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110 lines
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110 lines
7 KiB
Markdown
---
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author: jeremy-kauffman
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title: 5 Questions About LBRY
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date: '2015-07-01 13:09:20'
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---
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As I recently traveled across Europe, and ultimately to [PorcFest](http://www.porcfest.com), I took time to talk to talk to entrepreneurs, technologists, and libertarians about [LBRY](https://lbry.io).
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For the mutualistic education of myself and others, below are the questions and answers to five frequently asked questions.
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## Five Questions
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### 1. When will LBRY come out?
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As we recently Tweeted, we're extremely close to releasing a POC client:
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<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">LBRY's doors are locked, but gaze through the glass and one behold's the hazy form of a proof-of-concept <a href="http://t.co/93ViBCx72g">pic.twitter.com/93ViBCx72g</a></p>— LBRY (@LBRYio) <a href="https://twitter.com/LBRYio/status/616333374878281728">July 1, 2015</a></blockquote>
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<script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
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To make sure you hear as soon as it is available, [join our mailing list](https://lbry.io/list/subscribe) or [follow us](https://twitter.com/lbryio) on Twitter.
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### 2. What happens if someone uploads infringing content to LBRY?
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LBRY changes the way information is shared. LBRY's decentralized nature makes it impossible for LBRY Inc. to control any information
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published to the LBRY network. LBRY Inc. cannot censor or remove content from the network.
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That said, a user who initially uploads infringing content to the LBRY network may be liable for civil or criminal copyright
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infringement under their local laws. A patron who accesses infringing content via the LBRY network may also be liable for copyright
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infringement. LBRY Inc. strongly encourages creators to refrain from publishing content which may infringe upon copyright and urges
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patrons to wait for authorized providers to source content.
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Additionally, we've designed LBRY to protect miners and hosts. Content about information, or metadata, is stored in the LBRY blockchain
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and is required in the production of LBRY credits. Hosts only store tiny pieces of encrypted information, so they never have knowledge
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of their content nor, from a technical perspective, do they possess it. However, we are not your lawyers and this is neither
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legal advice nor a promise.
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### 3. If LBRY is Bitcoin + BitTorrent, why does it not use the Bitcoin blockchain?
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We spent a lot of time debating whether it was possible to build LBRY on top of Bitcoin. We certainly wanted to, as Bitcoin
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offers a tremendous user base.
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Ultimately, we decided this was not possible to do. We want LBRY to be the most efficient market for selling and buying
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information. From a fundamental perspective, kludging LBRY on top of Bitcoin would result in reduced efficiency.
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We are huge believers in Bitcoin and recognize we would not be here without it. If we have seen further, it is by standing on
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the shoulders of anonymous giants. For this reason, we plan to commit a significant initial portion of LBRY credits to
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Bitcoin holders.
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We will also be releasing the source of LBRY so that others may stand upon us.
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### 4. What's the difference between LBRY and MaidSafe (or X)?
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There are several attempts to build a decentralized computing platform. LBRY is not one of them; it exists only for information.
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Products that subsume the information problem, such as [MaidSafe](https://www.maidsafe.net) or [Ethereum](https://www.ethereum.org), will crumble
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under their own weight at the worst and not approach LBRY's performance at their best. Building an information delivery network
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inside of a larger decentralized platform is guaranteed at a fundamental level to result in worse performance, greater expense,
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or both.
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Other crypto-data solutions are about providing reliable and known data-access methods for *publishers* (i.e. they give you a name,
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frequently gibberish, and attempt to promise that data will remain available at that name). LBRY is about creating the best experience
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for *consumers*, who care less if names change than if a name gives them the information they desire.
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LBRY's reservation-based approach to names means unlike any other existing solution. We've leveraged Nobel Prize-winning economics
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to create a system in which names are extremely likely to resolve to what user's desire *as well as* be owned by the proper content
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creator. Greater user experience + greater creator experience = WNNNG<sup>1</sup>.
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<small><sup>1</sup> New LBRY policy: when disemvoweling, aim for maximum confusion. </small>
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### 5. **Allowing anyone to bid a higher price for a name is insane|brilliant.**
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First, for clarity, here is LBRY's naming system as succinctly as possible:
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> Whoever pledges the most credits against a name holds it, subject to a defined window for a counter-bid
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Our instinctual desire to have confident possession of our property makes LBRY's reservation-only name system feel off. However,
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it has strong economic underpinnings. Famed economist Ronald Coase made the insight that as long as property rights are clearly
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defined, and there are sufficiently low transaction costs, an efficient outcome will result regardless of the initial allocation
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of property.
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First, let's ensure the premises to our theorem hold. In LBRY, property rights could not be more explicit - whoever has committed
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the most credits holds the name. Second, transaction costs are close to zero.
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In the sense of this theorem, the efficient outcome is that the owner of any name will be the entity for whom the name holds the
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most value. When does a name hold the most value? When it maps to content that is most desired by users.
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What do users desire when accessing a name? For a name to resolve to the content, they envisioned as well as for that content to be
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provided by its legitimate creator. The former desire may outstrip the latter, but consumers would clearly rather pay a legitimate
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creator than a non-legitimate creator. Thus, the legitimate content creator has maximal incentive to provide a LBRY name mapping
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to their content.
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The end-result of LBRY's reservation scheme is two-fold: 1) names will almost always resolve to what user's desire and 2) content
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creators will economically benefit from publishing content via LBRY.
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## What No One Said
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Exposing even a straightforward creation to the public is daunting. LBRY, with several machinating, interlocking parts, is
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straightforward's antipode. In these first days, with our bare shelves, understanding the edifice we are building requires
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the ability to make acute insights. Particularly with LBRY's naming scheme, it veers into the imposing Kingdom of the
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Counter-Intuitive.
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Despite this, no one said "I don't get it" or "you're crazy". Some people certainly got it faster than others, but everyone saw
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the need and the opportunity. People were excited. While we'll admit our early testing grounds are favorable (tech groups and a
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liberty festivals), the reaction has been equally favorable. Every interaction leaves us more inspired to create the most egalitarian,
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efficient library the world has ever seen.
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