Awesome Cryptoeconomics

A curated list of awesome resources for Cryptoeconomics research

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Table of Contents

• Cryptoeconomics
  • Articles
    • Introductory
    • Game Theory
    • Mechanism Design
    • Cryptographic Primitives
    • Consensus Mechanisms
    • Network Effects
    • Governance
    • Cryptoeconomic Security
    • Token Engineering
    • Cryptoeconomic Primitives
    • Tokenomics
    • Token Design
    • Token Sales
    • Stablecoins
    • State Channels
    • Empirical Cryptoeconomics
  • Videos
    • Consensus Protocols
    • Cryptoeconomics
    • State Channels
    • Cryptoeconomic Security
    • Cryptography
    • Additional
  • Podcasts
  • Whitepapers
  • Research
    • Privacy
    • Proof of Stake
    • Proof of Work
    • More PoS
    • Plasma
    • Sidechains
    • Fault Attribution
    • Mechanism Design
    • Data Availability & Erasure Coding
    • Stablecoins
    • Governance
    • Cryptography Reading
  • Other Resources
  • Blockchain Hacks and Post-mortems
    • The DAO
    • Parity MultiSig
    • Bancor
    • King of Ether
    • Roulette
    • Miscellaneous
• Additional Information
  • Behavioural Economics
  • Economics
  • Cryptography
• Applications
  • State Channels

Articles

Introductory

1. Cryptoeconomics for dummies
2. Cryptoeconomics 101
3. Making Sense of Cryptoeconomics Making Sense of Cryptoeconomics by Josh Stark
4. What is Cryptoeconomics What is Cryptoeconomics, a guide by BlockGeeks
5. How Society Will Be Transformed By Cryptoeconomics
6. Paving the Future of Blockchain Technology
7. Vivek Singh's Cryptoeconomics in context
8. Cryptoeconomics Definitions Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3
9. The Blockchain Economy: A beginner’s guide to institutional cryptoeconomics by RMIT Blockchain Innovation Hub
10. Cryptoeconomics is Hard Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3 by Aleksandr Bulkin
11. How to create a cryptoeconomic protocol from scratch by Vlad Zamfir
12. Behavioural Crypto-Economics the challenge and promise of Blockchain Incentive Design by Elad Verbin
13. Introduction to Blockchain through Cryptoeconomics by Zubin Koticha
14. The need for an Incentive scheme in Algorand by Alexis Guaba, Zubin Koticha
15. Cryptoeconomics.study -- An free and open source book & course on Cryptoeconomics

Game Theory

1. Introduction to Game Theory Part one of a series by Devin Soni
2. Schelling Point Introduction to the concept of Schelling Point
3. Nash Equilibria and Schelling Points
4. The strategy of conflict book The Strategy of Conflict
5. Mechanism design (deck) Mechanism design theory examples and complexity
6. Standford's Algorithmic Game Theory lecture series
7. Cryptocurrency Game Theory What is Cryptocurrency Game Theory: A Basic introduction
8. Correlated Equilibria In Game Theory, No Clear Path to Equilibrium

Mechanism Design

1. A Crash Course in Mechanism Design for Cryptoeconomic Applications
2. Mechanism Theory paper by Matthew O. Jackson
3. Mechanism Design Theory

Cryptographic Primitives

1. Cryptographic Primitives as described in Wikipedia
2. A Graduate Course in Applied Cryptography by Dan Boneh and Victor Shoup
3. Ethereum: Signing and Validating
4. Merkling in Ethereum by Vitalik Buterin
5. Bitcoin's Academic Pedigree by Arvind Narayanan and Jeremy Clark

Consensus Mechanisms

PoW - Proof of Work

1. PoW and Blockchains presentation by Prof. Ittay Eyal (IC3)
2. The PoW concept article by the Nakamoto Institute
3. ConsensusPedia - An Encylopedia of 29 consensus algorithms article by the Nakamoto Institute) article by Vasa
4. Proof of Work vs Proof of Stake by BlockGeeks
5. Vulnerability: Proof of Work vs. Proof of Stake

