Decentralization in Bitcoin and Ethereum Networks · HackerPapers discussions

Decentralization in Bitcoin and Ethereum Networks — HN submission

Fri, 25 Feb 2022 14:11:29 GMT

Alternative Services for Blockchain?

In his recent critique of cryptocurrency/blockchain systems, David Rosenthal cites a study on crypto "decentralization" which claims a Byzantine Quorum of size >= 20 would provide a more robust "decentralized" solution than Bitcoin or Ethereum (https://arxiv.org/pdf/1801.03998.pdf). Are there any existing services that offer something akin to what he describes? If not that particular design, are there other alternatives worth looking into?

1 point; 0 discussion replies on HN. Paper and source history. A submission is not an endorsement.

Decentralization in Bitcoin and Ethereum Networks — mentioned by hudon

Fri, 18 May 2018 23:18:17 GMT

One example that the US government's OFAC is considering is blacklisting addresses and tainted UTXOs [0]. Miners would be forbidden by law to confirm a transaction related to a tainted UTXO. This means if the transaction is spending a tainted UTXO or sending to a blacklisted address (and thus creating a tainted UTXO), it wouldn't be confirmed. "taint" in this case travels forward in a chain of transactions and is a well documented property if you google it. Companies like Chainalysis have become really good at not only clustering related UTXOs but also monitoring taint as UTXOs are attempted…

Paper and discussion history. A mention is not an endorsement.

Decentralization in Bitcoin and Ethereum Networks — mentioned by hudon

Mon, 07 May 2018 11:49:20 GMT

> However, fails to notice that pools are made of individual miners/groups and do not represenet single huge datacenters. Groups/individuals can often change pools, and this is not an uncommon practice. citation needed. The trend in proof-of-work mining is consolidation of costs into large data centers[0], hence why it is no longer profitable for you to run an ASIC in your garage. Furthermore, there are very few profitable pools to choose from [0]. Large miners risk losing a lot of money by changing pools partly because not all pools provide as much revenue as the others. > where multiple…

Paper and discussion history. A mention is not an endorsement.

Decentralization in Bitcoin and Ethereum Networks — mentioned by Jommi

Mon, 07 May 2018 03:28:05 GMT

Thanks for these links, usually when talking about it not being decentralized the source is either Forbes or Business Insider. Let's see what your sources have in store. EDIT: [0] https://arxiv.org/abs/1801.03998 Good paper, lots of good research. Identifies that top pools do not change position too often. Shows also that system profits prefer higher pool sizes. However, fails to notice that pools are made of individual miners/groups and do not represenet single huge datacenters. Groups/individuals can often change pools, and this is not an uncommon practive. [1]…

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Decentralization in Bitcoin and Ethereum Networks — mentioned by hudon

Mon, 07 May 2018 02:59:52 GMT

> One value of Bitcoin is in its decentralization. There is surmounting evidence that this is not true and that Bitcoin is actually quite centralized and would benefit from being more centralized [0][1][2][3][4]. [0] https://arxiv.org/abs/1801.03998 [1] https://freedom-to-tinker.com/2015/07/28/analyzing-the-2013-... [2] https://arewedecentralizedyet.com/ [3] https://fc18.ifca.ai/bitcoin/papers/bitcoin18-final13.pdf [4] https://www.tse-fr.eu/sites/default/files/TSE/documents/doc/... > Why do we keep going over this? Because blockchainers are not listening to the science... why would they? It…

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Decentralization in Bitcoin and Ethereum Networks — mentioned by hudon

Wed, 25 Apr 2018 21:55:03 GMT

I've been actively researching use cases and properties of cryptocurrencies (more than 15 minutes) and have come to the opposite conclusion: none of the hype is based in fact. For instance, let's go through your claims one by one. > Decentralization, There is surmounting evidence that this is not true and that Bitcoin and Ethereum are actually quite centralized and would benefit from being more centralized [0][1][2][3][4]. [0] https://arxiv.org/abs/1801.03998 [1] https://freedom-to-tinker.com/2015/07/28/analyzing-the-2013-... [2] https://arewedecentralizedyet.com [3]…

Paper and discussion history. A mention is not an endorsement.

Decentralization in Bitcoin and Ethereum Networks — HN submission

Thu, 01 Feb 2018 19:50:33 GMT

Decentralization in Bitcoin and Ethereum Networks

1 point; 0 discussion replies on HN. Paper and source history. A submission is not an endorsement.