Topic: Gregory Maxwell threatens to sell his bitcoins and find other things to work on - page 6. (Read 7967 times)

They have said that sidechains are much more for experimental development (replacing the need for alt-coins), not for scaling.
Lightning Network is big and complex and will not be deployed any time soon, maybe in 3 years, or 2 if lucky.
However, the 1MB will be causing serious delays in tx confirmations within 1 year. So, an increase, even to 5MB or 10MB will buy the time needed for LN to be fully developed and deployed. Personally, I like what LN offers, I want to see it succeed as it will enhance Bitcoin. But I would rather have it enhance a healthy Bitcoin than one that is crippled and under a PR disaster cloud.

Why won't Core Dev buy the few years needed to bring LN and other off-chain solutions to the point where they are taking volume?

I beg to differ. Gregory just "threatens" to find something other to work on. This is fine, it's his decision after all. He doesn't like the way the whole Bitcoin project is headed, so he'll just do something else.
He doesn't state that he will sell out, though. Rather, he believes that the proposed changes to Bitcoin might be perceived as suicidal for Bitcoin, which is why he would consider it a wise move to sell his Bitcoins before they depreciate.
At least that's the way I understand his words. Maybe I'm just nitpicking, but I find that difference important enough to be noted.

Two chains might survive, but I too, doubt it. For a while, both might coexist, with the consequence of the value of Bitcoins in both networks together being roughly the same as the Bitcoins in one network now. For the exchange rate, this might mean a halving if both networks are of roughly equal size.
I believe it's much more likely that one of the chains will be significantly larger than the other from the beginning, probably something like 90/10 or even more. The larger one will most probably be valued more or less the same as before, while the other will depreciate rapidly, up to a point where it's no longer worthwhile to mine it or do anything meaningful with it.

So the question really is, which network will be larger?
As the old saying goes, just follow the money.
The larger network will be the one that's embraced by businesses like BitPay, large mining pools etc.
And I doubt that that's going to be the one without Gavin.

The "old" network might survive as something like a sect of the true faith of Satoshi, though. Which would make it a rather interesting social experiment

That's something most people can agree on, but they just can't agree upon the "how". Unfortunately, that's precisely the reason why Gavin has to take the steps he's taking right now.

Because XT is in control of Hearn & Gavin and if it wins the mass adoption and can outshine QT, then they wont need to discuss or honor the opinion of other core devs anymore. It will simply go the routes merchants & regulatory bodies want. The current change they are proposing to win mass adoption is aparently harmless. But, the next changes might include good coin/bad coin segration and a few more that will then go unchalenged. Fungibility of coins will probably be challenged in the name of certain country's national security. There comes centralization.

Because it will be needed more bandwidth, and a lot of people don't have access to it (node,etc...).

It is not that GMaxwell and other core devs did not agree with the problem of 1 MB cap. But, they are proposing a different solution to handle this, i.e. use of www.lightning.network and sidechains, which blockstream is working on. Though, I am not sure, how far that work is done. But, increase of cap to 20MB only delays the issue for a few more years. This is not a permanent solution as Gavin agreed too. What GMaxwell is saying is, if we do not implement the permanent solution sooner using sidechains & lightning.network and delay it for a few years, then bitcoin might grow too big to implement a fork.

I'm unclear on how going the XT path would make it centralized.

Another threatens thread, yuppie! Pleas guys, stop to use the word 'threatens' in the title.

---

He simple wants to sell some bitcoin, it is not a "threaten" .. example - I will say : if the price will not reach 250 dollars in the next 2 weeks I can sell most of my coins. He is also not obliged to work as volunteer for bitcoin, this should be clare from the beginning.. he is also free to leave or stay.

When the 1MB maxes out and confirmation times blow out, and the press articles appear savaging the "community" that failed, the ensuing PR disaster, and price collapse, a lot of full nodes will go dark - and then Gregory Maxwell will see the route to centralization. He might say "oops I didn't expect that", but it will be too late.

Have you not read his post? Are you having trouble understanding ti?
This is wrong. Two chains will never survive, although there will be a potential time period to sell coins (not necessarily though).
It is much more likely that the whole ecosystem will be abandoned rather than Gavin wining. Look at the drama now. Would you really stick with Gavin and Bitcoin XT which has weakened security?


There is also this. I agree that something has to be implemented to fix this as soon as possible. Implemented into the Core..

"We know from leaked emails that the Bitcoin XT fork has been planned for a year plus. "

Gavin planned the backstabbing of the whole community for over a year!  He is a traitor! Only scammers and criminals will support his altcoin! Gavin just lost the last respect he had! GTFO GAVIN WE DON'T NEED OR WANT PEOPLE LIKE YOU! I am disgusted how he brings down the whole coin! Exile Gavin from Bitcoin NOW! Remaining Devs need to fork the Github and take away his control ASAP to save billions of investement from this crazy moron!

Yes. Changing to something like "if Bitcoin-XT is adopted, Gregory Maxwell will find other things to work on" or something. The current title is misleading IMHO.

If you read the full statement that he has made, it'd be clear to you that he considers the adoption of Bitcoin-XT as the centralized route.

Do u mean a price rally ? In any case, I can see the outcome of this fork controversy is profit. There may be three outcome...

i. Both chains survive for some time -  Sell your coins on both chain. Double profit.

ii. Gavin wins - US merchants and new adoptors are with him. They'll start buying as Hearn & Gavin will now control the code.

iii. Gmaxwell wins - Old big holders are with him. Core remains. Gavin's out. All anti-US millionaires from China & Russia will start buying.

Moral of the story: Anyone who buys and hold till the fork happens, will walk out with profit.

You took two things which Maxwell told and made it one-like. This will make people think in a different way. Moreover, he didn't tell "I will sell my coins and will move on with other things", instead he told, "if Bitcoin goes a centralizing route, I will find other things to work on". Both are different.

Yup.  When you are serious about something like that and have truly lost all will you'd just silently disapear.  Its a call for a rally, perhaps signs we are in the anger stage.

That, I believe, is kinda true. Jed McCaleb threatened to sell off his Ripple holding, which he never sold.

Nobody who publically threatens to sell all their bitcoins will ever sell of their bitcoins, something just doesn't add up in that equation.

Which part ? It is quoted from his comment as it is...

Another misleading title.