In my last article I argued that Bitcoin Cash is nobody's project, but we as a community collectively own and manage it.
But what if there was someone who owned Bitcoin Cash? And could implement any changes he'd like? What would that mean for the project?
I'll argue that it would severely undermine Bitcoin Cash and make it unsuitable as peer-to-peer digital cash for the world.
First some important properties a cryptocurrency should have:
Transactions cannot be censored.
The supply cannot be manipulated.
There are other properties, but to me these are the two most important properties that makes cryptocurrencies stand out from other alternatives.
Now what if there was someone in control of Bitcoin Cash? Someone who could change the protocol in whatever way they wanted to? What would change?
Everything.
This person could censor transactions by implementing blacklists on the protocol level or steal coins from arbitrary addresses, making Bitcoin Cash censurable. It's the same fear some people have with most mining being located in China, as it might allow China to censor the protocol, but concentrated to a single person.
Ethereum did something similar after the DAO hack when they rerouted funds from a wallet outside their control, essentially breaking the contract of the Ethereum protocol. Most of the Ethereum community seems to be content to let Vitalik do whatever he wants with the protocol, essentially making him the dictator of Ethereum.
The supply could also be manipulated by changing the emission schedule or simply give himself a million BCH, destroying the soundness of Bitcoin Cash while doing so.
In short if Bitcoin Cash were dictated by a single person it would undermine the core properties that make up a decentralized currency.
Luckily no single person controls Bitcoin Cash so this is all preventable. Instead it's the community; the users, exchanges, payment processors, miners and other stakeholders that together control Bitcoin Cash, and they have the power to together block these changes.
But it requires us to be active. It requires us to be informed and above all it requires us to take action to prevent changes such as changing the supply limit or reversing transactions.
It's like a democracy. The voters have the power, but if nobody votes then we'll give that power away. And if we, the Bitcoin Cash community, truly want to be peer-to-peer digital cash for the world then we cannot allow anyone to assume the role of benevolent dictator over the protocol. Not Gregory Maxwell, not Amaury SΓ©chet and not even Satoshi.
The battle for the leadership of Bitcoin Cash isn't just important, it's essential.
It's a very informative post. I'm glad that no one is owning BCH but (WE) the people who use it.
It answer some of my question in minde. Thanks for this write up.
Who would it be. π
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Π‘ΠΏΠ°ΡΠΈΠ±ΠΎ ΠΠ°ΠΌ Π·Π° ΡΡΡ ΡΡΠ°ΡΡΡ, ΡΡΠΎ Ρ ΠΎΡΠΎΡΠ΅Π΅ ΠΏΠΎΠ½ΠΈΠΌΠ°Π½ΠΈΠ΅.
Actually it made me think
hahah if they had an owner they would be like The Dictator played by Sacha Baron Cohen!
I'm actually quite intrigued how bitcoin affects in larger economy as a whole. I'm still new at bitcoin though, this is a good insight.
Thank you sir for your valuable article. π
simply give himself a million BCH
People may think this is some far-fetched occurrence. But most often, it happens for other reasons, like "exchange got hacked".
March 2019: Bitcoin Candy printed 1B tokens to socialize compensate losses from an exchange/pool attack.
Or how the Ethereum Core developers were personally affected by the DAO hack.
For the beneficial and stability of cryptos, there should be a leader especially in core development which is very crucial to its existance . This leader/s have the core values of developing the project to a real decentralize ecosystem and give way, when it reach that level This what crypto promise from the very beginning..
It's a good thing that BCH doesn't have an owner. Like what you've said, if there's a owner, everything will be manipulated and controlled from transactions and such.
