Why One Bitcoin Core Developer Thinks Cryptocurrencies Have A Dreadful Future

[tokeweed]

I just want to hear opinions on the possibilities of different scenarios.  And in this one, what if Peter Todd was right.  What would happen?  Good?  Bad?

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[Lauda]

What does old age have to do with beliefs? Wisdom is the perspective created by large collection of truths. Learning takes time. Life is OJT.

Try convincing a 70 year old to use Bitcoin, then try a 20 year old. Your results will answer your questions.

That't really normal.
Bitcoin is not perfect, it still have a lot of problem to be solved.
No one really know the future of bitcoin.

that's my point, he should talk about how to solve those problem that would bring faith again to bitcoin, instead he is spreading funds, that from a dev can have even more of a bad impact

Indeed. Calling out the problems everywhere doesn't help anyone. We already know most of the problems of today, and possibly some of tomorrow. People should rather focus on finding and presenting solutions than complaining about the current situation.

[cbeast]

Countries that claim to be ruled by law have no legitimate reason to treat Bitcoin different than any other assets. Bitcoin can also resist unlawful states. It's funny nothing in his perspective has any historical references. He seems to repeat the mistakes of other cynics regarding scientific breakthroughs.

[ChuckBuck]

Wrong or right, good thing Bitcoin is a consensus decentralized open source invention that doesn't bend to the whim of one person or one party.

Bitcoin has it's faults and rough edges.  It's not perfect and will go through some growing pains and regulatory hoops.  That's what I took personally from that article about Peter Todd.   

[Ron~Popeil]

I tend to agree with his concerns, but they are not issues that are impossible to overcome. The ten minute confirmation time is really the only immovable object in the list and even that can be overcome with crypto payment processors. The title is quite misleading. He shares his concerns but doesn't quite forecast bitcoin doomsday.

I do think we should listen to people like this. If we simply pretend it is all sunshine and roses these issues are less likely to be addressed in a timely manner.

[CtrlAltBernanke420]

Altcoin's in general will always be able to circumvent the governments, but when he mentions only like 3 companies in the world are capable of producing the hardware to mine, and are going to want on/off switches… It is not end game for crypto but a very sizable constricting point.

The value of alt coins likely won't ever match that of the potential of bitcoin, but if bitcoin is forced into a centralized model, that's it for bitcoin.


The unlimited resources of the government, and the very purpose of government, will absolutely attack whatever threatens it, if bitcoin is a threat, it will be attacked, changed, molded. Do not think even if the .gov fails, they won't go down without a raging fight.

[leopard2]

I have said this before and I say it again, the usage of dedicated hardware is a huge risk because it leads to some sort of centralization that can be used by the Dark forces to attack BTC, just like he says.

HOWEVER this is simple to circumvent, it is always possible to change the algo to something that can only be done by GPU's or CPU's again - and it is not realistically possible to require licensed for those. Or, if the bad guys start monitoring electricity usage, use a POS solution. NXT requires no mining at all.

I do not agree with Todd about the risks of regulating the core protocol because it is impossible to force the majority to support a compilation that supports stuff like blacklisting. 

Weak points are the fiat conversion and the dedicated hardware, that's for sure.

[cbeast]

I have said this before and I say it again, the usage of dedicated hardware is a huge risk because it leads to some sort of centralization that can be used by the Dark forces to attack BTC, just like he says.

HOWEVER this is simple to circumvent, it is always possible to change the algo to something that can only be done by GPU's or CPU's again - and it is not realistically possible to require licensed for those. Or, if the bad guys start monitoring electricity usage, use a POS solution. NXT requires no mining at all.

I do not agree with Todd about the risks of regulating the core protocol because it is impossible to force the majority to support a compilation that supports stuff like blacklisting. 

Weak points are the fiat conversion and the dedicated hardware, that's for sure.

How are GPUs and CPUs not dedicated hardware? Are they all identical? Are their architectures public domain? If your algo benefits from one over another what's to stop that manufacturer from making special deals?

[Kprawn]

But what if...  just what if, what he wrote proved to be right?

Most of what he said, is genuine concerns.... but we all know that we do not have control over the law makers, who implement these stupid laws and regulations.

Do we change the Bitcoin protocol or do we change the minds and views of these lawmakers with our votes?

He is a Core developer.... ffs ...if he jump ship, at the sight of the smallest wave, many will follow. Core developers are the captains of the ship, they should navigate us out of trouble or go down with the ship.

At this stage, it looks like he is abandoning ship, to climb onto a possible bigger ship, in the hope that it will also not go down with his previous ship.

All of these ships, make up a fleet, under the banner of "Crypto currencies" ....no matter what ship you sail on... governments can sink them all. 

[Lethn]

He is a Core developer.... ffs ...if he jump ship, at the sight of the smallest wave, many will follow. Core developers are the captains of the ship, they should navigate us out of trouble or go down with the ship.

They have absolutely no obligation to do that, I think we all knew awhile back that special interests like the Bitcoin foundation among others would try to ruin Bitcoin and this is going to be part of what does it, I think the biggest trouble will happen if you ever have legislators trying to make changes to the code themselves at which point you can expect an immediate exodus.

[cbeast]

He is a Core developer.... ffs ...if he jump ship, at the sight of the smallest wave, many will follow. Core developers are the captains of the ship, they should navigate us out of trouble or go down with the ship.

They have absolutely no obligation to do that, I think we all knew awhile back that special interests like the Bitcoin foundation among others would try to ruin Bitcoin and this is going to be part of what does it, I think the biggest trouble will happen if you ever have legislators trying to make changes to the code themselves at which point you can expect an immediate exodus.

This is a problem with every volunteer organization that ever existed. It's called a schizm.

There is no such thing as a Core developer other than anyone that contributes some bugfixes to the code or contributes features to Github. Few developers agree on features and many have left Bitcoin to make altcoins. Most of them have no concept of security and consensus. The one notable exception was Satoshi himself. But nobody knows where he went or what he is doing.

[Joint Force]

Don't worry, DAOs to the rescue.

[WhatTheGox]

Interesting outlook from Peter Todd.  And a must read... whole.

https://medium.com/zapchain-magazine/why-one-bitcoin-developer-thinks-cryptocurrencies-have-a-dreadful-future-93007cff1613

Peter todd has a constructive critical take on bitcoin it seems there is no harm in that.  When people are debating something strongly its because its popular, we want bitcoin to be popular.

[Q7]

Adding identity information to bitcoin transactions and making it possible to blacklist fund

Something that i would not agree on. As much as i want bitcoin to turn into mainstream adoption, adding some form of regulatory control may not necessarily instill the confidence and especially when it is done in the expense of sacrificing privacy. It's against the core principle on why bitcoin exists in the first place

The rest i would acknowledge the weaknesses in terms of double spending and confirmation time which pretty much we have to live with and accept as part of bitcoin. These are the areas that we can't do much considering the size of the network right now