PoS - Proof of Stake

1. Strengths and Weaknesses of PoS Vitalik Buterin's article on the strengths and weaknesses of staking contrasting to PoW algorithms
2. PoS Design Philosophy A Proof of Stake Design Philosophy by Vitalik Buterin
3. Ethereum PoS FAQ
4. The evolution of PoS Article on the evolution of PoS by Coin Telegraph
5. Weak Subjectivity in PoS Weak Subjectivity in PoS by Vitalik Buterin
6. The History of Casper - Chapter 1 Vlad Zamfir's series on the history of Casper, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5
7. On Stake and Consensus
8. Critic on the PoS Philosophy by Tuur Demeester
9. Extended Summary on Casper by Jon Choi
10. The Economics of the PoS consensus algorithm
11. Casper vs Tendermint
12. Minimal Slashing condition in Ethereum

DPoS - Delegated Proof of Stake

1. DPoS Introduction Introduction to DPoS by Bitshares
2. DPoS vs PoW Article by Daniel Larimer from Bitshares
3. Tendermint BFT vs. EOS dPoS by Tendermint
4. Seeking Consensus on Consensus Delegated Proof of Stake and the Two Generals' Problem

dBFT - Delegated Byzantine Fault Tolerance

1. Byzantine Fault Tolerance in Distributed Systems by Prof. Kenneth Goodwin
2. dBFT vs PoW and PoS Antshare's (now NEO) views on consensus
3. Intro to Ethermint BFT

Network Effects

1. A Note on Metcalfe's Law, Externalities and Ecosystem Splits by Vitalik Buterin
2. Continuous Token Models: Towards a Million Networks of Value by Simon de la Rouviere
3. Crypto Tokens: A breakthrough in open network design by Chris Dixon
4. Bitcoin Network Effects
5. Keepers — Workers that Maintain Blockchain Networks
6. Smart-Contract Network Effect Fallacy

Governance

1. The Consensus Series, Part I: The Basics of Collectivity and Addendum by Aleksandr Bulkin
2. Governance and Network Effects
3. Notes on Blockchain Governance by Vitalik Buterin
4. Against On-Chain Governance by Vlad Zamfir
5. On Public vs Private Blockchains by Vitalik Buterin

Cryptoeconomic Security

1. Intro to Cryptoeconomic security Basic intro to cryptoeconomic security
2. Anti-fragile Cryptoeconomic systems Anti-fragile cryptoeconomic Systems through game theory
3. Triangle of harm by Vitalik Buterin
4. On Inflation, Transaction Fees and Cryptocurrency Monetary Policy Vitalik Buterin's article on the role of cryptoeconomics in blockchain security
5. Settlement Finality Vitalik Buterin's article on the elusive topic of economic finality
6. Bancor is flawed Bancor's review by Hacking Distributed
7. To sink front-runners, send submarines Bancor's front-running woes by Hacking Distributed
8. Bitcoin's security model by Jameson Lopp

Attacks

1. General article on how attacks work in PoW - Part 1 and Part 2
2. Long range attacks
3. Censorship attacks
4. P + epsilon attack
5. Coordination problems
6. The Miners dilemma
7. Dealing with failure in cryptocurrency Vlad Zamfir's article on dealing with failure in cryptocurrency
8. Model of an internal PoW attacker Vlad Zamfir's article on PoW attackers
9. Cryptoeconomics and X-Risk researchers should listen to each other more Vitalik Buterin's article on how cryptoeconomics and existential risk researchers could apply blockchain technology in global coordination challenges Part 2
10. Presentation on most common attacks in Bitcoin
11. 51% Attack Bitcoin.it Wiki explanation
12. Selfish Mining a 25% attack against Bitcoin
13. Sybil attack as described in Wikipedia
14. Nothing at Stake and Long-range attacks in PoS
15. $5 wrench Attack XKCD comic on the cheapest attack on cryptography
16. An Exploration of Attack Vectors in Proof-of-Stake Mechanism Labs

