Holochains
= "Holographic Storage for Distributed Applications".
URL: http://ceptr.org/projects/holochain
Whitepaper: http://ceptr.org/whitepapers/holochain
Description
Arthur Brock et al.:
"Holochain delivers on the dreams of making decentralized computing easy and real. It provides the underlying cryptographic fabric to maintain data integrity across unlimited peers without requiring consensus.
Integrity without consensus means:
● immediate and efficient processing,
● no proof-of-work,
● no proof-of-stake,
● no energy wasted on mining,
● no bottlenecks nor global delays.
In fact, Holochain is so efficient that you can run over 50 full nodes on a cell phone or a $35
Raspberry Pi computer. Holochain even enables scalable crypto-accounting to build new
generations of asset-backed and value-stable cryptocurrencies.
Programmers can leverage our RAD tools (Rapid Application Development) to quickly build fully P2P web applications designed to operate on the scale of Twitter or Facebook with no centralized data centers or infrastructure. Each user just brings their own device to share a small amount of computing and storage.
Holochain meets the demands of people who want to:
● own their own data,
● control their identity,
● have automatic backups,
● customize their user experience,
● choose how to connect their applications,
● decide with whom to share their private information,
● and transact without dependence on banks or governments."
(https://files.holo.host/2017/12/Holo-Green-Paper.pdf)
Discussion
"Holographic storage for distributed applications. A holochain is a validating distributed hash table (DHT) where every node enforces validation rules on data against the signed chains where the data originated.
In other words, a holochain functions very much like a blockchain without bottlenecks when it comes to enforcing validation rules, but is designed to be fully distributed through sharding so each node only needs to hold a portion of the data instead of a full copy of a global ledger. This makes it feasible to run blockchain-like applications on devices as lightweight as mobile phones
Historically, data integrity has been ensured by restricting access to data. If we wanted to prevent anybody from tampering with data, we locked it behind firewalls, or set strict permissions on databases and file systems. Because with centrally stored data, having the ability to write to data typically means you can change whatever you want.
If we want to build peer-to-peer systems where we collectively hold data among many parties, we need better strategies for shared data integrity. Many are excited about building these kinds of applications on the blockchain, because they provide a strategy to maintain integrity of data that can be held by many peers without a single central authority.
However, other limitations have become apparent, such as high computational overhead for achieving consensus, and the Pareto Effects of Proof of Work and Proof of Stake which steer the system toward being more centralized than many would want.
Breakthroughs in shared data integrity enable new social, political, and organizational patterns with less tendencies toward corruption that emerge from power imbalances involved with selective parties controlling data, information, and protocols.
We believe Holochains are one of these breakthroughs, because they take a different approach to ensuring the integrity of shared data. Instead of being built on top of cryptographic tokens they are organized around cryptographic validation of people (peers) validated against an immutable cryptographic record of those peers actions.
This change allows us to manage data integrity without the massive overhead of computing consensus on a global ledger. Our monotonic, validating, graph DHT (distributed hash table) achieves eventual consistency while only allowing valid data to propagate and holding everyone accountable for their actions.
The lower overhead of this approach makes it feasible to run full nodes on devices like cell phones or tablets which don’t have massive computing power.
Holochain is designed as a data integrity engine for distributed applications. Unlike a distributed database, there are no methods for users to directly interact with the data because this would bypass application specific validation rules. All interactions happen only through the application code which enforce whatever business rules, application logic, or restrictions they need to, since different applications have different demands for strictness." (http://ceptr.org/projects/holochain)
Four Reasons to support the Holo / Holochain project
By Jean Russell:
They are both "Inspired by natural systems and living ecology principles. Biomimicry applied to crypto-technology.
- Holo rewards people for sharing hosting capacity with the most minimal transaction fees because it is designed to serve hosts and those hosted rather than a central office that controls the flow. It solves the challenge of managing minuscule bits of data and tracking the accounting of them without adding to the complexity.
- Holochain is agent-centric not data-centric, meaning that it is putting the participant at the center of control and ownership. I own my data. I control permissions for others to access it. And by starting with the person at the center and then connecting them to a larger system, Holochain manages the dance between identity as something I control and something I am situated in (my reputation and activity engaging with others).
- I can imagine the applications this structural design makes possible, and they excite me. I can imagine applications that honor my lived experience as it truly is. I can imagine markets that help companies address risks by funding nonprofits to address those concerns. I can imagine applications and even currencies that help us make visible the value flowing in our communities, giving dignity to all contributions and contributors."
