Author: Antoine Riard 2021-06-21 15:05:57
Published on: 2021-06-21T15:05:57+00:00
The recent survey on potential softforks for the near-future of Bitcoin has gained much attention among those involved with bitcoin protocol development. Softforks are the result of thousands of hours of work from contributors all across the ecosystem, with discussions taking place on various platforms such as IRC public or private channels, mailing lists, and media outlets. However, there is also a submerged part of bitcoin protocol development that requires attention. Many ongoing projects require more than pure coding skills, such as specification, simulations, extensive code coverage, and up-to-date meeting documents.The Bitcoin development stage has changed significantly in the last 18 months due to the arrival of massive development funding, sudden mediatisation of protocol developers, pursued geographical spreading, diversification, and education of the poolset of contributors. However, some might suggest that there is a return to the 2017 era of ICO-like webpage pinning "developers-as-brands." New structures need to mature to something as sound as Chaincode or Square Crypto.Another bottleneck in Bitcoin development is the ongoing spreading of contributors around many geographical areas and time zones, making intra-communication far harder. Communication might not flow smoothly through all the development stakeholders, and the question arises, how do we make communications more distributed and fault-tolerant without losing quality? The ongoing increase in developer diversity is also something to salute. Lastly, direct pressure exercised on the developers themselves to bend their works is another uncomfortable issue to talk about, as the ongoing CSW case sadly recalls.In another article, there are concerns raised about the potential risks of Bitcoin governance and how it can lead to centralized control. The author argues that if someone wants to make changes to the system, they can simply replace those who would object to their ideas, making it easier for them to implement their plans without proper review. This can be done through various means such as making contributing unpleasant enough for the targets to leave on their own or using cancel culture to make them a pariah.The article references a 2014 post by Satoshi Nakamoto on the Bitcoin-dev mailing list, where he discusses the idea of working on social contracts. He acknowledges that people change, go crazy, or are coerced, which can lead to bad decisions being made. He also states that if bad people show up with a sufficient pointy gun, he would do whatever they tell him to do, even if it means submitting backdoors or making bad proposals. Overall, the article raises concerns about the potential for centralized control in Bitcoin governance and highlights the importance of maintaining a diverse and decentralized community to ensure proper review and decision-making processes.
Updated on: 2023-06-01T18:44:36.343368+00:00