Token Engineering

1. The Emergence of Cryptoeconomic Primitives
2. History Is Rhyming: Fitness Functions & Comparing Blockchain Tokens To The Web by Simon de la Rouviere
3. Introducing Curation Markets: Trade Popularity of Memes & Information by Simon de la Rouviere
4. Can Blockchains Go Rogue? by Trent McConaghy
5. Towards a Practice of Token Engineering, with presentation deck here by Trent McConaghy
6. Token Engineering Case Studies Analysis of Bitcoin, Design of Ocean Protocol by Trent McConaghy

Cryptoeconomic Primitives

1. The Emergence of Cryptoeconomic Primitives by Jacob Horne
2. Token Curated Registries 1.0 by Mike Goldin
3. Continuous Token-Curated Registries: The Infinity of Lists by Simon de la Rouviere
4. Tokens 2.0: Curved Token Bonding in Curation Markets by Simon de la Rouviere
5. Solving Price Discovery Of Non-Rivalrous Goods (with Curved Bonding) by Simon de la Rouviere
6. Hashtag Markets by Simon de la Rouviere
7. How to Make Bonding Curves for Continuous Token Models
8. Re-Fungible Token (RFT) by Billy Rennekamp

Tokenomics

1. Token sales models Token sales models by Vitalik Buterin
2. A business guide to Tokenomics by William Mougayar
3. Cryptoasset Valuations by Chris Burniske
4. Understanding Token Velocity
5. On Value, Velocity and Monetary Theory
6. The Token Classification Framework a multi-dimensional tool for understanding and classifying crypto tokens
7. MV = PQ isn't right for crypto a case made by Austere Capital
8. The quantitative theory of money for tokens a rebuttal of the MV = PQ theory by Warren Weber
9. NVT - network value to transactions ratio a market to transaction value proposal by Coinmetrics

Token Design

• How Does REP Work - Augur report on incentive structure of their prediction market token, REP
• Introducing the Gnosis Tokens (GNO) - Background and reasoning for design decisions for Gnosis and the GNO token
• Applications of Security Deposits and Prediction Markets - Vitalik Buterin on a few topics
• SchellingCoin - Vitalik Buterin on SchellingCoins

Token Sales

• Introducing the Gnosis Token Launch - Gnosis on using a dutch auction
• Analyzing Token Sale Models - Vitalik Buterin reviewing token sale models, including Gnosis' dutch auction
• Vickrey auction - Method used to keep bids secret and have the winner pay the 2nd highest amount
• Long-Term Cryptocurrency Distribution Models - Early Vitalik Buterin post on token distribution

Stablecoins

1. Ethereum Madrid's Cryptoeconomics 101 presentation on Stablecoins by Sandra Becker of Ethereum Madrid
2. An Overview of stablecoins
3. Stablecoins: A Holy Grail in digital cryptocurrencies
4. Volatility and Mass Adoption: 2 reasons we would benefit from a stablecoin
5. The search for a stable cryptocurrency
6. Maker for Dummies: A Plain English Explanation of the Dai Stablecoin
7. Designing a price stable currency by Haseeb Qureshi
8. A skeptic view of stablecoins

State Channels

1. Compact and very well explained definition
2. Overview on the Raiden Network
3. Generalised State Channels on Ethereum
4. Introducing multi-party state-channels
5. A state-channels adventure with Counterfactual Rick by SpankChain (SFW!)

