Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/OpenTimestamps

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was no consensus defaulting to keep and w/o prejudice to a future renomination. Ad Orientem (talk) 01:50, 17 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

OpenTimestamps (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)

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Non-notable software. The non-primary sources in the article are three mentions in this paper (search only "opent" or it won't find all mentions), a student paper, and Bitcoin Magazine. Џ 15:41, 25 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I attach some other non-primary sources:

• Immutability of Open Data through Distributed Storage, Keio University (Japan), Graduation Thesis
• Providing Reliable Log Delivery And Integrity of Logs, Tallinn University of Technology, Master Thesis
• How to achieve trustless digital timestamping with zero marginal cost, Politecnico di Milano, "Tesi di Laurea"
• Difficulties of Timestamping Archived Web Pages, Old Dominion University (Norfolk, VA)

I consider OpenTimestamps is notable for a Wikipedia article. It provides a robust decentralized timestamping format, and it is already used by many notary services and companies.

--FrankAndProust (talk) 18:49, 25 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I specify here the arXiv document presented by the OP to better recognize the title and further facilitate ongoing debate if necessary.

• (Short Paper) Towards More Reliable Bitcoin Timestamps, Singapore University of Technology and Design

The Bitcoin Magazine article introduced by the OP is also published on NASDAQ:

• OpenTimestamps Has Timestamped the Entire Internet Archive — Here’s How

--FrankAndProust (talk) 15:12, 26 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Internet-related deletion discussions. Bakazaka (talk) 20:25, 25 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Software-related deletion discussions. Bakazaka (talk) 20:25, 25 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The first three sources are student papers (Italian one says "Tesi di Laurea di/Thesis of") which probably don't qualify as reliable sources. The fourth mentions it five times, but only along with other similar services.

1. Page 5 "Services, such as OriginStamp 4 , Chainpoint 5 , and OpenTimestamps 6 , generate trusted timestamps in Bitcoin for digital documents. Even though timestamping steps might vary from one service to another, they follow a common procedure:"
2. Page 6 "Other services, such as Chainpoint, Tangible.io 7, Proof of Existence 8, and OpenTimestamps, are based on the same concept of using Bitcoin to timestamp digital documents. Some differences between these tools include:"
3. Next three on page 7 "Services like OriginStamp, ChainPoint, and OpenTimestamps support issuing either one Bitcoin transaction per submitted hash or one transaction per aggregated hash."
4. "Chainpoint and OpenTimestamps uses a Merkle Tree [24] to generate one aggregated hash (i.e., root hash)."
5. "Chainpoint and OpenTimestamps require installing client software in order to use the timestamping service" Џ 12:24, 26 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete as it stands - no RS coverage, academic sources are passing mentions in sources that don't even meet the standard of peer-reviewed single study - David Gerard (talk) 10:50, 26 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

We could delve on other papers, but at least the document "Providing Reliable Log Delivery And Integrity of Logs", from Tallinn University of Technology, is a Master Thesis and it has been supervised by a PhD working as a Senior Research Fellow. --FrankAndProust (talk) 16:14, 26 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment The project may not be quite relevant from a purely academic perspective, but it is for practical applications.
  OpenTimestamps does not make use of novel techniques to perform its tasks; the main idea behind it can be found in this paper Improving the Efficiency and Reliability of Digital Time-Stamping, D. Bayer, S. Haber, W.S. Stornetta, 1993 (which is itself cited in the Bitcoin whitepaper), with the main difference that instead of using newspaper advertisment it uses a Bitcoin transaction (or something else, as the project tries to be more abstract). In addition OTS aims to perform a single task, making it easy to embed it in other services (e.g. timestamp database logs, timestamp git commits), but also too simple to raise academic interest. Due to these reasons, it is not simple to submit an academic paper with OTS as a topic or to start a PhD with it as a subject.
  In my opinion, OTS is notable and this article is relevant as it provides a high-level description of an open-source software which brings users with a new possibilty: to easily create and independently verify timestamps of their data without the need to trust the timestamp server. In the use cases section there is a list of relevant use cases enabled by OTS.
  Would the lack of reliable academic papers citing OTS be enough to delete the page?
  In which ways should this article be improved to avoid deletion?
  Should it be more adherent to the style guidelines?
  Thank you in advance. --LeoComandini (talk) 10:21, 30 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep: OpenTimestamps is notable for a Wikipedia article. It provides a robust decentralized timestamping format, and it is already used by many notary services and companies.
  There is already an academic paper which has been reviewed by a Senior Research Fellow at University of Tallinn. Additionally, the article at NASDAQ provides a simple technical perspective of OpenTimestamps and may also be considered a reliable source. --FrankAndProust (talk) 10:24, 2 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Literally a crypto blog reprint in their blog, so no it can't - David Gerard (talk) 12:42, 2 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Reproducing an article verbatim does not invalidate the fact that it has been published by NASDAQ. Many reliable news organizations also publish verbatim reports by agencies worldwide. Those reports are usually reviewed to a certain extent before being published by the new media brand.--FrankAndProust (talk) 14:12, 2 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

NASDAQ is not a news source, let alone a WP:RS - it's the blog of an exchange. NASDAQ blog reposts of crypto blogs are generally treated as crypto blogs. This strongly suggests you don't in fact have good sources - David Gerard (talk) 16:20, 2 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

NASDAQ is nothing less than the second largest stock exchange in the world, which is owned by Nasdaq Inc, a multinational financial services corporation. I wouldn't dismiss their publication as a common blog.

I post a new document published by Springer Science+Business Media. It is a poster paper written by Peter Todd, the original developer of OpenTimestamps, and by Harry Halpin, a Senior Research Scientist at Massachusetts Institute of Technology:

• Poster papers, "OpenTimestamps: Securing Software Updates Using the Bitcoin Blockchain"
  It is part of the book "Financial Cryptography and Data Security" 21st International Conference, FC 2017, Sliema, Malta, April 3-7, 2017, Revised Selected Papers. I hope this new paper adds to the previous documents and it is favorably evaluated to consider OpenTimestamps as notable for a Wikipedia article.--FrankAndProust (talk) 17:50, 2 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

NASDAQ states on the bottom of the republished Bitcoin Magazine article: "The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc." That paper with Peter Todd as a co-author doesn't add to notability either since it's not independent Џ 00:13, 4 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It can be considered independent within reason. AFAIK, the publisher (Springer) is not closely affiliated with OpenTimestamps, which is anyway an open-source project to manage decentralized proofs of existence. The fact that Springer, a firm with reputation for fact-checking and accuracy, agrees to publish this study on a book of revised selected papers, assists on the notability to the subject.--FrankAndProust (talk) 13:03, 4 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

FYI here is a recent reference from Nature: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-00447-9 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2605:8D80:606:AE44:2848:EC71:1414:271E (talk) 05:13, 5 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Here's one more which appears to be peer reviewed; the reviewers specifically asked for OpenTimestamps to be mentioned: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/29167732/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2605:8D80:606:AE44:2848:EC71:1414:271E (talk) 06:37, 5 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

• Weak Keep per the Nature ref. power~enwiki (π, ν) 05:10, 7 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Coverage in a major blockchain-related news site: https://news.bitcoin.com/bitcoins-blockchain-timestamping-standards-face-off/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2605:8D80:605:3FE1:B1B3:FB2:6C7E:D1F6 (talk) 05:13, 9 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

• Weak Keep ... Per a scan of scholar citations and arguments above and importance of timestamps/security.Djm-leighpark (talk) 07:23, 9 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.