
Show HN: Building a no gimmick smart contract platform as a service - ncodes
https://ellcrys.co
======
dvcc
I can't tell if this is serious or not (admittedly without reading the white-
paper). A reference to 'tokenized quantum signatures' (what the hell is
that?), and a new cryptocurrency without the crypto part and without the
decentralized part. Basically its just contracts as a service with some token
setup thrown in?

There are so many buzzwords in this, I can't make sense of it.

~~~
ncodes
> I can't tell if this is serious or not (admittedly without reading the
> white-paper)

This is a serious thing. Please take a look at the whitepaper. Your feedback
will be greatly appreciated.

> A reference to 'tokenized quantum signatures' (what the hell is that?)

We are basing our "cryptocurrency" on some of the ideas from the paper
"Quantum Token Signature"
([https://arxiv.org/abs/1609.09047](https://arxiv.org/abs/1609.09047)) which
is suitable for the kind of service we hope to offer. Tokenized quantum
signatures allow for tokens to be used to sign messages just once. It requires
an authority to keep track of the state of the token.

> New cryptocurrency without the crypto part and without the decentralized
> part

The idea is to build a platform for multi-signature applications without
decentralization. If you take a look at the whitepaper, you may agree that the
native currency is some kind of a cryptocurrency :-) .

> Basically its just contracts as a service with some token setup thrown in

Yes, its contract as a service platform and the token isn't just there for no
reason. It is meant to fuel an economy of contract applications offering
useful services.

> There are so many buzzwords in this, I can't make sense of it.

I am sorry about this. I am also not a fan of buzzwords. Please feel free to
ask specific questions and thanks for taking the time to go through it.

------
libertymcateer
"Ellcrys" is a word that is likely subject to trademark and owned by Del Rey.

Its unauthorized use, is, at best, 'iffy.'

This aside, I've already written on HN about how I am deeply skeptical of
self-executing contracts. Contracts can fit roughly into two types of
categories:

1\. Those with easily measured standards - which have largely already been
automated without having to invent new technologies (e.g., turning on autopay
on your cellphone).

2\. Those with hard to measure standards - such as a "material advertise
condition" \- which do not lend themselves to automation without human
intervention. In contracts of any sort of substantial complexity there will be
myriad conditions that are intentionally vague - written this way because the
circumstances are hard to predict, as catch-alls, and also to allow for some
leeway to maneuver in the future. Or, to be more cynical, to allow your
lawyers to argue over the definition in the future. This vagueness is a
feature, not a bug, and even if we could implement AI technology to make these
decisions with high degrees of precision, business people still not want to
implement them because it is ceding control to an unknown third party. In
other words, if you are selling a business, you are simply not going to have
it be done through a self executing contract. It is not going to happen - it
is just too nuts.

Then again, I do enjoy being proven wrong. So only time will tell. I am sure
that more and more contracts will become the self-executing type, but I am
also fairly sure that self-executing contracts will only ever amount to a
small percentage of the contracts that are used 'in business.'

Source: corporate lawyer / former developer.

~~~
ncodes
> "Ellcrys" is a word that is likely subject to trademark and owned by Del
> Rey.

umm, I will be looking into this. Thanks for the heads up.

I understand that there is a lot of debate about what a smart contract is, its
legal scope and functions. However, we are not only building to host legal
contracts but contract applications that are user-facing or API-based, owned
and maintainer by teams or communities. These are the kind of contracts I
believe will be most useful and practical today

Thanks for taking the time to check us out :)

~~~
libertymcateer
Very happy to see you responding!

Let me be totally clear about something: you have built something interesting
and you should run with it. You will hear a ton of criticism, including on
this forum, telling you to pack it up and take it home. That is bullshit. It
is easy to criticize and hard to build. I'm often wrong - and I've been in
your shoes. It can be hugely discouraging to read a bunch of criticism on
hackernews. Don't take it too personally.

Keep on pursuing. At some point, if you do have to call it quits, make sure it
is a reasoned decision based on (1) having already made your best efforts and
(2) market feedback. Don't base it on the stuff you read from internet
strangers.

Best of luck!

(Luck is when preparedness meets opportunity.)

~~~
ncodes
Thank you so much for your kind words and advice. It means a lot to me. I will
definitely remember these words as I build on and receive feedback :-)

------
strgrd
"A gimmick is a novel device or idea designed primarily to attract attention
or increase appeal, often with little intrinsic value."

