of 54.13 tokens per block. Syscoin 2.1, released on December 18, 2016, halved block rewards by 330% percent, reducing the tokens per block to 16.39. Mining rewards, designed to be gradual and smooth, end at about 800 million coins (block 24,177,646 will happen around the year 2052), and thereafter supply is inflated via the Syscoin inflation/deflation system, assuming services are in high demand.
Syscoin is a permissionless, blockchain-based cryptocurrency with a set of smart contracts tested and built on the Bitcoin scripting system using OP1 to OP16 standard script op-codes. In contrast to Turing-complete smart contracts such as those found on Ethereum, smart contracts on Syscoin are hardened, while retaining backwards compatibility with the Bitcoin protocol, and can be combined to form building blocks for blockchain-based e-commerce solutions. This combination of hardened contracts and Bitcoin compatibility makes Syscoin the ideal choice for commercial integrators looking to leverage a secure solution utilizing blockchain technology.
In addition, Syscoin services are built with an alias identity system that utilizes recognizable, unique, and case-insensitive names to facilitate transactions across the network, including multisignature signing, payment discovery, and maintaining payment balances. Cryptographically secure signatures ensure that only the alias owners can perform transactions on the network.
Block subsidies through rewards and transaction fees are the two ways by which Bitcoin provides incentives to miners. However, it has been argued that bitcoin degrades miner incentives as the blockchain expands, making the network unstable. To counter this, Syscoin ties in usage of services to an inflation metric for block rewards, even as it retains transaction fees. If there is a high demand for the services that the Syscoin network provides, service fees are inflated to accommodate demand; if there is low demand, service fees are lowered. This stabilizes prices, and is akin to inflation targeting by central banks, albeit in a decentralized manner. Transaction fees are not affected, and always paid to miners.
Syscoin improves on bitcoin's pruning feature by splitting Syscoin service transactions into two outputs, with the first output not subject to pruning, and the second one being pruned after expiry. Thus, new nodes do not have to download and store expired service data while synching with the network.
Milestones
Features
Currently, Syscoin has the following features:
- Fully decentralized marketplace
Syscoin's state-of-the-art decentralized marketplace allows secure trading of any item, without the middleman. Syscoin helps avoid corporate gouging, political interference, downtime, and maintenance or other hefty fees. Entire stores where goods and services can be sold or offered for resale can be created directly on the marketplace. Marketplace-related features include the ability to peg alias rates to the prevailing exchange rate at time of purchase; the ability to create sales of digital ownership; reselling with whitelists to allow dropshipping of goods and services while offering provable sales through the marketplace; a feedback and rating system applicable to arbiters, merchants, and buyers; multiple payment options via Syscoin, bitcoin, and zcash; private payments via zcash; shipping notifications that leverage the encrypted messaging system to send tracking and other shipment information; and a marketplace multi-tier moderation system that uses safe search to hide products and services from public view.
- Encrypted messaging
Asymmetric cryptography is used to send data to alias public keys. The identity system plays a key role in messaging because the aliases of senders and recipients are used to determine the keys used for encryption. The sender and recipient keys are encrypted with the message so that no third parties can read the data transmission without having the private key of either of the parties involved. Multiparty encryption is also possible through the use of multisignature alias identities.
- Digital certificate signing and authentication
Blockchain cryptography is used to issue, authorize, and exchange digital certificates of any kind. Certificates can be issued to and from one or more parties on the blockchain, with Syscoin's cryptographic proof of work being used to authenticate the certificates. Document encryption is possible, if required.
- Send and receive money easily
Money can be sent or received in a secure, reliable manner.
- Arbitrated escrow capabilities
Buyers are assured that their funds are secure with Syscoin's arbitrated escrow service. If needed, buyers can specify a mutually agreed-upon party to secure the funds while the goods/services are in transit.
Syscoin masternodes and 2018 development plans
Syscoin masternodes aims to transform Syscoin from a blockchain-based marketplace to a complete blockchain development platform. Blockchain Foundry further aims to include decentralized databases and file storage, increased transaction speeds for POS/Visa/Mastercard capabilities, and true Turing-complete smart contract capabilities for unlimited business logic, sidechains, application layers, and the identity layer, to the platform in 2018. All these features will be accessible through an API, rather than a new language, enabling nearly any developer to create any foreseeable blockchain application.
Zero-confirmation, double-spend protected Syscoin service updates
For Syscoin services, instant transactions are going to be extended further as a zero-confirmation, double-spend protected service that allows for the service-related database to be updated right after a lock occurs. This allows for instant confirmation that a service has been updated. In the case of assets, transfer occurs in real-time, or as fast as the network can propagate the message that a transaction related to a service happened.
Because the masternode network will effectively be a high-throughput relay propagation layer, and because the locking mechanism for Syscoin services occurs within a single hop in a single message handshake across the network, it will not only reduce traffic across the p2p network layer but also can lead to much faster confirmation of locks, compared to the Instant Send feature. Updates to the service layer database also happen in real-time, allowing for visibility of updates to services as they occur. To prevent double-spending (more correctly, double-updating in Syscoin services), the services are locked and stored with a previous state. If a double-update is detected within the block, the network is notified of the potential conflict in real-time and can take appropriate actions to wait for the next block.
