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Merge soon

ultrasound.money

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Re: Merge soon

#71

Post by cflynnus »

jeroenhd wrote: post #57

This is good. It took way too long to get here, but it's good that Ethereum is finally fixing its "waste energy to create coupons" system. I still don't really see the point of most ethereum applications but at least it's trying to burn the planet much slower now. All eyes should now be on Bitcoin to also switch to a non-planet-burning proofing system. Ethereum proved that it can happen and all other blockchains shou…

Labeling Bitcoin mining as "wasteful" is a subjective opinion not an objective truth. Mining does produce something: physics backed security guarantees, which has a value that's determined by a free market (see Bitcoin price/market cap).

Re: Merge soon

#72

Post by chrisco255 »

cflynnus wrote: post #60
mudrockbestgirl wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uh, that's just wrong. If you don't upgrade your software your money is not gone.

If you don't upgrade your client software you wont be able to transact w/ the new/forked ethereum network. Ok so maybe "upgrade your software or your funds remain locked" is more accurate. Still not good.

I mean, you can still transact. As long as you have your private key, you can transact. For example, there is going to be a "Proof of Work" fork of ETH after the merge. Price will dump on day one, but it will be there, and will tick away, and you'll still be able to move your ETH on both chains. But one will be considered canonical, because the community has gone with it.

Same thing has happened to Bitcoin multiple times. BCH, BTG, etc.

Re: Merge soon

#73

Post by rvz »

cflynnus wrote: post #60
mudrockbestgirl wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uh, that's just wrong. If you don't upgrade your software your money is not gone.

If you don't upgrade your client software you wont be able to transact w/ the new/forked ethereum network. Ok so maybe "upgrade your software or your funds remain locked" is more accurate. Still not good.

This commenter here is right you know. They (Ethereum Foundation) decide what the 'trademarked' Ethereum uses and if you are not on whatever they ultimately move to, well your money is unusable and locked. PoS is an increased risk of censorship and it is quite possible for regulators to even tell validator providers to censor addresses if they want to be compliant with regulations.

It is the re-centralization of Ethereum and will be made worse with Proof-of-Stake.

Re: Merge soon

#74

Post by cflynnus »

zionic wrote: post #2

This deserves to be the top spot on HN right now. Years of countless replies and mockery here across N accounts telling me this day would _never_ happen. Yet here we are, we're finally about to break away from the shackles of PoW and the crypto skeptics are silent. EDIT: I'm rate limited/soft banned so I can't reply to most of you/anyone until tomorrow. While I can still edit: -Cash is the ultimate scammer currency,…

Strongly disagree that PoW is a form of "shackles" PoW = bad is an Ethereum marketing narrative. The Bitcoin community has many robust counterarguments to this narrative.

Re: Merge soon

#75

Post by kevinak »

Pretty sad to see so many people hate on proof-of-work. I can only assume it's because they have read shallow articles that tell them "Bitcoin uses X amount of energy therefore it must be bad, because using energy is bad" or something along those lines. It's not so simple.

Proof of work solves issues like: - What to do with electricity before the generating source is connected to the grid

- Reduces carbon emissions by incentivising the burning of methane gas (20x worse than CO2)

- Makes it more viable to research new energy sources by lowering the cost.

- Acts as a load-balancer for the grid and makes it way more stable. This in turn means that we can build out huge amounts of solar and wind that rely on the weather.

Of course there are situations where Bitcoin is mined using non-renewable sources but if you believe that Solar and Wind are so cheap, then that issue will sort itself out, no? And it won't take long.

If you're an environmentalist and you want to solve the global issue of CO2 emissions, Bitcoin (and PoW) is a very very valuable tool. Don't throw it away because of a faulty belief.

Re: Merge soon

#76

Post by cflynnus »

aidenn0 wrote: post #32
fermentation wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

there’s been much discussion here about how PoS does little to provide a decentralized monetary system since it appears to be built with the idea those with the most money should determine what the “truth” is

PoW is those with the most wealth can determine what the truth is.

I don't think this is correct. The book "The Blocksize War" by Jonathan Bier does a good job of covering this topic.

Re: Merge soon

#77

Post by cflynnus »

wedn3sday wrote: post #21
seibelj wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some people don’t trust the government, other people do. I like a liquid, fungible asset not controlled by the government. Statists don’t. It’s a philosophical debate more than a technical one at this point.

Personally, I like a currency I can walk into a shop and buy a sandwich with.

In at least one nation state, El Salvador, Bitcoin is an option for buying a sandwich with.

Re: Merge soon

#78

Post by dist1ll »

cflynnus wrote: post #42
zionic wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. This is a triumph and the entire open source community should be celebrating

Disagree. This is a centralized project forcing a set of breaking consensus rule changes on users. Literally "upgrade your software or your money is gone" Bitcoin has hard guarantees of user rights. Ethereum is a centralized project masquerading as decentralized.

Dude, the entire point of crypto is freedom and choice. If you like protocols that don't change their consensus rules, stick with Bitcoin. Nothing wrong with that.

Re: Merge soon

#79

Post by worldsayshi »

sterlind wrote: post #31
pavlov wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes this one of the biggest upgrades in the history of software? How many Ethereum nodes are there compared to, say, iOS or Android or Windows deployments? What’s their hardware diversity? What’s the complexity of Ethereum compared to the aforementioned operating systems?

proof of stake is extraordinarily complicated to get right. that's why it took so long. not only is the code changing, but so is the entire incentive structure of a huge virtual economy, running the code in a sprawling, Byzantine, decentralized system, while trying to keep a miner's revolt from sabotaging the whole deal.

>not only is the code changing, but so is the entire incentive structure

Is there any good writeup or video essay about how incentives and control will change? I'm a bit sceptical about this part. Feels like ethereum owners now have a big incentive to make this change benefit them rather than the utility of ethereum. Like I heard this will make it even more deflationary which seems like an odd choice.

Re: Merge soon

#80

Post by cuteboy19 »

RestlessMind wrote: post #11

An open source project pulling off one of the biggest upgrades in the history of software development thanks to efforts of a distributed group of people should be celebrated here. Else, what is the point in calling ourselves "Hacker" News?

Eh, what's the worst that could happen?

If they mess up they can just roll back the immutable blockchain again, same way they did it last time

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