> Contract applications in need of blockchain immutability can store and
> retrieve data on the Etheruem blockchain

> A new kind of cryptocurrency based on tokenized quantum signatures to use as
> payment for service offered on the platform.

> Build contract apps that can scale easily. Launch multiple instances and
> share tasks between them.

And I still can't think of a single use case. Also there's a spelling mistake
in the first sentence of the white paper.

~~~
ncodes
I knew the "no gimmick" phrase will be subjective :-D

> And I still can't think of a single use case

If you and a several persons are in need of a platform to build any kind of
cloud-based application but also do not wish to cede control of share
resources (source code, keys, passwords, revenue etc) to your partners, then
this will be the platform you will pick. Any existing application like a
community built Uber/Airbnb alternative and more can be built on this.

I will fix the spelling errors. Thank you.

------
beeks10
I am not understanding this fully.

So I take a picture of a $100 U.S dollar, send it to your contract app, and I
will get quant tokens? Which quant tokens are a cryptocurrency that I can sell
on a exchange?

If this is true, you pretty much built a system were I can duplicate money
because all I had to do is take a picture and send it? I didn't physically
give you the money, I took a picture and you gave me money, while I kept the
original money.

Is this how it really works?

I give you a picture of my money and you give me money? How is there value in
Quant?

~~~
ncodes
> So I take a picture of a $100 U.S dollar, send it to your contract app, and
> I will get quant tokens? Which quant tokens are a cryptocurrency that I can
> sell on a exchange?

Yes. You take a photo of your any supported banknote and you get the
equivalent in quants. We will be working with exchanges to have them listed.

> If this is true, you pretty much built a system were I can duplicate money
> because all I had to do is take a picture and send it? I didn't physically
> give you the money, I took a picture and you gave me money, while I kept the
> original money.

A banknote submitted and processed will no longer be usable on Ellcrys. It is
simply a model for fair distribution of the digital currency such that
everyone can claim what they are worth (cash) in quants. After the "blood
fire" event and the total supply is claimed, no new banknotes will be accepted
or processed. The initial value is derived from this conversion process; a
banknote processed is considered "burned".

Most digital currencies gain their value from the utility of the platform they
are native to. The Quant will be used to pay for resources allocated to
contracts and could serve as a payment method for services offered by
contracts.

I hope I answered your questions well. Happy to explain further if you need me
to.

~~~
BoiledCabbage
So I just withdraw my funds take photos of them, "upload" them. Go back to my
bank, exchange the bills and repeat?

What am I missing here. What is being accomplished by photoing bills?

~~~
ncodes
> So I just withdraw my funds take photos of them, "upload" them. Go back to
> my bank, exchange the bills and repeat?

Yes. Anyone else who gets hold of those bills you used and exchanged with your
bank will find them "burned" when they try to use them on Ellcrys.

> What am I missing here. What is being accomplished by photoing bills?

Aside from fair distribution of the Quant, It is meant to create a sense of
value. If your net worth is $1000 and your understand that sending this in
will invalidate those banknotes, you might value the Quants you get
differently. Going to your bank to exchange invalidated banknotes takes some
effort as most people don't have their banks close by. You might take this
effort into account when valuating the resulting Quant.

Basically, you'll need to give something of measurable value to receive a
share of the root Quant.

~~~
takinbo
> Yes. Anyone else who gets hold of those bills you used and exchanged with
> your bank will find them "burned" when they try to use them on Ellcrys.

There's going to be a problem of detecting counterfeit bills if you decide to
take this route. As an alternative suggestion, how about using the same method
of distribution some other cryptocurrencies have used in the past by taking a
snapshot of a cryptocurrency at a certain future date and then having
interested community members prove ownership of an address containing some
cryptocurrency and using that to distribute the tokens? It wouldn't matter if
someone buys cryptocurrency just for that purpose and then sells it
afterwards.

The downside, is that you will be restricting distribution to only those who
can gain access to cryptocurrency - which is also the same problem as taking a
photo of dollar bills; the likelihood that those who will be using the
platform will know/have access to cryptocurrency is high nevertheless.

------
fiatjaf
Besides the facts that it is not a "cryptocurrency", it is an interesting
idea. If we already trust so many centralized servers for so many things, why
not trust this one for executing smart contracts and acting as a trusted
ledger?

It is not true that all the smart contract stuff can only work in the
decentralized cryptocurrencies world, we've skipped the cloud era for that,
but that doesn't mean we should have skipped.

