Last I heard, Todd has nothing to do with Blockstream other than he throws rocks at them as is his nature.
That is correct. He is part time employed at Viacoin, an altcoin that competes with bitcoin. I don't know whether he has other emplyment. But he is one of the "core devs".
IIRC, his statement that sidechains were not intended to solve the scaling problem was made on the same reddit thead where Greg announced the Sidechain Elements release; and I did not see any denial by the other core devs.
As I see it, the 'chain' part of 'sidechains' would be a bit of a misnomer. I'd imagine all sidecoins to have a chain to use as an interface layer but not necessarily as a back-end. I would hope that it is close to true to say that there is not much which 'cannot' be a sidecoin. I've argued (sort of) to Adam that a token back-end makes more sense for a lot of use-cases than a '(now)classic' chain-based system. Of course I'm limited in what I can 'teach' Dr. Back about...well...almost anything.
Some time ago, someone claimed that sidechains would not need special-purpose mechanisms in the bitcoin protocol; that the "peg" could be implemented simply by moving coins to and address controlled by the sidechain. Pretty much like when a bitcoiner moves his value from raw bitcoins to a Coinbase or Bitstamp account. I have never seen an explanation of why that would not be sufficient, and why there had to be specific support for pegs in the bitcoin protocol.
As for Blockstream's 'design, implementation, and management', I've seen nothing which indicates that it will differ from any other open-source project and nothing to be threatened by (unless you have a burning need to feel threatened of course.)
My reference to independent 'design, implementation, and management' of sidechains was not referring to Blockstream specifically. On the contrary, my understanding is that the sidechains would NOT e under Blockstream control. Therefore not even Blockstream could trust that they would be secure or work as claimed.
The thing about LN that really impressed me was the 'slack'. Once in a while I pull the keys out of my pocket and a quarter comes with them and falls in a gutter. That does not stop me from using coins and having pocket change. From an engineering perspective there is a huge amount to be gained by having a little room for error. That the designers were cognizant of this impressed me...although it is rather obvious to anyone who has done systems work.
I'll not speak for the LN developers, but as a general design goal a fraud-proofing perspective, the most critical thing is to not allow an operator to profit from fraud. This will almost completely evaporate many forms of fraud from even being attempted. A distant second priority would be how long it takes me to get my value back in the event of a failure (which I would expect to be an uncommon event and one I may never see.)
I am fairly satisfied that, in the current sketch, there is not much room for fraud in the LN. (Not totally, though.) But, if the LN were to be implemented, its many fatal problems would have to be solved, and the only way I can see to solve them is for clients to surrender the coins to the "LN banks" (hubs); just like today the banks own their clients' dollars.
Even without such "improvements", the hubs could block client funds for months, deny service to specific clients and merchants, charge whatever fees they can think they can get away with, etc..
Open source means that they not only welcome competition but foster it. So down goes the 'one company' BS. Blockstream only need to do it better, and that is highly likely given the makeup of the entity.
See how well they welcome BitcoinXT. Blockstream had clearly counted on having control of the code base; for what exactly I don't know, but Adam's desperate attack on Gavin and Mike seem to be motivated more by the fear of losing that control than by seeing congestion get delayed for several years.
Luke on reddit defended that the defintion of the protocol IS the BitcoinCore code, and disaster would befall if people used any other code base; because if the other code did not copy Core down to the most obscure bug, the coin would split and that would be doom.
Nothing about sidechains in any way detracts from the ability for individuals to use native Bitcoin except perhaps that they won't be subsidized and will thus have to pay transaction fees proportional to the cost of operating a secure system.
Forget sidechains, they are not important anymore. Blockstream openly declared vision for the future of bitcoin is a settlement layer for the Lightning Network, which will carry most payments. The Core devs have been saying all the time on reddit that they expect the "fee market" will make bitcoin transactions so expensive that only settlements between hubs and other high-value transactions will be worth doing there. They have talked of fees of 10, 20, or even 100 USD per transaction.
I do sense that you are deeply hopeful that Bitcoin will collapse. Again, I suspect that this is why Blockstream and sidechains bothers you so much.
Yes, I do hope that the bitcoin investment pyramid will collapse as soon as possible. I have no problem with bitcoin the payment system (although I believe that it will not get much beyond an interesting experiment).
But the reason I am bothered about the Lightning Network and the "fee market" is that I am a comp sci prof and they are bad computer science. Imagine how a physicist would react if someone proposed to replace coal stations by perpetual motion generators.
And the reason I am bothered by Blockstream is that I have this problem with cheats and liars...