The miner would include the first transaction or the one paying the higher fees in the block and it will overwrite the conflicted service transaction by reverting the service database to the last service state that was included in the block. The new service update is then applied to the processing block. Because network relay is not prohibitively expensive for this operation, fees will be kept standard, increasing the incentive to use such features. The feature is enabled automatically for all Syscoin services, except when creating a new Alias Identity.
Syscoin Assets
Syscoin Assets will provide a layer of tokenization on top of the Syscoin network. Use cases include loyalty points as well as coins backed by physical assets and service backed currency. Syscoin assets can also track individual minted tokens as inputs during transfer of ownership. The creator/owner of the asset can mint and allocate tokens to other alias identities, which can then subsequently transfer ownership of tokens to other alias identities. The tokens can be divided up to a definable amount of decimal places, allowing for a flexible unit-of-account model depending on the use case.
For example, in a gold-backed asset token, you may want to track ownership of entire gold bars which are stored and audited in a vault with serial numbers. Because Syscoin assets can track inputs when sending tokens, you can place ownership of the gold bars and link them to the external serial numbers through Syscoin's offchain data-anchoring mechanism, which will store an offchain data file associating the token inputs to serial numbers and anchor them cryptographically to the asset object from the asset owner. A central issuer would allow redemption of the bars based on ownership of token inputs.
No other asset implementation in the industry allows tracking of inputs for assets; generally the assets are defined with a quantity and a minimum dividable quantity (this is also supported in Syscoin assets). The tracking of individual inputs and anchoring of the subsequent data model to the asset through the offchain anchoring allows for external services/assets/business practices to be distinguishable when linked to cryptographically secure and verifiable ownership of tokens.
Usage
Syscoin has had a decentralized marketplace in place since v.1.0. The marketplace feature has had several improvements since then.
Syscoin 2.2, to be released in early 2018, will bring blockchain auctions to Syscoin's already extensive feature set. Blockchain auction is particularly useful for the following:
- Energy trading
- Real estate
- Domain names
- Retail goods
- Automobiles & automotive parts and supplies
- Liquidation
- Supply chain
- Rough goods
Competition analysis
Blockmarket Desktop is a direct competitor to OpenBazaar, which also offers a decentralized marketplace based on peer-to-peer technology, albeit one that is not based on the blockchain. Although both platforms use TOR to anonymize buyers and sellers, unlike OpenBazaar, which accepts only bitcoin, Blockmarket takes privacy one step further and utilizes zcash anonymity in transactions, aside from accepting both Syscoin and bitcoin. The end game for Blockmarket is to become just as efficient and popular as eBay or Amazon and to recreate the eBay/Amazon experience in a decentralized environment transacting with cryptocurrencies.
Other Blockmarket competitors include Safex, BitPay, and Particl.
Team
Blockchain Foundry is the developer of Syscoin, and comprises the following:
- Sebastian Schepis - Syscoin co-creator & core developer
- Dan Wasyluk - team manager & developer
- Jagdeep Sidhu - Syscoin co-creator & core developer
- Brad Hammerstron - marketing
- Chris Marsh - business development manager
- Sebastien DiMichele - community manager
- Willy Ko - Chinese community manager
- Janette Baker - marketing & social media
Ecosystem
Exchanges
Syscoin is available on the following cryptocurrency exchanges:
- Bittrex
- Poloniex
- BTC38
- Tux Exchange
In addition, Syscoin can be bought using local currency in the following 'fiat' exchanges:
- Bittylicious (UK pounds)
- Changelly (US dollars)
Decentralized Identity Foundation
Syscoin is a member of the Decentralized Identity Foundation (DIF), which counts IBM and Microsoft among its members. The DIF is building an open-source decentralized identity ecosystem built on the blockchain.
Hawaii Digital Currency Foundation
Syscoin is a co-founder of the Hawaii Digital Currency Foundation, which helps educate merchants and consumers in Hawaii about the advantages of cryptocurrency.
Microsoft Azure's Blockchain as a service (BaaS) platform
Syscoin is an official Microsoft Azure Development Partner. Syscoin's blockchain-based solutions are offered on Microsoft's Azure cloud platform. Blockmarket is included in Microsoft's Azure Blockchain as a Service (BaaS) platform; three other Syscoin products, namely, Fully Hosted Syscoin Node, Syscoin Price Peg Server, and Syscoin API Server, are also offered on Microsoft Azure.
Syscoin's suite of blockchain products can be deployed from https://azuremarketplace.microsoft.com/en-us/marketplace/apps?page=1&search=syscoin.
To know more about testing Syscoin on Azure, see the Syscoin Azure Quickstart Template page on Github.
Payment gateway
Syscoin is supported on Coinpayments, an integrated payment gateway for cryptocurrencies.
Wallets
Syscoin is supported on Android via Coinomi, and is also available on HolyTransaction's multicurrency wallet.
References
External links
- Official website
- Blockchain Foundry
- Syscoin API Documentation
Source of article : Wikipedia
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