Topic: Think about the "decentralization" of bitcoin from seven different aspects (Read 344 times)

In fact, this is not to say that this is a shortcoming of a decentralized system, we can only say that it is more difficult to establish a consensus on a decentralized system. We now live in a society controlled by a centralized system. The consensus here is generally enforced by the centralized system through war, military, financial, legal and other forces. However, the consensus of a decentralized system is completely different. It is based on established mathematical algorithms. The rules are transparent and fair to everyone. To establish a consensus, everyone needs to truly approve the system, and it cannot be enforced by external forces. That's why I said that building such a consensus requires a higher degree of difficulty and must be widely recognized. If there is no widespread recognition, it is easy to form divisions.

What you noted above sounds like a disadvantage or a drawback to the decentralized system, but you treated it as a compliment. What happens if such scenario repeats often and curses more frequent division in the system. What would be the fate of the decentralized system or bitcoin.

Yes, I very much agree with your point of view. Although Bitcoin has only been born for more than ten years, it has provided us with a brand new governance model. This is decentralized governance. Bitcoin continues to provide us with the idea of decentralized governance and also provides tools for decentralized governance. This is governance on the blockchain. At present, human society is changing from a centralized civilization to a decentralized civilization. Maybe this process will be very long, but it will definitely come.


The stakeholders I am referring to here are not only the miners and core developer groups, but the most important group of Bitcoin holders. However, the current status of Bitcoin determines that governance can only be minimized, and it is difficult for most ordinary Bitcoin owners to truly participate in the governance of the Bitcoin ecosystem. This is also an important issue in the current Bitcoin ecosystem in my opinion.

In regards to 6, you think it's going to be truely decentralized if you have only those you listed as "Stakeholders" governing the entire community? Wish you used etc after "Bitcoin retail holder group" , so people don't assume that's the number of "stakeholders" that will govern the entire Bitcoin Community, or people assuming if they don't belong to any of the groups they can't participate in governance whether they are qualified or not. I believe every honest participants should be able to participate in governance so we don't place too much barrier and risk centralizing governance. You can use merit/reputation system for quality control
Besides, the "groups should be made mainly of independent participants else we could have issues of collusion, centralized groups, or group managed by single entity due to mostly to not adhering to the important Bitcoin Principles

In the previous society, there was only one single power, all of which were centralized. However, this type of centralized power has not been eliminated for hundreds of years, so can it be that human beings cannot change the centralization by themselves?
So is decentralization a force majeure that exists like non-human resources?
It took ten years for Bitcoin, which was born in 2009, to start thinking about decentralization in terms of human development.At this point, I believe that decentralization is an inevitable way of development, and non-human resources can be reversed.

Without decentralization, Bitcoin has no future, the elite of the world will not allow this.

Thanks to the author for the article, it is very systematic. The development of Bitcoin can also be said to be the biggest obstacle facing the development of decentralization is the relatively high upward pressure. Sovereign states in the real world will continue to exist for a long time. Bitcoin now has a little 'utopian' flavor, but decentralization still has many advantages.

• The decentralized system is more resistant to risks. This is compared to a centralized system. Because there is no decisive central node, you cannot destroy the entire system by destroying the central node.
• Users in a decentralized system are more equal. The centralized system will use the media to induce everyone, or specify policies for everyone to follow. In a decentralized system, everyone can speak. And they will all have equal opportunities to express their opinions.
• The decentralized system consciousness is bottom-up control, which determines that most nodes in the decentralized system are very satisfied with the system. The decentralized system eliminates the corruption, greed and brain development of the central node. Negative factors such as water (President Joker) cause serious damage to the entire system.
• The decentralized system has unlimited possibilities. Just like biological evolution, a diverse ecology has been developed. Over time, many altcoins have broadened the application scenarios of Bitcoin and will develop a perfect decentralized blockchain financial DAPP.

To examine each issue with a dialectical perspective, the shortcomings of decentralization also exist.

• Due to the huge number of nodes, a decentralized system tends to become a bloated organization, so the efficiency is much lower (compared to a centralized system), which means that the cost of communication is relatively high.
• The decentralized system is uncontrollable and unpredictable. When a certain consensus has a huge divergence, it will form a fork. This does exist and it is difficult to avoid.

