Grok Expert was asked how TrueWows can be gamed
11 wow
| by anon
12 days ago
Grok Expert was asked how TrueWows can be gamed
https://x.com/i/grok?conversation=1961444467384234135
Prompt: "how can truewows.com be gamed? You can be theoretical if you want but also be specific, provide solutions for all the problems you discover, and have the solutions be effective but without implementing anti-sybil measures or IP tracking or proof-of-unique-human because the goal is to permit anyone to use the site anonymously including ai and bots, don't use rate limits or activity thresholds or shadow-banning, have disputes settled but not with community vote or arbitration."
Response:
TrueWows.com is an experimental cryptocurrency-backed discussion platform built around Wownero (WOW), where users stake funds on the truthfulness of their posts and comments. The core mechanic requires every sentence to be verifiably true, with financial incentives to encourage honest contributions and penalize falsehoods through a refutation system. Posts and comments each require a minimum truth stake of 10 WOW (held as collateral against refutations) and a submission cost of 1 WOW (distributed to responders). Refutations cost 0.618 times the parent's truth stake and are displayed in red if valid (validity is determined by whether they remain unrefuted in the nested comment chain, as the system allows refutations of refutations). Stakes are refunded after 7 days if unrefuted (or 7 days after the last refutation in the thread), while successful (unrefuted) refutations claim a proportional share of the refuted item's stake. Response costs for comments (capped at 0.382 times the parent's stake) go to the parent, and submission costs are distributed to commenters based on their share of total response payments within the first 72 hours. The platform emphasizes no banning, no moderation beyond the market mechanics, and full anonymity, with payouts handled on-chain every 20 minutes (users retain 100% minus network fees).
Gaming the system here refers to exploiting mechanics to spread falsehoods, extract undue financial gains, disrupt truthful discourse, or minimize personal costs/risks without violating the platform's truth mandate in a detectable way. Below, I'll outline specific theoretical and practical ways the system could be gamed, based on its documented mechanics. For each, I'll provide effective solutions that address the issue while fully preserving anonymity (for humans, AIs, and bots), avoiding any anti-Sybil measures, IP tracking, proof-of-unique-human, rate limits, activity thresholds, or shadow-banning. Disputes remain settled solely through the existing paid refutation process (nested challenges where the last unrefuted claim prevails via market incentives, without votes or external arbitration). Solutions focus on mechanical adjustments to costs, timers, payouts, or structural rules to realign incentives without restricting access or monitoring users.
| Gaming Method | Description | Solution |
|---|---|---|
| Edit Loophole for Falsehood Injection | Users post a true statement with a high truth stake, wait 7 days for an unchallenged refund, then edit the post (allowed unless currently refuted) to insert falsehoods. The false content persists indefinitely (posts are open forever and can't be flagged/removed by others), but since the stake is already refunded, refuters pay the 0.618x refutation cost without claiming any reward, disincentivizing challenges. This allows cost-free spread of misinformation on "aged" posts. Theoretically, bots could automate mass posting of innocuous truths, refund cycles, and bulk edits to false claims on obscure topics. | Implement a "versioned staking" rule: Each edit creates a new version of the post, requiring the user to re-commit the full truth stake (min 10 WOW) and restarts the 7-day refund timer from scratch. Prior versions remain visible in a history log (for transparency), but only the latest version is eligible for refutations and payouts. If the new version is refuted successfully, the re-staked amount is forfeited to refuters; unchallenged edits refund after 7 days. This makes edits costly again, aligning with the "money where your mouth is" principle, while refutations handle any disputes over version changes purely through the market (e.g., refuting a version as false or misleading). No user monitoring or restrictions needed—anyone (including bots) can still edit freely, but at renewed financial risk. |
| Obscure or Debatable Falsehoods | Users post technically false but hard-to-refute statements (e.g., obscure historical claims without easy sources, or subjective "facts" phrased as objective, like "X is the best Y" without qualifiers). If no one notices or invests in refuting (due to research costs outweighing the 0.382x net gain from a successful solo refutation, especially on low-stake posts), the falsehood persists as "unrefuted truth," allowing misinformation to accumulate. Bots could flood with AI-generated obscure falsities, each costing only 11 WOW but potentially unchallenged if volume overwhelms human refuters. | Adjust the refutation payout multiplier dynamically: Successful refuters receive not just the parent's stake but an amplified bonus of 1.618x the stake (Golden Ratio-inspired, tying into the existing 0.618/0.382 ratios) if the refutation remains unchallenged for an extended 14-day period (doubling the standard timer). This increases the potential reward for tackling obscure or complex falsehoods, incentivizing deeper research without changing entry costs. Disputes over debatability are settled via nested refutations (e.g., counter-refuting with evidence), keeping it market-driven. This encourages bot/AI participation on the refutation side too, as automated tools could scan for high-reward opportunities, balancing the ecosystem without limits or tracking. |
