Each coloured line = one user’s net ⊙ position over time · same IOU amounts, same receivers, same random senders — only the record-keeping differs
⚠ Large user counts may slow or freeze your browser. The effect is equally clear at 1K users.
A · CONVENTIONAL — random sender, full history
Sender chosen uniformly at random · all records kept forever
min —
max —
mean —
SD —
crossings —
live records —
IOUs —
IOUs/s —
B · IOUNet — same senders, history erased at zero-crossings
Identical random sender selection · records permanently deleted when balance crosses zero
min —
max —
mean —
SD —
crossings —
live records —
IOUs —
IOUs/s —
debt eliminated —
What you’re watching: Both panels receive the same IOUs — identical amounts, identical recipients, identical senders, tick by tick. The only difference is what happens to the records.
Panel A is a conventional system: every record stored forever. Lines drift away from zero and stay there.
Panel B applies one IOUNet rule: zero-crossing erasure. When a user’s net balance crosses zero, their prior records have cancelled mathematically — those IOUs are permanently deleted. In the chart you can see each line reset to zero at the moment of cancellation, with only the post-crossing history visible. The live records stat shows how much history has already been destroyed.
Privacy is not a policy promise. It is a mathematical consequence of settlement. The records self-destruct because the debt cancelled.