Today's world is a highly centralized management model. The state is in the hands of a few groups and the company is in the hands of the CEO. But as a great experiment, decentralized Bitcoin will become an opinion leader leading change.

Bitcoin is a decentralized encrypted digital currency system that is completely separated from the bank and only relies on the Internet to operate.
The decentralization of Bitcoin makes it no longer dependent on the central processing node, and realizes the distributed recording, storage and update of data. Let everyone have the account data of the entire network, can participate in verification and recording. It breaks the monopoly of the third-party intermediary structure or the endorsement of trust institutions. All nodes must form a consensus in a completely open and transparent manner, and everyone should keep accounts together to ensure the accuracy and security of the ledger.
Bitcoin runs on a network system, and its issuance and transactions are all decentralized. In the Bitcoin system can truly control personal assets instead of indirectly controlling money through the bank. Bitcoin's decentralization is the first in human history to use technology to ensure the sacred and inviolable private property.

Each of us has different educational backgrounds and knowledge levels, so we have different perceptions of one thing. For most ordinary people, Bitcoin is a very difficult thing to understand. It takes a lot of learning to have a certain understanding of Bitcoin. This is a long process, and more people are unwilling to use their brains, only hoping to passively receive education from the media.

Atleast someone will get benefit from the article if they are really keen to learn something, I will also share this article on my public feed so people will have access to it, but my concern is why they are not ready to accept it? They never question the government why you keep printing money and giving us the loans then make money out of it but they shoot that bitcoin is hackers money, the money comes from single click of a button, blah blah...

Yes, for the past three or four years, I have been introducing Bitcoin to my friends. And helped many friends to buy Bitcoin for the first time. However, most of my friends did not insist on holding Bitcoin. Some friends sell it when they make a little money, and some friends sell it when they lose money. When I gradually understood this, I found that it is difficult for me to help others make investment decisions. Because no matter what causes them to lose money, they will complain on me. In my opinion, the main reason is that they don't understand Bitcoin, they don't have a system to learn Bitcoin, and they don't understand the logic of Bitcoin's long-term appreciation. This is why I write these articles now, to share the underlying logic and philosophical thinking of Bitcoin with more friends.

My first article recorded these experiences of mine, you can read it directly:
  Bitcoin is not just a currency, but represents a new human civilization

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.57358177



Yes, I fully agree with this. If monarchy is centralization. Decentralization could trend nearer to being a republic, Or format of democracy. In my opinion, Bitcoin brings us more than just a currency, but more importantly, it brings us a The idea of republic and democracy. It achieves governance through the decentralization of power. In the past of human history, centralization has been implemented to ensure the political system, and it is difficult for decentralization to truly operate. However, blockchain technology was created on the basis of Bitcoin. Decentralized governance can be established through algorithms and mathematics, making decentralized governance possible.

It might be fair to say: if centralization is a monopoly, decentralization trends nearer to a free market system.

There were many news stories and publications criticizing big american tech for being monopolies. Centralization enables monopoly. If it is true that many negative circumstances are endemic to monopoly. Then these criticisms may also extend to centralized monolithic formats. In that vein, decentralized design could be considered a hedge against monopoly and centralization.

Spheres of influence and control in bitcoin are decentralized in such a way as to make centralized control difficult to attain. The majority of crypto mining could be centralized in china. But that wouldn't be enough to give china complete control. Core developers have a great deal of influence, but its not centralized enough for their perspective to be the only one deemed relevant.

If monarchy is centralization. Decentralization could trend nearer to being a republic. Or format of democracy.

Lets keep the forum members aside, have you every thought teaching about bitcoin to someone who you know personally, if you got success then you are helping with the adoption. Even I do it sometimes but most of them refuse my statement and they will simply call bitcoin as fake money and it is going to zero even many economical experts used to say that.