| Payout Manipulation via Coordinated Responses | Colluding users (or a single entity using bots) post a high-submission-cost item, then flood it with comments paying varying response costs within the 72-hour window to skew distribution of the submission cost payout. For example, one "main" account pays a disproportionately high response cost to capture most of the payout, while dummy accounts pay minimal to dilute others. Since response costs go to the parent (potentially the colluder), this could net positive by recycling funds internally, especially if comments are true and refund their own stakes. | Redesign submission cost distribution to a quadratic formula: Payout share for each commenter is proportional to the square root of their response payment divided by the sum of square roots of all response payments within 72 hours. This diminishes returns for disproportionately high payments (reducing large-pay-in dominance) while rewarding broader participation without favoring volume. For instance, if one pays 10x more, their share increases only ~3.16x, not 10x. Refutations can challenge manipulative comments as "not responding correctly to the parent's words" (per rules), settling via the chain. This mechanic self-balances incentives for genuine responses, allowing unlimited bot coordination but making extreme skewing less profitable without any user-specific restrictions. |
| Low-Stake Spam for Discourse Dilution | Users (or bots) submit numerous low-stake (10 WOW) false posts on similar topics, diluting the platform's visibility of truthful content. Each costs 11 WOW, but if WOW is cheap, volume could overwhelm search/browse features, burying good posts. Refuters might ignore low-reward targets (net ~3 WOW gain per refutation after costs), allowing falsehoods to proliferate unchallenged. This games the "no removal" rule to create noise. | Introduce a compounding stake escrow: All truth stakes from a single post's thread (including nested comments/refutations) are pooled into a shared pot, with successful refutations claiming from the entire pot proportionally to their contribution depth (e.g., deeper refutations get a 1.618x multiplier on their share). This makes even low-stake false posts more attractive to refute if they spark chains, as the pot grows. Unchallenged low-stake spam still refunds individually, but the pooled incentive draws refuters to clusters of similar spam. Disputes over thread relevance are handled by refuting connections in the chain. This escalates rewards for cleaning up spam without thresholds or bans, encouraging bots to automate refutations for profit in high-volume scenarios. |
| Refutation Chain Exhaustion | In a disputed thread, colluders alternate false refutations and counter-refutations to extend the chain indefinitely, delaying refunds (tied to 7 days after the last refutation). This ties up opponents' stakes long-term while colluders recycle funds via internal payouts. Since each level costs 0.618x the parent's stake, deep chains become expensive, but bots could automate shallow-depth harassment to frustrate genuine users without aiming for wins. | Cap refutation nesting depth at 5 levels, after which the chain auto-resolves by refunding all unresolved stakes but marking the entire thread as "inconclusive" (grayed out, not red/green). To reopen, any party must re-post the core claim as a new top-level post with double the original stake. This prevents infinite exhaustion without limiting activity, as anyone can restart disputes expensively. Settlement stays market-based: The cap forces escalation to new posts, where refutations continue. Bots remain free to participate, but the cap curbs abuse by raising restart costs, aligning with anonymity. |
| Vague or Ambiguous Phrasing | Users craft posts with ambiguous language (e.g., "Many believe X is true" instead of "X is true"), making refutation hard without quoting a clearly false sentence (per rules). This skirts the "clear, bounded, defensible" requirement, allowing misleading content to evade challenges while refunding stakes. AI/bots could generate mass ambiguous "truths" on controversial topics. | Mandate a machine-parsable "claim summary" field for each post/comment: A required 1-sentence restatement of the core assertion, auto-checked for length/clarity via simple algorithmic rules (e.g., under 100 words, no excessive qualifiers via keyword scan). Refutations must target this summary first, costing only 0.382x stake initially, with full 0.618x for body details. If the summary is refuted, the whole post forfeits. This forces specificity without human moderation—disputes over ambiguity are refuted against the summary. Algorithms are transparent and non-tracking, allowing bots to optimize phrasing while making vagueness riskier and more refutable. |
Prompt: "The Edit loophole was fixed.