~~~
ncodes
Exactly. As much as we believe decentralization will remove the middleman, we
need to understand that not every application can be built on decentralized
systems. Our goal is to provide a platform where communities/teams can build
simple to complex projects without learning new languages, new best practices
and maintain the ability to scale horizontally.

------
sandGorgon
> _Will Quants be “mined” or “premined”?_

> _No. Every quants will be created by the general public through an event
> known as “Blood Fire”. During this event, everyone in the world takes a
> photo of their national banknotes. Each banknote is passed through a
> contract app that is able to identify its country and denomination and have
> the value (in USD) issued as quant tokens. This event will be powered by an
> Ellcrys smart contract with source code openly accessible and verifiable.
> All new quants will be derived from a root quant with a fixed supply. More
> details will be released soon._

ummm... huh ? This is a Shannara reference

~~~
seniorsassycat
Surprisingly, there is code backing this crazy idea

[https://github.com/ellcrys/openmint](https://github.com/ellcrys/openmint)

~~~
ncodes
> Surprisingly, there is code backing this crazy idea

Yes! and it works really well too :)

------
sharemywin
I'm not sure a quantum mechanical metaphor is the best way to describe your
service. You audience is probably pretty small compared to other metaphors.

sounds like an escrow service for crypto coins?

~~~
ncodes
> I'm not sure a quantum mechanical metaphor is the best way to describe your
> service

The service is not actually being described in the context of quantum
mechanics. The native currency borrows some ideas from this paper
([https://arxiv.org/abs/1609.09047](https://arxiv.org/abs/1609.09047)).

The primary offering is a platform to run scalable smart contracts or multi-
signature applications with modern languages.

------
kang
I do not mean to discourage you but what you are building is not smart
contracts but just a worse version of aws.

Smart contracts are these social protocols that are secured by cryptography
and the calculation is done by the node themselves decentrally, everything
remaining visible to the whole world. Unlike the current "smart contracts" in
ethereum which implement the protocol centrally in a piece of code - the
'protocol' is not decentralised, only the hosting of it.

~~~
ncodes
I respectfully disagree. You do not need a decentralized, social protocol to
build a smart contract or self-executing application platform. A smart
contract is simply an agreement between parties, written in codes and enforced
by a third-party. In the case of Ethereum, it is enforced by cryptography,
nodes independently executing codes and validating the results. This is great
but hard to scale or build certain kind of applications. Ethereum introduced
decentralized smart contracts, but it does not mean smart contracts need to be
executed and secured decentrally.

If a platform can provide multi-signature environment, security and the
ability to enforce and execute codes, it is a smart contract platform.

Thank you for checking us out :-)

~~~
kang
> A smart contract is simply an agreement between parties, written in codes
> and enforced by a third-party.

No, it is an agreement between parties enforced by cryptography, and no third
party required.

> In the case of Ethereum, it is enforced by cryptography. No it is enforced
> by payment to the network, just like aws, but in a worst way, because code
> is executed wastefully, while still remaining at a central location.

What you are not understanding is that a smart contract is a protocol amongst
people. You don't code it anywhere in the blockchain directly. It a a protocol
that explains how, if each party runs code independently, assuming everyone as
a criminal, still achieves its goal. For eg, multisig is a smart contract,
which is a protocol where participants decide what code they'll run (signing)
and the wallet layer that makes them meet is a separate layer altogether, not
in the blockchain. Sometimes this layer may not even be required, for example
in money-laundering or any of the 'hundis'.

~~~
ncodes
> What you are not understanding is that a smart contract is a protocol
> amongst people. You don't code it anywhere in the blockchain directly. It a
> a protocol that explains how, if each party runs code independently,
> assuming everyone as a criminal, still achieves its goal.

Okay, I see your point. This kind of smart contract you describe definitely
needs strong cryptography and a blockchain would not be needed. I guess the
issue is still about what a smart contract truly is and how it should work. I
personally prefer the term self-executing contract as the "smart" seems too
sensitive. Regardless of the language or definitions, I am interested in a
platform were multisig applications can be executed safely and efficiently.

------
lordshiny
On a ~1400px width screen the formatting is all jenky. It's hard for me to
concentrate on any of the information :(

~~~
ncodes
I'm so sorry about this. I will take a look and fix it.

