Idea: “unlocked” public bitcoin wallets with autogenerated key pairs that can be given to someone without them needing a pre-existing wallet.
1) transactions are instant and free, ie giving over physical ownership of a pub/private key pair (this could be done via scan of a QR code)
2) no prior onboarding necessary (avoids the repeated question “do you have this wallet/app?”)
Before, if I didn’t have cash, to tip a valet I’d have to ask them “do you have Zelle or Venmo?”, then I’d get their details, then send them money. Here, I could just pull out my wallet, create a new wallet with the specific amount, show them the QR code and say “scan this and it’s yours”.
Basically bitcoin gift cards without the store-specific lock-in.
Wouldn't your valet example be even easier with venmo? Or is it because the money has a QR code instead of the account - that could easily be done with venmo, but isn't, it's true.
With crypto I worry about the transaction costs dwarfing the utility of something like this. Without a central exchange avoiding fees for the tiny movement of crypto, you'd lose too much in transaction costs when setting up a new wallet to give away. But if you have a central exchange running it anyways why not just expose this UX over an existing cnetralized payment system like venmo?
With Venmo, I still need to ask for their username. A two way transfer of information still has to occur. Same with current wallet-to-wallet transactions. Even if we are in the same app, I need to know your wallet username or address to send you money.
With cash, you can leave a tip in a tip jar, with no “end destination wallet” if you will.
This would aim to solve that issue. The key pair would be contained in whatever the handoff mechanism is (QR code?) so that only a one-way information transfer needs to occur, ie giving someone the QR code or handing them a gift card representation of it. The funds would be locked up in this handoff state until that person were to transfer the funds off or claim ownership another way.
As for the fees, I covered this in my other comment, but basically there would be no on-chain transaction. The funds would never switch wallets.
With venmo you can just scan their account QR code to send them money, which is easily accessible in the app. I even have a card from them with my qr code printed on it. It requires them to have an account, but this seems no more onerous than understanding how to spend the new wallet you just got the keys to.
When you create the wallet, and put money in it however, there have to be fees right? I understand transferring the wallet is not going to cost anything because you are just sharing a private key, but you still have to fill the wallet. And now the recipient also has to move the money out of the wallet on the blockchain to use it, paying transaction fees. (Worse, they have to do so before you do, since you made the wallet you still have the private key! This needs another centralized service to prevent you from spending money you tipped)
I think the crypto angle is a red herring, what is really important to your idea is the QR-code flow that doesn't require the recipient to have done any setup. That's a good idea.
You still have to ask them if they have Venmo, ask them for their QR code, scan it, create the transaction, and then send it, and then make sure you sent it to the right person.
The loading wallet/unloading wallet concern is definitely warranted. I’d imagine that this would have to become a new special type of wallet, that the private keys are never accessible to the end-user. You could verify funds in the wallet per the blockchain as normal etc but the administrative account permissions would have to be abstracted to a more centralized system of control unfortunately.
If you spent the funds directly from these temp/“cash” wallets, you wouldn’t need to pay fees on the way out either, right. Furthermore, if you could pay directly with these types of cash wallets, businesses could just utilize the direct transfer themselves and never cash them out when customers use them to purchase from them.
Right, what you have described requires a central authority to 1) manage access to the funds (instead of trusting the tipper not to spend the funds he gave the tippee), and 2) avoid blockchain overhead by spending from accounts directly. Double spending then is prevented by trust in the central authority in both cases. The only useful part of the crypto currency left is the account-less nature of it, which can be done off the blockchain (has to be really here per number 2).
It's a UX problem in the payments space, which is not really a problem crypto helps with is my point. Definitely see the problem, just don't see the crypto angle.
Well said, I agree with that, although I do think there is a difference between trusting a central authority to maintain an opaque system vs merely being a regulatory figure maintaining a transparent system. If that’s even possible :)
We are currently still trusting places like Coinbase as much as we would need to already, to implement this sort of system. Why? Because you’re right - it’s a current UX problem of payments, not something crypto inherently solves.
transactions are very much not free when paying with bitcoin, and this has been tried in a few forms already but none have been successful. how can they spend what you give them? are you going to sit there and explain bitcoin to the waiter?
Let me clarify. Yes, you have to pay transaction fees when transferring money on the blockchain.
I am proposing that no transaction would occur. Just like when you hand cash to someone, no external transfer needs to take place. You would essentially be giving them full access to said wallet, and giving up ownership. No transaction would need to be recorded to the blockchain because no actual wallet transfer would take place. Only the immediate physical ownership of the keys which could happen offline, instantly, etc.
The rest of your questions are not answered so easily, and agreed, this still doesn’t answer the issue of onboarding to crypto in general. What it does solve though is the necessary onboarding to creating a wallet and understanding how to receive bitcoin. No one needs to “understand” how to receive cash. You stick your hand out and receive it. Should be just as easy as that with bitcoin.
Since this amounts to handing over the password to a wallet, what guarantee does the recipient of the wallet have that they are now the exclusive holder of that password?
You could easily have retained access yourself, so after you walk away you can yank the funds out of it.
Or you could hand out access to the same wallet to a half dozen people.
Without actually transferring the funds to a wallet you know you exclusively control, you have no way to know that you've actually received anything of value.
Very true - this is elaborated on in the rest of this thread. Basically, the holder would have to be locked out of the private key from creation of the wallet, and there would have to be trust placed in a centralized regulatory body to issue and redeem these wallets.
This is spot on, and I like that you don’t need hardware for it unlike opendime.
Phone numbers are a bit scary though, prone to SIM takeover hacks and other insecurities. And you still have to ask for/have their phone number. I’d prefer to manage the hand-off part of it myself through my medium of choice.
How can you claim that this is vulnerable to double spends when we haven’t even finished defining the system?
Double spending is a symptom of a broken system. Let us at least figure out the system first so we can determine if it is broken.
Of course double spending is a concern that will need to be navigated in a system like this. Check out some of other discussions in this thread about where that leads - a centralized authoritative body responsible for issuing and “transferring” these wallets.
1) transactions are instant and free, ie giving over physical ownership of a pub/private key pair (this could be done via scan of a QR code)
2) no prior onboarding necessary (avoids the repeated question “do you have this wallet/app?”)
Before, if I didn’t have cash, to tip a valet I’d have to ask them “do you have Zelle or Venmo?”, then I’d get their details, then send them money. Here, I could just pull out my wallet, create a new wallet with the specific amount, show them the QR code and say “scan this and it’s yours”.
Basically bitcoin gift cards without the store-specific lock-in.