The battle for leadership is important as long the leaders work to put BCH on top that is crucial then they have my support and I believe from the community, the problem with leaderships is that many use it in their own behalf but I am sure in Bitcoin Cash that won't be possible, great Articleπ
we are alone the owner of our own BCH( just in my opinion) . π€. Anyway i really love to read articles of yours specially about BCH and Cryptocutrency. BCH one of the most used and convenient online currency for processing transactions and soon to be in trading . Hopefully, an independent crypto in the market which is beneficial to users BCH. i may not have basic knowledgebinto it butt i want to learn more ( just correct me if im wrong sir) you did a great job emphasizing each point on every article you do.
We as a Fastgrowing community should definitely be active. Sin
Sure, and cool movie the great dictator. π
But don't it really have an owner
Very good take on the recent claims. It's good to keep insisting on community values until we truly have multiple mining nodes with equal distribution.
Internet Explorer in the early days was introducing a lot of crazy ideas into web without going through community or any standardization because they had the majority share. We have to learn from history, WWW improved significantly when different browsers worked together and had a healthy competition with each other.
Another good article. I'm glad no one in particular owns Bitcoin Cash. I am in crypto because of the decentralization. Hopefully it stays that way.
My first read. Very great article you've got here. For me, when it comes to currency, no one person should have autonomy over a particular one. Imagine the case of Mansard Musa over gold (very close call).
Thanks you for this article this give such a valuable answers that's been a question in my head since #BCH appear in the cryptocurrency market. Well done ππ
Is not clear that it has. Otherwise why is the miscomspeaction between bch after it got forked. Abc and vcs.
If BCH had a owner probably the fees might be increase due to the interest of the owner
Yes, there is an owner of Bitcoin Cash. That's me. I created it and I own almost all of it. Here's proof: π
https://memo.cash/explore/tx/4c846297e4e194b298bcdafcd9512d6ab6c3336b520e75689a1cd3c8f9514f7f
https://memo.cash/token/4c846297e4e194b298bcdafcd9512d6ab6c3336b520e75689a1cd3c8f9514f7f?balances
I can't believe it I found you!!
The long search is over unless our @Telesfor change his username again hopefully not π
Wow really. Can't believe this. Now I know who's the Owner of #BCH #BitcoinCash kudos to you sir π @Telesfor such a humble person. π
More project to #BCH hopefully To see it
I can't believe it is you. Huhu. I barely excited to know you
Wow, sir, I can't believe that you are the owner of BCH. You are a humble person. Amazing sir! BCH for the win. Kudos to you sirππ
We have this same reaction dear π€£ππ€£ππ€£..
Transactions cannot be censored
But developers can censor transactions if they wanted, in their version of the node. The question for you is: What are the checks and balances here? And I would argue, as I did before, that there are alternatives that people can use instead -- if the lead developer went off the rails and started doing things like this.
The supply could also be manipulated by changing the emission schedule or simply give himself a million BCH, destroying the soundness of Bitcoin Cash while doing so.
Again, that would destroy the soundness of Bitcoin Cash, so it's outside the realm of reasonable things to do as long as their is competing currencies. Bitcoin Cash is not the entirety of the world, and it has no army to force you to use it.
Luckily no single person controls Bitcoin Cash so this is all preventable
This is only true insomuchas there are outside checks and balances that impact price and user base.
TLDR Bitcoin Cash is centralized and the solution is to move the entire community to a new coin, losing the all-imoortant network effect effectively gutting it.
This is a non-solution and if it's the only way out then Bitcoin Cash and the whole cryptocurrency space is a big fat failure.
Good
A very important article. If you allow me I can spread this article among my friends in my country now in my own Bengali language. Of course I can translate in my own language if you allow. Let's read the important article and gain knowledge about the article.
Link to the original article and you can translate any article you want.
Thanks dear.
interesting article dear ππ
Keep sharing
Luckily no single person controls Bitcoin Cash so this is all preventable. Instead it's the community; the users, exchanges, payment processors, miners and other stakeholders that together control Bitcoin Cash, and they have the power to together block these changes.
No your wrong i own the intire bch on my wallet hahaha βοΈ