Empirical Cryptoeconomics

1. How manipulation-resistant are Prediction Markets? How manipulation-resistant are Prediction Markets? Our Undertaking in Empirical Cryptoeconomics by Gnosis
2. Empirical Cryptoeconomics Vitalik Buterin's post on empirical cryptoeconomics
3. Testing mechanism design with AI agents Tool for Smart Contract testing with concept paper and intro

Videos

Consensus Protocols

1. Consensus Consensus Algorithm - Andreas Antonopoulos
2. Intro to Casper Karl Floersch presenting Ethereum's Casper PoS
3. PoS roundtable PoS roundtable with Joseph Poon, Vitalik Buterin, Vlad Zamfir, Dominic Williams, Zack Hess at Cryptoeconomicon 2015
4. PoW roundtable PoW roundtable with Tim Swanson, Vitalik Buterin and Peter Todd at Cryptoeconomicon 2015
5. Proof of Stake - Technion Cyber and Computer Security Summer School and presentation deck
6. CESC2017 - Casper Proof of Stake
7. Hangout - Ethereum PoS: Casper FFG In Depth and the presentation
8. Hangout - Ethereum PoS: Casper & Smart Contract Consensus Overview and the presentation deck

Cryptoeconomics

1. Game Theory in Bitcoin Game Theory approach behind the motivation for Bitcoin mining
2. CESC2017 - Cryptoeconomics in Casper
3. What is Cryptoeconomics Vlad Zamfir introducing Cryptoeconomics
4. Introduction to Cryptoeconomics Vitalik Buterin introducing Cryptoeconomics. The corresponding presentation deck is available here
5. Hard problems in Cryptoeconomics Vitalik Buterin discussing hard problems with cryptoeconomics
6. The Cryptoeconomic way Vitalik Buterin discussing cryptoeconomics.
7. Cryptoeconomic Protocols In the Context of Wider Society Vitalik Buterin discussing cryptoeconomics. The corresponding presentation deck is available here
8. The current state of Cryptoeconomics The current state of Cryptoeconomics by Vlad Zamfir
9. Programmable Incentives by Karl Floersch at Devcon 3
10. Hard problems in cryptoeconomics by Vitalik Buterin
11. Cryptoeconomic Primitives
12. Global Scale Research Networks and Cryptoeconomics
13. Towards a Practice of Token Engineering by Trent McConaghy
14. Cryptoeconomic Theory an on-going series by Viktor Makarskyy with part 1, part 2, part 3 and part 4
15. Programmable Incentives - Intro to Cryptoeconomics - A talk by Karl Floresch at DevCon 3

State Channels

1. The Raiden Network, a technical introduction
2. Short introduction to the The Raiden Network by Lefteris Karapetsas
3. State Channels explained in detail by Ameen Soleimani

Cryptoeconomic Security

1. The costs of hacking Bitcoin Sybil attacks explained
2. Game theory and Network Attacks- How to destroy Bitcoin by by Max Fang 03/2017
3. Game theory and Network Attacks- How to destroy Bitcoin by Nadir Akhtar and Aparna Krishnan 11/2017
4. 51% Attacks: Pools and Game Theory
5. Nothing at stake Introducing the nothing at stake attack
6. Security Considerations of the Casper Protocol Vlad Zamfir at Standford's Blockchain Protocol Analysis and Security Engineering 2017

Cryptography

1. Cryptography for Cryptocurrency
2. Bitcoin - Cryptographic hash functions
3. Hashed based signatures An illustrated primer

Additional

1. BBC Documentary Adam Curtis' "Fuck you buddy" BBC documentary

Podcasts

1. Q&A on Casper Vlad Zamfir answering questions regarding Ethereum's Casper PoS
2. PoW attacks Podcast from 2015 on PoW attacks
3. Cryptoeconomics, Stablecoins, Casper with Vlad Zamfir, and corresponding transcript is available here
4. Fintech Podcast - Episode 151 Cryptoeconomics as explained by Dr Chris Berg
5. Cryptoeconomic Primitives by Trent McConaghy

