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[ANN] Litecoin - a lite version of Bitcoin. Be ready when is launches!

FIRST NOTE: No need to rush to download the code. The coin has not been launched yet.

Litecoin is the result of some of us who joined together on IRC in an effort to create a real alternative currency; similar to Bitcoin, but able to stand alone.  We wanted to make a coin that is silver to Bitcoin's gold.  Various alternative currencies have come and gone.  Some brought innovation.  All brought problems.

ixcoin - Nasakioto premined 580k coins. Seemed like a pump and dump. Competed with Bitcoin for GPU resources - Dead (~2 gh/s)
i0coin - Basically ixcoin without the premine. Not much support was given to this coin after it was released. - Dead (~5 gh/s)
SolidCoin - Innovative quick transaction times. Appears to have been run aground by CoinHunter, its creator, due to insecure changes and immature forum presence. - Dead, shutdown by CoinHunter
GeistGeld - Lolcust premined 7.7 million coins.  15 second block time is probably a bit extreme. - Alive, but limping (~15 gh/s)
Tenebrix - Lolcust premined 7.7 million coins.  CPU proof of work using scrypt is very innovative.  Price doing fairly well on btc-e.com. - Alive (~0.003 gh/s)
Fairbrix - Basically Tenebrix without the premine.  First launch was crippled due to bad config.  Relaunch attacked initially - Doing OK now, but no exchange so far. - Alive, but limping (~0.0001 gh/s)

We wanted the best innovations of Bitcoin and these other currencies to create a coin with all of their benefits, but nearly none of their problems.

Proof of Work

We really liked Tenebrix's Scrypt proof of work.  Using Scrypt allows one to mine Litcoin while also mining Bitcoin.  We humbly offer a big thanks to ArtForz for the implementation.

Premines

Litecoin will come with ZERO premined coins.  We believe a coin needs to be released in a fair manner.  Having one person (or a group) control a large amount of coins that can be used as they see fit is against the decentralized vision of Bitcoin.  Yes, it is true that without premined coins, we will not be able to afford to pay for bounties, but we believe people will see the virtue of this coin, invest in it as early adopters, and will be willing to spend time creating services to make this coin better.

Fast transactions

We were impressed by the convenience of SolidCoin's fast transactions.  Although we know that fast confirmations are not necessarily as secure as Bitcoin's slower confirmations, they are very convenient for small merchants who don't need Bitcoin strength security.  The average Litecoin block take 2.5 minutes, one quarter of Bitcoin's 10 minutes.

Difficulty retarget

We will keep the retarget block the same as Bitcoin's 2016, but because blocks are found 4 times faster, difficulty will retarget about every 3.5 days.  The combination of fast retarget times and Scrypt (Litecoin will not compete with Bitcoin for miners) means we expect to not see the sort of problem Namecoin encountered; hashing power that leaves more suddenly than it came, causing a high difficulty slog for everyone who stayed.

Coin generation

Miners will generate 50 coins per block.  In light of our faster blocks, to properly mimic Bitcoin's generation trajectory, we needed to change the blocks at which coin generation is halved.  Bitcoin generation is halved every 210,000 blocks.  Litecoin generation will be halved every 840,000 blocks.  For those of you doing the math, Litecoin is scheduled to produce roughly 4 times as many coins as Bitcoin, about 82 million bitcoins.

Fairness

We have come up with a plan that we believe is most fair.  Some previous coins were released without Windows binaries or without source code; we consider this as unfair as it is unsafe.

We will release Litecoin for everyone at the same time.  We are releasing the source code TODAY.  We are in the process of creating a Windows binary that will be released soon.

Right now you can only mine on the Testnet.  Whatever you mine right now is worthless, save for confirmation that the program works as intended.  We are withholding the genesis block of the real Litecoin chain until the scheduled release.  When we release, only a simple change to the litecoin.conf file is needed for you to start mining right away.  This will be DEAD SIMPLE.  For some time before the official launch, EVERYONE will have been able to run Litecoin against Testnet either by running the Windows binary or by compiling from source themselves. When we launch, we will just post the required parameters that need to be added in your litecoin.conf file.  You will be able to start mining a few seconds later. No downloading, no compiling, just mining right away!  And if you are fast enough might even find the first block, proving there were no premined coins.

We will set the release date to be in approximately 3 days. We've included a poll at the top so you can vote on the exact release time that is most convenient for you.  Which ever choice gets the most votes wins and we will release the required parameters to mine the Litecoin chain at that specified time EXACTLY.

51% attack

The problem with alternative currencies is that the network hashrate is likely low when the coin starts up, making an easy target for any potential 51% attacker. With a little hope, a little prayer, and a lot of hype due to our innovative release, there should be a large hashrate from minute one.  We hope this will deter any attackers from targeting this chain.  Should anyone attack, we hope they find very little, if any success.

NOTE:  Because everyone will be jumping in at once, without all clients talking to each other for a bit, NATURAL CHAIN FORKING AND ORPHANING WILL HAPPEN.  Don't be surprised if some of your initial blocks turns out to be orphans.  This is natural and expected in the first couple hours of mining.  Just keep mining the legitimate chain for best results.  And OPEN YOUR PORTS if you know how, so we can get all these clients talking to each other before too many blocks are found and orphaned.

Source code

The source code is here: https://github.com/coblee/litecoin
This is based on the latest Bitcoin code. You can either build the daemon version (litecoind) or you can build the QT gui version. See the build docs.

To run against testnet, you need to put "testnet=1" in your litecoin.conf file. Without it, the client will crash.
Port is 19333 for testnet and 9333 for the real release. And default RPC port is 9332.

Mining

You can mine the coin by using the default miner in the client. Just put "gen=1" in your litecoin.conf file.
Or you can use a CPU miner. Currently, the only miner that works with scrypt is Lolcust's Tenebrix miner: https://github.com/Lolcust/Tenebrix-miner


So tell us what you think.


We will post the Windows binary ASAP. And don't worry, since the coin has not launched yet, there's no rush.


Thanks to everyone that's helped with or inspired Litecoin whether they know it or not:
All Bitcoin developers
Thomas Nasakioto
CoinHunter/RealSolid
Lolcust
ArtForz
coblee
michaelmclees
EskimoBob
OneMINER
terrytibbs
DeLorean
pigeons