Author: Gareth Williams 2014-04-30 14:31:08
Published on: 2014-04-30T14:31:08+00:00
In a discussion about the relevance of attackers in the Bitcoin network, Mike Hearn requested people to read Satoshi Nakamoto's white paper from 2008. Another participant in the conversation argued that while the notion of an attacker is relevant to someone designing the system, it should not be relevant to someone running a node. The fundamental disagreement between the two participants is whether Bitcoin is a democratic or trustless system. The participant arguing for a trustless system believes that Satoshi Nakamoto intended to create electronic cash that was trustless, and that Bitcoin accomplishes this using distributed consensus. While the infrastructure supporting Bitcoin may be democratic, this does not mean voting is required for decision-making within the network.
Updated on: 2023-06-08T20:46:33.412325+00:00