Hey everyone,
Posting this here since there was a lively discussion related to the privacy aspects of this in the r/compsci thread.
I've been working for almost a year now on a platform I call the Ultranet that I'm planning on launching in two weeks on February 25th at 12pm Pacific Time (signup here to be notified). It's a marketplace platform that is fully-decentralized, private, and censorship-resistant.
It works by having each user who runs the software download and store a cryptographically-secured copy of all of the listings, orders, ratings, and all other marketplace data through a concept I introduce in the paper called a "block pool." This means that as long as a single node somewhere in the world is running the Ultranet software, all data, including all listings and all reputation data, will be preserved. This is in stark contrast to virtually all platforms that exist today, which are subject to censorship of listings and/or outright take-down, the latter of which results in all reputation data being lost. Moreover, the Ultranet achieves censorship-resistance and privacy (it's pseudo-anonymous like Bitcoin) while maintaining feature parity and user experience parity with existing centralized marketplaces. It also introduces Ultra, a hyper-deflationary cryptocurrency that is burned every time an order is placed on the system and by merchants in order to promote their listings, resulting in increasing scarcity over time (i.e. hyper-deflation). Importantly, the use of a native cryptocurrency allows the value of the network to accrue to its users rather than a privileged few, while also giving people an incentive to use the system early on (thus helping to solve the "platform chicken and egg problem"). Finally, the software has a built-in fully-decentralized exchange mechanism I introduce in the paper called "interchange" that allows users to purchase Ultra using Bitcoin or Monero without any third parties involved, along with a fully-decentralized end-to-end encrypted messaging platform.
I worked really hard on this because I really believe that the direction society is headed under the dominance of "surveillance capitalism" needs to be challenged somehow, and because I thought all of the existing attempts at disrupting things weren't sufficient. As such, having invested a lot of time and energy into trying to engineer a better way, I think the Ultranet and the concepts I introduce in the paper and in the software itself can at least serve as a guide to get us started down a serious path toward a more open and more democratic platform ecosystem.
I'm launching the Ultranet in two weeks on February 25th at 12pm Pacific Time, at which point I'm going to make the software available for download on the ultranet.one website. I was going to wait until then to make my first post, but I thought publicizing it a bit before I release the final version of the software could give me a chance to address any last-minute concerns people might have about the first iteration (which is why I'm also releasing the code today; see below).
In the meantime, if you want to learn more about the platform, below are some resources:
- I wrote a paper that you can read here: ultranet.one/white_paper.pdf
- If you're interested in browsing the code, I've uploaded the latest version to github (this is pretty close to what I plan on releasing in three weeks): http://github.com/sarahc0nn0r/ultranet
- If you want to try a demo of the software in your browser you can do that on the ultranet.one website
- If you want to sign up to be notified of the public launch when it happens, you can do that on ultranet.one.
- If you have any questions, I set up a subreddit on r/Ultranet that you can post to.
Thanks, and for anyone who reads this far just know that it means a lot to me that you are considering my work.
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