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The DAO Disaster Illustrates Differing Philosophies in Bitcoin and Ethereum

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Re: The DAO Disaster Illustrates Differing Philosophies in Bitcoin and Ethereum

#11

Post by jacquesm »

nxzero wrote: post #7

>> "it seems that funds can still be reverse under certain circumstances" Maybe it's me, but ideas like being able to reverse funds do not belong in crypto currencies. If risk is presented, escrow the transfer, buy insurance, etc. Why are people so unwilling to take responsibility for themselves?

> Why are people so unwilling to take responsibility for themselves?

This question - and the answer - has implications far outside of crypto currencies and you could probably write very large books about it. It goes to the heart of why we have religions and many other social phenomena.

Re: The DAO Disaster Illustrates Differing Philosophies in Bitcoin and Ethereum

#12

Post by aakilfernandes »

croon wrote: post #10
onestone wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. The ability to reach consensus within a community does not necessarily imply centralization.

Genuine question: As a self-described fairly intelligent tech person, the blockchain and its working is still fairly magical to me, so answer me this: Would it be theoretically possible for big players on the market (read EvilCorp) to push the market over to a fork by convincing enough of its cronies to make the switch? I'm assuming what you mean is that market consensus is (at least) 51% of the market accepting the…

While I would hardly describe the players as "EvilCorp", or "Cronies", thats exactly what is happening now.

If the protocol developers and exchanges switch to a fork, there's very little the community can do.

Sticking with the former chain is difficult because 1) everyone else is calling a different chain "Ethereum" therefore you probably need to change your name to something else, 2) You need to be concerned with mining attacks

Re: The DAO Disaster Illustrates Differing Philosophies in Bitcoin and Ethereum

#13

Post by drcode »

nkuttler wrote: post #9

Smart contracts that can be modified post-hoc, through consensus or (after a precedent was made that it is possible) legislation or a judge are not smart.

> legislation or a judge

Sure, if the judges can use their power of personal persuasion to convince the dispersed population of anonymous miners/stakers that they should adopt the contract modification (as ethereum community leaders did during the DAOsaster) they will be able to enact changes.

Re: The DAO Disaster Illustrates Differing Philosophies in Bitcoin and Ethereum

#15

Post by aakilfernandes »

drcode wrote: post #13
nkuttler wrote: post #9

Smart contracts that can be modified post-hoc, through consensus or (after a precedent was made that it is possible) legislation or a judge are not smart.

> legislation or a judge Sure, if the judges can use their power of personal persuasion to convince the dispersed population of anonymous miners/stakers that they should adopt the contract modification (as ethereum community leaders did during the DAOsaster) they will be able to enact changes.

This is based on a false narrative that miners/stakers determine the protocol. The protocol is determined by the nodes. The nodes produced by the dev team and run by the exchanges are the "economic majority" and are sufficient to change the protocol.

Perhaps this is confusing enough to trick regulators, however I'm not so certain.

Re: The DAO Disaster Illustrates Differing Philosophies in Bitcoin and Ethereum

#16

Post by drcode »

aakilfernandes wrote: post #15
drcode wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> legislation or a judge Sure, if the judges can use their power of personal persuasion to convince the dispersed population of anonymous miners/stakers that they should adopt the contract modification (as ethereum community leaders did during the DAOsaster) they will be able to enact changes.

This is based on a false narrative that miners/stakers determine the protocol. The protocol is determined by the nodes. The nodes produced by the dev team and run by the exchanges are the "economic majority" and are sufficient to change the protocol. Perhaps this is confusing enough to trick regulators, however I'm not so certain.

Well, you make a fair point that miners are ultimately interested in mining on the fork with the largest economic activity. But just as with Bitcoin (where exchanges have lobbied for a blocksize increase for a long time already with zero success) I would argue the number of parties that affect overall economic activity is hard to pin down and includes a larger segment of the community than you suggest.

Re: The DAO Disaster Illustrates Differing Philosophies in Bitcoin and Ethereum

#17

Post by onestone »

croon wrote: post #10
onestone wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. The ability to reach consensus within a community does not necessarily imply centralization.

Genuine question: As a self-described fairly intelligent tech person, the blockchain and its working is still fairly magical to me, so answer me this: Would it be theoretically possible for big players on the market (read EvilCorp) to push the market over to a fork by convincing enough of its cronies to make the switch? I'm assuming what you mean is that market consensus is (at least) 51% of the market accepting the…

Hard forks don't require any particular adoption percentage (unlike soft forks). The network simply splits in two chains. If one of the chains is obviously weaker, it usually dies quickly, as it's no longer economically viable.

In this case the sentiment among actual ETH holders is ~ 85% in favor of the hard fork. Check http://carbonvote.com/ (it's not a binding vote, just an indication showing which way the wind blows).

Re: The DAO Disaster Illustrates Differing Philosophies in Bitcoin and Ethereum

#18

Post by drcode »

aakilfernandes wrote: post #2

Such a fork would be more difficult in Bitcoin due to their political/financial (not necessarily technical) decentralization. This fork, if it happens, will be proof that Ethereum is far behind bitcoin in terms of decentralization.

To be fair, ethereum is a newer, and more experimental platform- It has many arguable advantages over Bitcoin, but as an etherean I am happy to agree that right now Bitcoin is more established and also may be somewhat more decentralized (given that the ethereum community is giving some deference to the core team at this early stage, in the future this will likely no longer be true)

Re: The DAO Disaster Illustrates Differing Philosophies in Bitcoin and Ethereum

#20

Post by jmount »

Found the linked article http://hackingdistributed.com/2016/06/28/ethereum-soft-fork-... very interesting as it points out the soft fork proposal essentially introduces a 2nd kind of exception semantics into the the Ethereum protocol. This in turn could be converted into a griefing attack on miners supporting the soft fork. The system level semantics and consequences don't really seem to be under control.
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