Return-Path: Received: from smtp1.osuosl.org (smtp1.osuosl.org [IPv6:2605:bc80:3010::138]) by lists.linuxfoundation.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id A5250C000E for ; Fri, 5 Nov 2021 14:45:48 +0000 (UTC) Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by smtp1.osuosl.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8197E82531 for ; Fri, 5 Nov 2021 14:45:48 +0000 (UTC) X-Virus-Scanned: amavisd-new at osuosl.org X-Spam-Flag: NO X-Spam-Score: -2.1 X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-2.1 tagged_above=-999 required=5 tests=[BAYES_00=-1.9, DKIM_SIGNED=0.1, DKIM_VALID=-0.1, DKIM_VALID_AU=-0.1, DKIM_VALID_EF=-0.1, RCVD_IN_MSPIKE_H3=0.001, RCVD_IN_MSPIKE_WL=0.001, SPF_HELO_PASS=-0.001, SPF_PASS=-0.001] autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no Authentication-Results: smtp1.osuosl.org (amavisd-new); dkim=pass (2048-bit key) header.d=cock.li Received: from smtp1.osuosl.org ([127.0.0.1]) by localhost (smtp1.osuosl.org [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10024) with ESMTP id 47QdFJv4mwFS for ; Fri, 5 Nov 2021 14:45:47 +0000 (UTC) X-Greylist: from auto-whitelisted by SQLgrey-1.8.0 Received: from mail.cock.li (mail.cock.li [37.120.193.124]) by smtp1.osuosl.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id F22F482525 for ; Fri, 5 Nov 2021 14:45:46 +0000 (UTC) MIME-Version: 1.0 DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/simple; d=cock.li; s=mail; t=1636123538; bh=jRDm/9YEfg7FhR1b3kj1r+6Fi06BIQ3IEBVIY+sM/G8=; h=Date:From:To:Cc:Subject:In-Reply-To:References:From; b=avjRwQ3+1fgWvxr5cF/lpj4AbGOwBOyH4qPwUQVyNdryLrafB2wfSyJijD5uWya5y 3G+RvtSTvA/Yr1VDAd3DGYvJe143ppIpIuyFvQbduxfQoDZqo5iOPG+xMlZaLTEf3/ tiWGkAiHMMr//YMMUI4gcYPK3psVZHuX7o7yyfRxUqlDJqRQFaoH1uNgK3alNGHpEH ppacBevGYz308aipmsYN9AM5yz2RXQzvKjWycAVNLyA7owvzpXsjhuus5TmUmPqEnp xX+X7olIlpYixSyaFmhZlZ2PqQCbRaV+NW5Fzg+ZnJliFS9DtKbRPLoRoB8sqgraC7 NYDZXquW68Ofg== Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Date: Fri, 05 Nov 2021 14:45:36 +0000 From: yanmaani@cock.li To: Prayank , Bitcoin Protocol Discussion In-Reply-To: References: <20211020192054.GA117785@jauntyelephant.191.37.198.vultr.com> Message-ID: <3d686c3a100338514c3ebcc264ec24f2@cock.li> X-Sender: yanmaani@cock.li User-Agent: Roundcube Webmail/1.3.16 X-Mailman-Approved-At: Fri, 05 Nov 2021 14:57:59 +0000 Subject: Re: [bitcoin-dev] bitcoin.org missing bitcoin core version 22.0 X-BeenThere: bitcoin-dev@lists.linuxfoundation.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.15 Precedence: list List-Id: Bitcoin Protocol Discussion List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Fri, 05 Nov 2021 14:45:48 -0000 On 2021-11-05 08:17, Prayank via bitcoin-dev wrote: > What followed it (whitepaper being shared on different websites) was > true decentralization and we need something similar in other aspects > of full node implementations. Few things that can improve > decentralization: > > 1.More people using alternative full node implementations. Right now > 98% of nodes use Bitcoin Core. Unfortunately, this isn't really possible. If they did that, you could get consensus splits. This is why all the other stuff is so important - if Bitcoin is subverted via soft-fork, you *can't* just run your own fork. Theoretically, I suppose you could run two implementations and do something if they differ, but what? 1. Bitcoin Core and both say block is valid -> valid 2. Bitcoin Core and both say block is invalid -> invalid 3. Bitcoin Core says valid, says invalid -> valid (or get forked off) 4. Bitcoin Core says invalid, says valid -> invalid (or hardfork) > 2.More people like Luke Dashjr and Amir Taaki who do not simp for > anyone. Being a contributor or maintainer in Bitcoin full node > implementation is different from other open source projects. It was > never going to be easy and it will get difficult with time, This is all about the money - it's easy to have people be independent when their source of money is independent. But nobody's crazy enough to bite the hand that feeds them, and you couldn't really build a system on that basis. Our best hope is gentle hands, or contributors wealthy enough not to have to care. (Whatever happened to Amir Taaki, by the way?) > 3.More people from different countries getting involved in important > roles. Isn't Bitcoin already plenty distributed? Funding people in under-represented countries seems to me like a textbook exercise in 'box-ticking, but moreover, I'd frankly rather have reasonably well-off guys from Western Europe/America who have the financial backbone to not worry that much about attacks to their funding, than mercenaries who have to follow orders or get fired. Even if they're from West Uzbekistan. (Maybe they need a union?) > 4.Few anons. Gonna guess you mean "a few anons," not fewer anons. Again, problem is money. These days, nobody threatens anyone with anything substantive, like murder - the threats all involve cutting off some funding. So having anonymous people being funded by non-robust sources doesn't really buy you that much, because the weakest link will pretty much never be the de-jure, legal freedom of an individual. Having a system that allows people to fund anonymous people better would be interesting, but it has some challenges with trust and so on. > 5.Individuals and organizations who fund different Bitcoin projects > should consider contributing in alternative. full node implementations > as well. Maybe start with Bitcoin Knots. See above. Bitcoin Knots isn't really independent. btcd in Go is, so I guess they could try that. But at the end of the day, it wouldn't help - btcd has to be bug-for-bug compatible with Core, and it couldn't really be any other way. For my $0.05, what's needed is more "hard money" - if people could make donations into a fund, with the fund then paying out to developers, and that fund be controlled in a civilized and non-centralized way (that's the hard part!), this would somewhat insulate developers from people threatening to stop their contributions to The Fund, at the price of having developers being able to be coerced by The Fund. You could also look into a system like Monero's CCS. But at the end of the day, funding is really a very difficult problem, no matter how you slice it. The money still has to enter the system somehow. Since Bitcoin is a public good, you can't really capture its value, and this means individuals who can (e.g. by malicious activity) will always have the leg up.