On 3/1/2022 12:39 AM, Billy Tetrud wrote:
This entire issue is avoided completely, if all the chains
--decentralized and centralized-- and in the same monetary unit.
Then, the monetary network effects never interfere, and the
decentralized chain is always guaranteed to exist.
It sounds like what you're saying is that without side chains,
everyone might switch entirely to some altcoin and bitcoin will
basically die. And at that point, the insecurity of that coin people
switched to can be heavily exploited by some attacker(s). Is that right?
Yes, precisely.
Its an interesting thought experiment. However, it leads me to wonder:
if a sidechain gets so popular that it dominates the main chain, why
would people keep that main chain around at all?
For some reason, this is a very popular question. I suppose if you believe in "one size fits all"
chain philosophy (see comment below), it makes sense to say "these sidechains are terrible" on
Monday and then "these sidechains are so good they will replace the mainchain" on Tuesday.
In any event, sidechains cannot exist without their mainchain (as I see it).
For example, imagine that you are on a zcash sidechain, and someone claims they
deposited 1000 BTC, from Bitcoin Core into this sidechain? Do you give them
1000 z-BTC, or not? Without the mainchain,
you can't tell.
If you run the Bip300 DriveNet demo software (drivechain.info/releases), you
will see for yourself: the test-sidechains are absolutely inert, UNTIL they
have rpc access to the mainchain. (Exactly the same way that a LN node needs a
Bitcoin Core node.)
> someone is actually in the wrong, if they proactively censor an
experiment of any type. If a creator is willing to stand behind
something, then it should be tried.
> it makes no difference if users have their funds stolen from a
centralized Solana contract or from a bip300 centralized bit-Solana
sidechain. I don't see why the tears shed would be any different.
I agree with you. My point was not that we should stop anyone from
doing this. My point was only that we shouldn't advocate for ideas we
think aren't good. You were advocating for a "largeblock sidechain",
and unless you have good reasons to think that is an idea likely to
succeed and want to share them with us, then you shouldn't be
advocating for that. But certainly if someone *does* think so and has
their own reasons, I wouldn't want to censor or stop them. But I
wouldn't advocate for them to do it unless their ideas were convincing
to me, because I know enough to know the dangers of large block
blockchains.
Yes, I strongly agree, that we should only advocate for ideas we believe in.
I do not believe in naive layer1 largeblockerism. But I do believe in sidechain
largeblockism.
Something funny once happened to me when I was on a Bitcoin conference panel*.
There were three people: myself, a Blockstream person, and an (ex)BitPay
person. The first two of us, were valiantly defending the small block position.
I gave my usual speech: that node costs must remain low, so that people can run
full nodes. The largeblocker mentioned that they ran many nodes (including BCH
nodes etc) and didn't mind the cost, so I disclosed --in a good-natured way--
that I do not even run a BTC full node myself (out of choice). Thus, I was
yammering about software I wasn't even running, I had no skin in the game! Lo
and behold -- my Blockstream smallblocker ally-on-the-panel, immediately
admitted to everyone that he did not run a full node either. The only
node-runner was the largeblocker. The audience found this very amusing (as did
I).
We smallblockers, justified our sinful nodeless behavior, as follows
(paraphrasing): we receive BTC mainly from people that we know (and have a
long-term relationship with); our receipts are not time sensitive; we are not
paid in BTC that often; if payments turned out to be forged we would have
enormous recourse against our counterparties; etc.
We did not run full nodes, because we did not need to draw on the blockchain's
powers, **for those transactions**.
Which is my point: people are different, and transactions are different. I make
many transactions today, with VISA or Venmo. These are not
censorship-resistant, but somehow I survive the month, without bursting into
flames.
Wouldn't life be better, if we Bitcoiners could easily sweep those fiat
transactions into *some* part of the BTC universe? (For example, a family of
largeblock sidechains). To me the answer is clearly yes.
Unlike layer1-largeblockism, no one running Bitcoin Core ever needs to see
these 'btc' transactions (the same as we don't see them today, on account of
them not existing at all); they do not burden Bitcoin Core full nodes. Hence
why it seems like a good idea to me.
An SPV-wallet-of-a-largeblock-sidechain, is of course, a *disgrace* compared to a
full-node-of-smallblock-mainchain-Bitcoin-Core. But, it is emphatically superior to Venmo
/ VISA or even "custodial LN". And certainly superior to nothing.
Paul
*https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3cvH2eWqfU
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