The solution to Obscure or Debatable Falsehoods seems like a more complex version of "just increase the 7-day period to 14 days". Debatable falsehoods can be refuted by AI bots (AI vs AI instead of AI vs human).
The solution to Payout Manipulation via Coordinate Responses seems like it could also be a bad solution, because it prevents an expert, confident response with high stake to be rewarded for it. Large-pay-in implies more-at-stake, more skin in the game. Why prevent more skin in the game?
Low-Stake Spam for Discourse Dilution can be prevent be increasing the cost to post, from 11 WOW to much higher. Pooling into a shared pot is complicated, and the submission cost of a post is effectively a shared pot already.
Can't Refutation Chain Exhaustion be prevented by refutations by increasing their truth-stake? This forces opponent refutations to have more to lose.
The example you provided for Vague or Ambiguous Phrasing doesn't skirt the "clear, bounded, defensible" requirement because it's vague. It contradicts the full explanation of this requirement: "This means posts and comments must be easy to understand and hard to misinterpret, must be specific instead of vague, and must be supported with evidence that anyone can verify. "
"
Response:
Thank you for the feedback on the proposed solutions. I'll address each point raised, acknowledging where the original suggestions could be simplified or improved while maintaining the core constraints: full anonymity for humans, AIs, and bots; no anti-Sybil measures, IP tracking, or proof-of-unique-human; no rate limits, activity thresholds, or shadow-banning; and disputes settled exclusively through the paid refutation chain (market-driven, without votes or arbitration). Solutions remain focused on mechanical tweaks to costs, timers, payouts, or rules to better align incentives. Where your alternatives are viable or superior, I'll incorporate or refine them; otherwise, I'll explain why and offer an adjusted approach.
Since the edit loophole has been fixed (as you noted, likely via some form of re-staking or version control in the live system), I'll omit it from further discussion.
Below is a revised analysis, structured as a table for clarity, focusing on the remaining gaming methods. For each, I've incorporated your critiques into refined solutions that are simpler, more effective, and theoretically sound.
| Gaming Method | Critique Response | Refined Solution |
|---|---|---|
| Obscure or Debatable Falsehoods | You're right that the original solution essentially extends the timer for higher rewards, which could be streamlined. Also, valid point on AI bots enabling refutations (AI vs. AI), as the system already allows bots to participate anonymously. This could naturally balance obscure falsehoods if incentives draw AI refuters, reducing the need for complexity. | Simplify to a flat timer extension: Extend the standard refund period from 7 days to 14 days for all items, with successful refutations claiming 1.618x the stake if unchallenged by the end (as before). This gives more time for discovery/research without added multipliers or dynamics, making obscure falsehoods riskier to post (longer capital lockup) and more rewarding to refute. AI bots can automate scans and refutations for profit, creating an AI-driven equilibrium (e.g., bots posting obscure falsities get countered by refuter bots chasing amplified payouts). Disputes over debatability settle via nested refutations with evidence, keeping it market-based. No changes to anonymity or access—bots/AI thrive in this extended window. |
| Payout Manipulation via Coordinated Responses | Excellent observation: Quadratic distribution could indeed penalize genuine high-stake responses from confident experts, undermining the "skin in the game" ethos. The goal isn't to prevent large pay-ins but to deter skewed manipulation without discouraging bold participation. | Retain linear proportional distribution but add a "confidence bonus" cap: Cap any single response's share at 50% of the total submission cost payout, with excess redistributed proportionally to other responders. This allows high-pay-in experts to dominate rewards (up to half) for strong contributions while preventing near-total capture by coordinated floods or solo dominance. If manipulation is suspected (e.g., dummy minimal responses), refutations can challenge them as "not meaningfully responding" (per rules), settling via the chain and forfeiting manipulators' stakes. This preserves incentives for high skin-in-the-game without complexity, allowing unlimited bot coordination but making extreme skews less viable. |