(https://medium.com/h-o-l-o/thrivabletechnology-3371a6a9ff8b)
The Holochain is the most promising project so far for building cooperative coins
Oliver Sylvester-Bradley:
"Of all the current crypto currency options Holo stands out because it based on the Holochain (a more efficient way of encoding transitions) and it’s currency is not only going to be based on “mutual credit” but its also going to backed by computer processing power. It’s well worth watching this great video from Philip Beadle to get an idea of how blockchain works and the differences between Bitcoin, Etherium and Holochain – especially from an app building point of view.
Holo are just concluding a very successful crowdfunder which aims to provide the ‘bridging technology’ to bring holo into the mainstream. The ‘hosting boxes’ (holo ports) people have bought through the crowdfunder will allow non-technically minded people to simply plug a spare hard drive in to their router to provide storage capacity and processing power on the Holo network.
The Holo network is nothing short of true peer-to-peer. Meaning that users can access each others computers directly, without the need to go via Google’s or Amazon’s servers. In fact, they can host and runs applications on the Holo network, in much the same way as BitTorrent works. This provides incredible opportunities for scaling (as more peers join the network, everyone benefits from ‘the network effect’) and, equally as importantly, the opportunity to re-define how the applications that run on the network are designed to work; it solves the entire “net neutrality” issue completely. Holo, and the people behind it, have designed the Holo network to work in a more “user centric” way than the way the web works today.
The Holo ICO is a very HOT topic. Art Brock, one of the founders of the project, has written about building responsible crypto currencies and agrees that
- “Cryptocurrencies do not have to be gambling tokens created from nothing. They can be responsibly connected to assets, promises, or real-world value. They don’t have to re-create all the speculative money problems that they were supposed to be solving”.
Currencies can be optimised to be a useful means of exchange, or a useful store of value, but rarely work well when trying to be both at the same time. “Holo fuel” (also known as HOT, or Holo Tokens) are designed to provide a medium of exchange on the Holo network. Their ICO requires users to buy HOT with ETH (another crypto currency).
Given that buying in to the Holo ICO with ETH will be at a specific price, we were keen to understand how the value of HOT has been calculated, how it hopes to avoid being linked in value to ETH and other crypto currency prices in the future, and how HOT will avoid suffering from speculation?
We put the question to Jean Russell, project lead for the Holo ICO, who answered as follows:
- HOT is set as 10k x ETH for the launch. But that is just the initial set. Once the network starts, then 1 HOT = 1 Holo fuel. And Holo fuel is about the value of hosting in Holo.
Surely there will arise an exchange that will convert ETH to Holo fuel, so they will be relational in some way. However, even if the Ethereum system collapses, Holo can continue and the value should not be negatively impacted. We believe that we will be much more than 10,000x faster/cheaper than Ethereum (mostly because that system in some ways was designed to be difficult and slow as part of the security). Our system is designed for scalability and resilience (DHT) so it should get better as it scales. Anti-fragile in fact.
The initial price (and the practical network value the community gives it) will be a gap that speculators can guess at. Thereafter though, it should remain fairly stable as it is really about the asset and the value of that asset in the marketplace.
I can’t give the deep philosophical explanation that Art can, but what I hear from him is that mutual credit along with asset-backing pretty much assures that it can’t be a gambling game of high stakes. Those who invest early when there is high risk of the platform getting off the ground will gain some benefit, yes. But then it should achieve a meta-stable state.
We have high hopes for Holo. With Holochain offering a viable alternative to blockchain it should, naturally, benefit from “second mover advantage” by learning a lot of lessons from its predecessor. The way it has been designed from a holographic, and sociocratic perspective seems to fit the requirements of a co-operative economy which distributes ownership and governance to the lowest possible levels.
If their ICO, which they are calling an “Initial Community Offering“, goes well it will be very interesting to see how this first major alternative to the blockchain based systems develops.
If Holo is successful and a vibrant peer to peer community emerges, perhaps the Holo Network would be the place to launch a dedicated co-op coin? Much of the hard work, in terms of underlying infrastructure, will have been done so a launching a co-op coin on holo should not be as hard as starting from scratch. The main issues would be achieving agreement between a sufficient number of stakeholders about a co-op coins parameters, mainly it’s issuance and the management of supply and demand." (https://open.coop/2018/01/25/co-op-coin-ico-look-like/)
More Information
"We describe a holographic data storage architecture which combines the data integrity assurance of Hash-Chains with the efficiency of Distributed Hash Tables while eliminating consensus bottlenecks typical of Blockchain and typical approaches to distributed computing."