Author: Prayank 2021-06-30 12:12:35
Published on: 2021-06-30T12:12:35+00:00
In a recent conversation, Eric Voskuil expressed his inability to provide evidence of a valid game theoretic model applicable to Bitcoin. He stated that while people often use the terms "game theory" and "Bitcoin" together, he has not seen any actual demonstration of their relevance to each other. He also clarified that mining pools and exchanges do not necessarily hold discussions before signaling for a soft fork. Rather, signaling is simply a public signal that a miner intends to censor, with no label apart from signaling being necessary. In addition, miners can mine whatever they want, earning the block reward in the process. Voskuil further explained that consensus rules are enforced by merchants who reject trading for something they do not consider money, and that miners can enforce censorship by not building on non-censoring blocks. While every two people trade, both parties validate what they receive (not what they trade away), with those receiving Bitcoin being economically relevant and their power being a function of how much they are doing so. Finally, Voskuil noted that while signaling is not voting, it is a clear behavior that has been misunderstood or misinterpreted by many.
Updated on: 2023-06-14T23:43:18.502041+00:00