Clarifying Bitcoin and The Future
2018 is an exciting year, having launched futures contracts on bitcoin, having every government agency trying to determine what bitcoin is and to classify it correctly (e.g. Is it a currency? Is it an asset? Is it a commodity?).
It seems everyone has become aware of bitcoin, and how it has increased in value from virtually nothing ("pizza day"), to the current valuations where most people cannot afford to buy a single bitcoin.
Still, almost everyone I speak with about Bitcoin has a mental filter of one sort or another, and are unable to really think clearly.
By the end of this article, your head should be spinning with excitement.
One critical fact about bitcoin is "bitcoin does not exist as a thing anymore", and by this, I mean the two main thought streams that split bitcoin in 2017 are in diametrically opposed camps now. They have created "bitcoin core" and "bitcoin cash". [there are other "forks", but ignore them - trust me on that.].
Sadly, the introduction of the words "bitcoin cash" in some groups creates emotions and misconceptions that do not follow logic or understanding.
Hint: "bcash" and "fake Satoshi" are keywords to recognize the 4-D type attacks on the BCH side (4-D: deception, disinformation, disruption, destruction - see this psyop paper for more information).
What should also be noted is bitcoin (and any other blockchain where economic value is stored), is a competition (just like commerce, with companies vying for market leadership), where someone wins and someone loses (e.g. a miner wins the prize, all others do not). The same holds true with every other blockchain that competes for utility or attention - some will win and some will lose.
While I can't tell you what to think, I can help you understand some of the beliefs and positioning that has separated bitcoin into two camps:
Here, for example, is a description of one of the things Bitcoin Core (BTC) is implementing, something termed "the lightning network". It is part of their plan to solve the scalability issue (letting bitcoin to be used for everyone, for everything) by using multi-hop side chains:
Those of us who are deeply technical see that this lightning network leads to a highly centralized structure, with a large attack surface. It undermines bitcoin's functionality, and the bigger it gets, the bigger the problems get.
Compare this with BCH, its "1.32 hop" network design and smallest possible attack vector.
The position of the BCH thoughtstream is, as bitcoin mining rewards are halved every four years, the only way miners (the heart of both bitcoin systems) will continue strong, is by uncapping the block sizes, and letting increasingly massive numbers of transactions be contained in each block (and by this, the miners get paid handsomely for mining that block, via a massive amount of tiny transaction fees along with a small or zero block reward).
If you think about this a little, it can help your economic future in some ways.
Another point of note are the teams. BCH has some stunningly bright members working on revolutionizing the technology, while the BTC team has smart people who all have mental blocks affecting their critical reasoning capabilities.
Let me know what you think about the philosophical arguments surrounding bitcoin and the two camps that have formed.
If this has piqued your interest, and you'd like to hear more, then there are two recent talks I recommend that will give you futher clarity. They discuss the two bitcoins, the feature development, and where each fork will be in the years to come:
And finally, here are two knowledgeable individuals that discuss the two bitcoin forks and come to a logical conclusion:
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6 年Neville Swaby Wow!! jack there is a lot of information its the best i have ever here,.the commodity explain and because of all the Hype and distraction. no one takes the time to say this much, and now i can understand why. But my interest is in the mother of then all the Blockchain so i hope later we can talk more on that sector.But you are right this is kinda techinal for the layman to understand here.
Enabling Utilities and Communications to more efficiently power and connect the world
6 年Jack, this is above my technical grade, but here's my understanding [from the perspective of a guy with heavy experience in both Finance and Technology]: The blockchain technology inspired by Bitcoin is much more revolutionary than Bitcoin itself. There should be no central point of failure, as the top allures of blockchain are security and system resiliency. As the blockchain is continuously replicated across several points - if one of the points on the network fails or gets attacked, other points jump up and provide identical info. As a former Finance guy, this is a bit like checks and balances, in my opinion - you can immediately smell anything fishy going on. Decentralization should also create more trust and better data integrity since there is constant replication across many points in the system.