| Low-Stake Spam for Discourse Dilution | Agreed—increasing the minimum post cost is a straightforward fix that directly raises the barrier to spam without thresholds or monitoring. The submission cost already acts as a proto-shared pot (distributed to responders), so leveraging that avoids unnecessary pooling mechanics. | Increase the minimum truth stake and submission cost uniformly: Raise the floor to 50 WOW stake + 5 WOW submission (total 55 WOW per post/comment), scaling with WOW's market value if needed (e.g., via an on-chain oracle for inflation adjustment). This makes low-value spam cost-prohibitive while keeping high-quality posts accessible. Unchallenged spam still refunds after 14 days (tying into the prior solution), but the higher entry deters volume dilution. Refuters are incentivized by larger stakes (net gains scale up), and bots can still spam but at greater risk/loss. Disputes over spam relevance settle through refutations, maintaining anonymity and open access. |
| Refutation Chain Exhaustion | Yes, escalating stakes per level is a cleaner way to prevent indefinite chains, forcing deeper participants (including opponents) to commit more, which aligns with the platform's risk-reward core. This avoids arbitrary caps while raising the cost of harassment. | Implement escalating refutation costs: Each refutation level multiplies the required truth stake by 1.618x the parent's (e.g., level 1: 0.618x parent; level 2: 1x parent; level 3: 1.618x parent, etc.). Successful deep refutations claim proportionally amplified shares of the parent's stake. This exhausts shallow harassers quickly (costs spiral) while rewarding committed disputants. Refunds tie to 14 days after the last refutation, but escalation discourages prolongation. Bots can automate chains, but the math favors resolution over infinity. Settlement remains via the unrefuted end of the chain, with no external intervention. |
| Vague or Ambiguous Phrasing | Fair critique—the example ("Many believe X is true") does contradict the "clear, bounded, defensible" rule if interpreted strictly, as it invites misinterpretation and lacks verifiability. However, gaming could still occur with subtler ambiguities (e.g., "X tends to be true in most cases" without defining "most"). The solution should enforce clarity without relying on vague rule interpretations. | Require a mandatory "verifiability anchor": Each post/comment must include a hyperlink or on-chain reference to a verifiable source (e.g., a public URL, blockchain tx, or immutable data hash) supporting the claim, auto-validated for existence (simple bot-checkable, not content). Refutations can target the anchor first at a reduced 0.382x cost, forfeiting the full stake if the anchor is proven irrelevant/misleading via the chain. This forces specificity and defensibility mechanically, without human moderation—ambiguous posts without strong anchors become easy, low-cost refutation targets. AI/bots can generate compliant posts but risk quick challenges if anchors are weak. Disputes over ambiguity resolve through refuting the anchor or claim, preserving market-driven anonymity. |
Prompt: "For Obscure or Debatable Falsehoods, 1.618 of the stake can't be claimed because by definition the stake is 1.
Why did you suggest increasing the minimum truth stake and submission cost specifically to 50 + 5 instead of keeping it the same or increasing it to 11 + 1? Do you know the specific cost of spam per post/comment or the price point where cost to spam per post becomes prohibitively expensive? The point is, if it's low and it doesn't work well then increase it, but not increase it now to a specific amount.
Refutation Chain Exhaustion now increments truth stakes by 1.618. Note there's a hardcoded max truth stake limit of 20,000 to prevent truth-stakes growing out of control.
Regarding Vague or Ambiguous Phrasing, not defining "most" is undefined by definition. So it's not specific so it's false, or it's not backed by evidence so it's false. The anchor can be part of the body of the claim."