Yes, in my opinion, many people don't know how Bitcoin works, but they are still using Bitcoin. Here, I share some deeper knowledge in order to communicate with you in different knowledge systems. Regarding the technical issues of Bitcoin, there are already many experts here, and they are all selflessly helping everyone in the forum. When I write these articles, I am more inclined to think from philosophical thinking. Although it is difficult to understand many times, I think these thoughts are still very valuable.

Teaching about the depth of bitcoin to the community is important but first we need to teach about the money to the people since 90% of the population doesn't know how it works still they are using it everyday and working for it all their life. Bitcoin is not created to make anyone to rich or to stabilize the economy of a country buts its actually created to eliminate the third-party who controls our money.

Yes, this is the change that Bitcoin brings to our human society. We are now discussing Bitcoin extensively every day, but most of the content we currently discuss is mainly limited to the technical level and the currency application level. There are still relatively few in-depth discussions about Bitcoin on the forum. In this article, I think about Bitcoin's decentralization thought from 7 different angles. I always believe that the ideas behind Bitcoin are always the most important and valuable. We need to explore our sea of stars under the guidance of Bitcoin thought.

The decentralization of Bitcoin means that its issuance and circulation are not restricted by the central control, but the distributed recording and storage of data is realized through the network system. Let everyone have their own account data on the entire network, and everyone will keep the accounts together to ensure the accuracy and security of the data.
Its decentralized nature also breaks the monopoly of the central government or other institutions, and controls personal assets by itself.

Thank you for your detailed knowledge of the annotations, which show us more clearly the relationship between the core dev team and other stakeholders in the governance process. Especially the story that happened in 2017, let me understand the details of the governance process more clearly. The content of my article is more about the Satoshi  spirit and decentralization thought behind Bitcoin from a philosophical level. I have always believed that Bitcoin is not only technology important, but more importantly, the ideas behind this technology. More of us just because of the recognition of this kind of thinking, we continue to support Bitcoin.

just a note to add to your learning

the network is not all fair 0% control
there actually is a hierarchy

bitcoin code is not self produced AI. its actually wrote by devs.
so any and all bitcoin rules are subject to the devs decision to include or change or remove rules

at this present moment. there might be several 'implementations.' but the ruling/control implementatation all others follow is the CORE dev team

beside that is the main 'economic' nodes and the other side is the mining nodes

the core dev team can collude with the merchants(economic nodes) to enforce a change that will blackmail the mining pools to change their implementation in favour, to ensure miners have the ability to continue spending rewards with merchants
(no point making old blocks that merchants reject, as then you cant spend your rewards)

on the flip side the core dev team can collude with the mining nodes to enforce a change that will blackmail the merchants to change their implementation in favour, to ensure merchants transactions get accepted into blocks
(no point making old transactions that miners reject, as then you can spend your funds)

next outer layer is the wallet service/custodian non-mining full node services
because they service hundreds of people and are responsible of getting users payments accepted. they are pressured by the layer above to follow the whims of the dev team

next outer layer is the independant users full node
again they cant spend unless they are following the rules of the upper layers.

finally. the litewallet phone apps. well they are just slaves to the custodial service non-mining fullnode

..
alot of people think the 'independant user full nodes' and 'the custodial service non mining full node' have power/voting. but.. if the devs and merchants want to change things.. they can. and users then become less than full nodes blindly accepting data they cant fully validate for all rules. meaning users are forced to upgrade to stay able to transact and spend as true full nodes

take 2017 events
first there was the dev&miner campaign.. this only got 45% vote for upgrade from nov 2016-june 2017
because alot of merchants and users hesitated/declined and 55% of mining pools declined

however june-july2017. devs colluded with merchants (NYA) and threatened pools that anyblocks not conforming to new formet. the merchants would disregard/reject
within weeks mining pools suddenly seen the threat of lost/ignored/invalid rewards so majority accepting the
(NYA)
within weeks of that, old blocks(vetoing) were disregarded which allowed for in unprecedented 100% vote locking in the new change

all without any input from the user/custodian nodes

Whenever we mention Bitcoin, there is one word that must be mentioned, and that is "decentralization." There are also posts in our forum discussing "Is Bitcoin really decentralized?". In my opinion, "decentralization" is the core thought of Bitcoin, and it is also the embodiment of the true Satoshi spirit. "Decentralized thinking" guides all Bitcoin believers to continue to move forward.