Whitepapers

1. Bitcoin Whitepaper
2. Ethereum Whitepaper
3. Blockchain Consensus Protocols in the Wild
4. dBFT Whitepaper The Quest for Scalable Blockchain Fabric: Proof-of-Work vs. BFT Replication by IBM Research
5. Federated Byzantine Agreements by Stellar Development Foundation's David Mazieres
6. Research Paper on PoS vs. Pow by Bitfury
7. Demystifying Incentives in the Consensus Computer
8. Game Theory approach behind Bitcoin mining
9. Research Paper on the security model in PoW by ETH Zurich and others
10. A Note on Limits on Incentive Compatibility and Griefing Factors
11. Research Paper on eclipse attacks on the Bitcoin Network
12. Research Paper on eclipse attacks on the Ethereum Network
13. Research paper on hashrate-based double spend attack
14. Satoshi Risk Tables
15. MakerDAO Purple Paper
16. Sweetbridge Liquidity Protocol
17. Bancor Protocol
18. Maker Dai Stablecoin
19. Curation Markets by Simon de la Rouviere
20. The Economics of BitCoin Price Formation This paper analyses the relationship between BitCoin price and supply-demand fundamentals of Bitcoin
21. A Cost of Production Model for Bitcoin
22. The Bitcoin Backbone Protocol Analysis and Applications
23. Cryptocurrencies without PoW
24. Some Simple Economics of the Blockchain
25. Crypto-Economics of the Nervos Common Knowledge Base

Research

Privacy

• Privacy on the Blockchain - Vitalik Buterin on privacy
• ZK-Snarks - ZK-Snarks under the hood by Vitalik Buterin
• ZK-Starks - Early article on ZK-Starks

Proof of Stake

• Cryptoeconomics in Casper - Video of presentation by Vlad Zamfir at CESC2017
• Cryptoeconomics in Casper - A Google Slides presentation by Jon Choi
• A Proof of Stake Design Philosophy - Vitalik Buterin post about the design of a PoS system
• The Triangle of Harm - Post on Casper’s incentivization philosophy
• Proof of Stake - A talk at Cryptoeconomicon
• Proof of Stake with Casper - Vlad Zamfir podcast about Casper
• The History of Casper - Vlad Zamfir on Casper, a Proof of Stake Consensus Protcol
• Ethereum Casper 101 - Great article on Cryptoeconomics overall with a focus on PoS
• On Stake - Early Vitalik post on staking
• Proof of Stake FAQ - FAQ from the Ethereum wiki

Proof of Work

• Bitcoin - Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System
• Proof of Work - A talk at Cryptoeconomicon

More PoS

• On Inflation, Transaction Fees and Cryptocurrency Monetary Policy - Vitalik Buterin
• On Settlement Finality - Vitalik Buterin on settlement finality
• Light Clients and Proof of Stake - Vitalik Buterin post on light clients using PoS
• Weak Subjectivity - Vitalik Buterin on PoS
• Cryptocurrencies without Proof of Work
• Slasher Ghost, and Other Developments in Proof of Stake
• Least Authority Performs Incentive Analysis For Ethereum
• Demystifying incentives in the consensus computer
• Formal methods on some PoS stuff - Formalizing PoS Medium article
• Safety Under Dynamic Validator Sets - Vitalik Buterin medium post on safety
• A mechanized safety proof with dynamic validators - A reply to the Vitalik Buterin post above
• Formal methods on another Casper - Talking about the differences betwen Vlad and Vitalik's approach to Casper
• Nothing at Stake Problem - StackExchange "What exactly is the Nothing-At-Stake problem?"

