Author: Peter Todd 2014-01-10 11:11:28
Published on: 2014-01-10T11:11:28+00:00
The discussion revolves around the concept of proof-of-sacrificed-bitcoins and proof-of-sacrificed-newcoins, which are guarantees that something of value was given up. While proof-of-sacrificed-bitcoins is always a true sacrifice, proof-of-sacrificed-newcoins is valid only if the consensus system includes that sacrifice within the consensus. The author argues that merge-mining is not secure for new alt-coin protocol widgets and regular mining may not be much better either. However, decentralized consensus systems competing for market share in some domain can benefit from merge-mining. In such cases, merge-mining can be beneficial as it avoids the costs involved in attacking a new system. Without merge-mining, the value to participants in the new system should be greater than the harm done to the participants in the old system for the new system to survive. Merge-mined alt-coins that are currencies often get attacked quickly, which is why they can be considered scam-coins.
Updated on: 2023-06-07T23:17:46.198871+00:00