But what exactly is decentralization? Why can Bitcoin be decentralized? We can further think about these issues. In my opinion, we can think about the "decentralization" of Bitcoin from 7 different aspects.

1. Decentralization of system architecture

From a technical perspective, Bitcoin implements distributed data storage technology. This reflects the decentralization of Bitcoin from the technical architecture level. In the previous architecture system of Internet products, centralized servers were used for centralized management of data. But in the Bitcoin network, it turns a highly centralized center into a network system with many nodes distributed, and each node has all the data. Data management is peer-to-peer, and any node can become a phased center. When one or some nodes suspend service, it will not affect the normal operation of other nodes.Therefore, the decentralization of the Bitcoin system means that it does not have a centralized server, and data storage is distributed in the form of nodes. It presents the characteristics of openness, flatness, and equality, and no independent individual can tamper with or control the Bitcoin system.


2. Decentralization of currency issuance

In our reality, the currencies we use daily are issued by the central banks of various governments and are subject to the regulation of the central bank. When the central bank of the country has no power to restrain, over-issued currency has become the norm. But in the Bitcoin network system, there is no centralized central bank. The issuance of all bitcoins is decentralized and controlled by the bitcoin network. The total amount of Bitcoin is fixed, and the output is halved in four years. This is the most basic logic of Bitcoin issuance. Bitcoin has completely realized the decentralization of issuance.


3. Decentralization of miner access

In the Bitcoin network, miners are an important group, and miners maintain the accounting system of the entire Bitcoin network. The Bitcoin network is permission-free. Anyone who meets the conditions can join the Bitcoin mining community. There is no centralized organization that audits miners and decides who can and cannot mine. This achieves the decentralization of access for miners.


4. Decentralization of mining computing power

When miners from different regions of the world join the Bitcoin mining industry, miners can choose different models of mining machines and different types of CPU mining machines for mining. As long as miners can use their own mining machines to provide computing power for the Bitcoin network. At the same time, the Bitcoin network will automatically adjust the mining difficulty of the entire system according to changes in market computing power. This itself does not require any centralized organization to manage and audit, so I said that the computing power of Bitcoin mining is also decentralized.

5. Decentralization of asset management

In our daily lives, we use our country’s legal currency for daily payments or asset storage. But these funds are managed by centralized banks entrusted by the state. In many cases, banks can freeze our funds and assets for various reasons. However, in the Bitcoin network, Bitcoin is managed separately by each of us. As long as we have the private key of our Bitcoin wallet, no one can plunder our assets. We truly have our personal assets in our hands.

6. Decentralization of community governance

In our daily work, most of our country or our company exists in the form of centralized governance. But it is completely different in the Bitcoin network. Bitcoin does not have a centralized organization to manage the entire ecology, but exists in the form of a community. In this community, there are different stakeholders. There is a core developer group, a miner group, a Bitcoin whale holder group, and a Bitcoin retail holder group. There is no centralized organization to manage these stakeholders, but everyone uniformly abides by the consensus mechanism of the Bitcoin community and spontaneously participates in the construction of the Bitcoin community. No single individual or collective can fully control Bitcoin. If someone wants to upgrade the Bitcoin network, they need to get the consensus of different stakeholders in the community. If there is no consensus, it is easy to cause the division of the community. This is the decentralization of community governance.


7. Decentralization of social governance

As of now, the Bitcoin network has been operating stably for 12 years. In addition to the early experience of the miner fork, the Bitcoin community has also developed in a very stable manner in recent years. This also proves the feasibility of decentralized governance in the Bitcoin community. The decentralized governance of the Bitcoin community provides a model market for the decentralized governance of our entire human society. Now more and more blockchain projects are implementing decentralized governance practices in accordance with Bitcoin's ideas. When more and more economies begin to implement decentralized governance, it will trigger the entire society to transform to decentralized governance. This process may be very long, but we have seen this trend, and this trend is irreversible.


The above is some of my understanding of Bitcoin decentralization, and you can also express your thoughts.