Plasma

• Plasma: Scalable Autonomous Smart Contracts - Paper on Plasma by Joseph Poon & Vitalik Buterin
• Plasma in 10 minutes - Easy to understand overview of Plasma proposal by Anthony Akentiev

Sidechains

• Sidechains - Blockstream: Enabling Blockchain Innovations with Pegged Sidechains
• Cosmos - A Network of Distributed Ledgers - Cosmos whitepaper

Fault Attribution

• The problem of censorship - Vitalik Buterin on attributability of censorship
• Minimal Slashing Conditions - Vitalik Buterin on slashing conditions
• Shapley values - Technique for translating fault attributions into penalties

Mechanism Design

• Mechanism Design - Wikipedia article
• On Anti-Pre-Revelation Games - Vitalik Buterin on anti-pre-revelation games
• Blockchain and Smart Contract Mechanism Design Challenge - Vitalik talk in Malta

Data Availability & Erasure Coding

• A note on data availability and erasure coding - Comprehensive review of the data availability problem from the Ethereum Foundation
• Secret Sharing and Erasure Coding - Vitalik Buterin guide for the Aspiring Dropbox Decentralizer

Stablecoins

• Stablecoins - A talk at Cryptoeconomicon
• The Search for a Stable Cryptocurrency - Vitalik Buterin on stablecoins
• The Dai Stablecoin System - MakerDAO's approach to a stable currency
• Arc primer and overview (non-technical) - A practical, intrinsic-value and financial-market approach for a stablecoin
• A Note on Cryptocurrency Stabilisation - Research by Robert Sams on Seigniorage Shares

Governance

• Futarchy - An intro to futarchy by Vitalik Buterin
• Tezos - Whitepaper of Tezos, "a self-amending crypto-ledger"
• Hard Forks, Soft Forks, Defaults and Coercion - Vitalik Buterin on when to hard fork or soft fork (and more)
• A Note on Metcalfe's Law, Externalities and Ecosystem Splits] - Vitalik Buterin on blockchain splitting

Cryptography Reading

• Public-private key cryptography - Simple explanation on StackExchange
• Hash functions - Basics of Hashing from Consensys
• Homomorphic encryption - Blog post by Matthew Green

Other Resources

1. Evolution of Trust Fun interactive game by Nicky Case showing the evolution of group trust over time
2. Ethresear.ch Casper research topic
3. CECS - CryptoEconomics Security Conference
4. Reddit subgroup
5. Telegram Group
6. RIAT - Institute for Future Cryptoeconomics a research group from Austria
7. Cryptoeconomics Asia is an independent research firm
8. Cryptoeconomics at RMIT University a research group of economists in Australia
9. Research Institute for Cryptoeconomics Vienna University of Economics and Business
10. MIT Cryptoeconomics Lab MIT's first cryptoeconomics lab

Blockchain Hacks and Post-mortems

The DAO

1. The DAO can turn into a naturally arising Ponzi prescient article by Hacking Distributed
2. Analysis of the DAO Exploit by Hacking Distributed
3. Thoughts on the DAO hack by Hacking Distributed

Parity MultiSig

1. Parity's Post-mortem
2. Deep dive into the Parity hack

Bancor

1. Front-running Bancor in 150 lines of Python

King of Ether

1. King of Ether Post-mortem

Roulette

1. Attacking a public RNG article by Martin Swende on attacking a smart contract that used a public Random Number Generator

Miscellaneous

1. 51 percent attack - StackExchange answer to "What can an attacker with 51% of hash power do?"
2. Cost of a 51 percent attack - Present day cost for someone to do a 51% attack the Bitcoin network
3. The P+ epsilon Attack - Vitalik Buterin on the P+ epsilon attack
4. Long-Range Attacks - Post by Vitalik Buterin "The Serious Problem With Adaptive Proof of Work"

Additional information and related topics

Behavioural Economics

1. BE Ted Talk Prof. Dan Ariely's Ted Talk on Behavioural Economics
2. Predictably Irrational book Predictably Irrational by Prof. Dan Ariely
3. The Honest Truth About Dishonesty book The Honest Truth About Dishonesty by Prof. Dan Ariely

Economics

1. Awesome Economics

Cryptography

1. Awesome Cryptography

Applications

State Channels

• Lightning Network - Payment channels on the Bitcoin network
• Raiden Network - Payment channels on the Ethereum network
• Perun Network - Perun Network (virtual channels)
• State Channels Explanation - Jeff Coleman on state channels

License