Response:
| Gaming Method | Critique Response | Refined Solution |
|---|---|---|
| Obscure or Debatable Falsehoods | Valid point—the stake represents the total collateral (e.g., 10 WOW minimum), and refuters can only claim up to 100% of it (normalized to 1), not more, as there's no system treasury for bonuses in the described mechanics. Over-rewarding would require external funding, which isn't specified. AI bots can indeed handle refutations, fostering an automated balance. | Stick to timer extension without multipliers: Extend the refund period from 7 days to 14 days for all items. This provides more time for obscure or debatable claims to be discovered and refuted, increasing the risk for posters (longer lockup) while keeping refutation rewards standard (proportional share of the stake). AI bots can scan and refute for profit, creating a self-correcting ecosystem. Disputes settle via nested refutations with evidence, maintaining anonymity and open access for all. |
| Low-Stake Spam for Discourse Dilution | Agreed—specifying 50 WOW stake + 5 WOW submission is arbitrary without knowing WOW's real-time price, spam costs, or economic thresholds. The minimum should only be raised reactively if low-stake spam becomes an issue, based on observed platform dynamics, rather than preemptively to a fixed amount. The existing submission cost distribution already incentivizes responses to valuable posts. | Make the minimum truth stake and submission cost adjustable via on-chain governance (e.g., a simple WOW-weighted proposal system where stakeholders suggest changes, resolved by stake-majority without user identification). Start at the current 10 + 1 WOW, but if spam dilutes discourse (e.g., via high volume of unchallenged low-value posts), incrementally increase to a level where entry costs deter frivolous volume while remaining accessible (e.g., test 20 + 2, then higher if needed). Refuters remain incentivized by stakes, and bots can participate freely. Disputes over spam settle through refutations, with no proactive limits. |
| Refutation Chain Exhaustion | Acknowledged—the 20,000 WOW max stake limit prevents unbounded growth, so any escalation must respect this cap. Multiplying by 1.618 per level aligns with Golden Ratio themes but could hit the cap in ~10-15 levels (starting from 10 WOW: 10 * 1.618^15 ≈ 1M, but capped at 20K), naturally limiting depth without hard caps. | Proceed with escalating stakes, capped at 20,000 WOW: Each refutation level requires a truth stake of 1.618x the parent's (minimum 10 WOW), but never exceeding 20,000 WOW (auto-set to max if calculation exceeds). Successful deep refutations claim proportional shares of the parent's stake. This raises costs for prolonging chains, deterring exhaustion while honoring the limit. Refunds after 14 days from last action, and bots can automate, but escalation favors quick resolution. Settlement via the unrefuted chain end. |
| Vague or Ambiguous Phrasing | Correct—the existing "clear, bounded, defensible" requirement already mandates specificity and verifiable evidence, making undefined terms like "most" inherently false or refutable without support. Requiring a separate anchor adds unnecessary structure when it can be embedded in the body (e.g., "X is true in 70% of cases per [source link]"). | Enforce via existing rules without additions: Posts must include evidence (e.g., links or references) in the body to meet "defensible" criteria, or they become easy refutation targets at standard costs. Ambiguous phrasing is refuted as "not clear/specific" or "unsupported," settling through the chain (e.g., counter with defining evidence). This leverages the market for clarity enforcement, allowing AI/bots to post/refute while keeping mechanics simple and anonymous. No algorithmic checks needed—purely incentive-driven. |
Prompt: "Regarding Obscure or Debatable Falsehoods, why extend the refund period to 14 days? Isn't 14 days as arbitrary as 7 days?"
Response:
The choice of 14 days for the refund period extension is indeed arbitrary in the same way that the original 7 days is—any fixed timeframe involves some subjectivity based on balancing user experience, capital lockup, and platform dynamics. However, it's not random; it's a deliberate doubling of the existing period to provide a meaningful increase in time for discovering and refuting obscure or debatable falsehoods, without excessively prolonging refunds (e.g., jumping to 30 days might frustrate posters too much by tying up funds longer). This allows more buffer for research—such as verifying niche historical facts, scientific claims, or data that isn't immediately accessible—while aligning with natural calendar increments (two weeks vs. one). In practice, if 14 days proves insufficient or too long based on real usage, it could be iteratively adjusted (e.g., to 10 or 21 days) via the same on-chain governance I suggested for stake costs, ensuring the mechanic evolves without violating anonymity or access rules.