these ppl have a strong incentive to make money, not only for themselves but for their investors. to do this, they need to construct and sell as many of these speculative SC's that offer all manner of speculative assets, none of which are likely to be related to sound money. in fact, they discourage sound money by encouraging speculation.
I'm so sorry to have to say this again but you are out of you mind.
The core devs you talk down on have been hacking for hours on Bitcoin's code for the previous few years.
You think that you have got all the answers because you have a popular thread on bitcointalk forum and your join date says 2011 ?
Did you even bother reading their blogs and understand where they are coming from? Who they are? What this project means to them?
For some, it is the culmination of nearly 20 years of cryptography related work. These guys are all champions of the open-source movement. Cypherpunks that have collectively recognized that Bitcoin is their opportunity to show their work to the world.
Your insistence on using the stupid "devs gonna dev" meme is a blatant offense at the core of Bitcoins' ethos. I sometimes wonder if you forget about the audience you are talking to. This very forum is full of devs creating the services YOU are using, without charging you a satoshi. All because of open source.
Considering you are an ardent defender of Satoshi's blockchain, I propose you consider having some respects for devs, that have devved & came up with the technology that you use everyday and will make you filthy rich.
As for these people, no they are not in the business of creating "speculative SCs".
They are in fact hoping to build a decentralized environment of trust-less infrastructure that will support the Bitcoin economy and actually help strengthen its core.
Sidechains are IMO *the* natural evolution of BTC. It is Bitcoin 2.0 done right. Now that does not mean that all other crypto 2.0 projects are irrelevant : I think federated models/oracles/voting pools and maybe colored coins will find their niche and be used most probably in majority by the corporate world to create whatever model of infrastructure that provides necessary control, oversight & transparency.
Sidechains will likely support large scale open source infrastructure where the value exchanged might command a security model that should be considerably more decentralized. My bet is these open source platforms will be developed by Blockstream.
These 20 millions are going to be used to develop Sidechains' dev kit. This kit might include platforms ("official" sidechains) that enable bootstrapping other secondary sidechains. Reid Hoffman has insisted that Blockstream at this stage is akin to the Mozilla Corporation. He has stressed prioritization of "public good over returns to investors."
In that sense, you are right that SPVP is crucial to their success because it is the only way they can create these ambitious extensions of Bitcoin I'm sure they have in mind.
I suspect they will leverage these open source platforms to then concentrate on consulting and developing secondary sidechains that serve corporations/governments interest. These will likely not be MM for reasons stated below, they are likely to use a different model.
What you should not forget is SPVP is open source and so are the platforms Blockstream will develop.
If you think they are going to be alone playing with these toys you are fooling yourself. None of this is proprietary.
By its open source nature it will become part of the internet and will lay the foundation for hundreds, thousands of unimaginable innovations.
SPVP, sidechains are a public good for everyone to use, Blockstream are the innovators leading the way.
Yes there will be idiots who will try to abuse the system but they will be flushed out by honest, hardworking technologists that will build recognizagle, safe and useful applications for the world to use, preserve its value & grow the economy.
Yes speculative instruments will be built but they will run on mathematically proven and secure reserve that does not inflate the value of its holder's wealth. Withstanding the obvious fluctuations of whatever market or asset he decides to invest in. Your suggestion that people are going to be throwing their money into half-assed scams that will sink the Bitcoin economy is asinine at best.
If these sidechains are successful than logically so is Bitcoin because unlike what you twisted up logic leads you to think no one can sit at the table without having purchased its tickets. It matters little whether people decide to hold stocks, bond, insurance & contract because they are all trading in BTC. Someone has to pay for them, whether they decide to use them as bearer instrument for anything or as currency.
No, people are *not* having a free pass by "siphoning" BTC through a sidechain. Unless they effectively steal them they will have to pay "cold hard cash" to claim them (BTC).
Careful!
Canada has NI 51-102. In the US its section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933.
But when making such strong claims about the future you may want something like this somewhere in your public facing documentation:
The above contains statements related to future business and financial performance and future events or developments involving Blockstream that may constitute forward-looking statements.
These statements may be identified by words such as "expect," "look forward to," "anticipate" "intend," "plan," "believe," "seek," "estimate," "will," "project" or words of similar meaning.
Blockstream may also make forward-looking statements in other reports, in presentations, in material delivered to shareholders and in press releases. In addition, Blockstream representatives may from time to time make oral forward-looking statements. Such statements are based on the current expectations and certain assumptions of Blockstream management, of which many are beyond Blockstream's control. These are subject to a number of risks, uncertainties and factors. Should one or more of these risks or uncertainties materialize, or should underlying expectations not occur or assumptions prove incorrect, actual results, performance or achievements of Blockstream may (negatively or positively) vary materially from those described explicitly or implicitly in the relevant forward-looking statement. Blockstream neither intends, nor assumes any obligation, to update or revise these forward-looking statements in light of developments which differ from those anticipated.
I didn't see anyone is alleging actual impropriety, merely pointing out a conflict of interest due to the duties of care and trust which exists between the Blockstream employees to their investors, and to the constituent community of Bitcoin Core.
It isn't the first time for such conflicts, it likely won't be the last. People will be watching how the conflict is managed and making decisions based on that. There are already some mechanisms in place for work review and commit review, and they might consider adding or some reviewers or looking at the process to avoid the appearance of any impropriety.
It is probably a
good thing you have nothing whatsoever to do with Blockstream because if you did, you would be a problem for them.
