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I think this e-mail [1] answers these two points [1] https://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/emails/cryptography/2/ https://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/emails/

by hggh 6y ago

I think this e-mail [1] answers these two points [1] https://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/emails/cryptography/2/ https://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/emails/cryptography/2/

littlestymaar 6y ago
It doesn't. Satoshi simply failed (as you can see in this response) to imagine a world where full nodes and miners would be disjoint entities, and as a result full node receive no reward whatsoever (and the biggest miners don't even bother to verify that the blocks they mine are correct). The reliability and independence of the bitcoin blockchain runs on top of the shoulders of benevolent people running full nodes. Increasing the block size, means increasing the cost for those essential people. Not a good idea at all.
- hggh 6y ago
  But why would you want to run a "full node" if not for mining? And why would running a "non-mining full node" should be rewarded if it's doing nothing good to the network? Only if you run a business that makes/receives lots of transactions, then would make sense to have the full blockchain, but that doesn't help the network, and shouldn't be rewarded whatsoever. > The reliability and independence of the bitcoin blockchain runs on top of the shoulders of benevolent people running full nodes. You don't need "non-mining full nodes" for that. See point 8 (Simplified Payment Verification) of the whitepaper [1] [1] https://www.bitcoin.com/bitcoin.pdf https://www.bitcoin.com/bitcoin.pdf
  - littlestymaar 6y ago
    > And why would running a "non-mining full node" should be rewarded if it's doing nothing good to the network? If all full nodes are miners, then there is no one to keep the miners to respect the protocol. The two keys points here are halving and difficulty scaling: these are burdens the protocol inflict to the miners. Without third party full-nodes, the miners can decide they don't like these rules and just do as they like. The bitcoin protocol is supposed to be a trust-less one, without non-mining full nodes: the miners control the blockchain and you have to trust them to respect the rules.
    - hggh 6y ago
      > If all full nodes are miners, then there is no one to keep the miners to respect the protocol. If none of them has more than 50% of the total hashrate, then there is not such threat.
      - littlestymaar 6y ago
        But by definition the miners collectively have 100% of the mining power. Miners as a group have converging interests, which doesn't align with users' interest. Remember, bitcoin ain't really a cryptographic money (there's little crypto involved, not much more than when using PGP signed-commits in git) but more of a game-theory money, and as such it's extremely important to maintain a balance of power between miners and users.

by hggh 6y ago

I think this e-mail [1] answers these two points [1] https://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/emails/cryptography/2/ https://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/emails/cryptography/2/

littlestymaar 6y ago

It doesn't. Satoshi simply failed (as you can see in this response) to imagine a world where full nodes and miners would be disjoint entities, and as a result full node receive no reward whatsoever (and the biggest miners don't even bother to verify that the blocks they mine are correct). The reliability and independence of the bitcoin blockchain runs on top of the shoulders of benevolent people running full nodes. Increasing the block size, means increasing the cost for those essential people. Not a good idea at all.

hggh 6y ago
But why would you want to run a "full node" if not for mining? And why would running a "non-mining full node" should be rewarded if it's doing nothing good to the network? Only if you run a business that makes/receives lots of transactions, then would make sense to have the full blockchain, but that doesn't help the network, and shouldn't be rewarded whatsoever. > The reliability and independence of the bitcoin blockchain runs on top of the shoulders of benevolent people running full nodes. You don't need "non-mining full nodes" for that. See point 8 (Simplified Payment Verification) of the whitepaper [1] [1] https://www.bitcoin.com/bitcoin.pdf https://www.bitcoin.com/bitcoin.pdf
- littlestymaar 6y ago
  > And why would running a "non-mining full node" should be rewarded if it's doing nothing good to the network? If all full nodes are miners, then there is no one to keep the miners to respect the protocol. The two keys points here are halving and difficulty scaling: these are burdens the protocol inflict to the miners. Without third party full-nodes, the miners can decide they don't like these rules and just do as they like. The bitcoin protocol is supposed to be a trust-less one, without non-mining full nodes: the miners control the blockchain and you have to trust them to respect the rules.
  - hggh 6y ago
    > If all full nodes are miners, then there is no one to keep the miners to respect the protocol. If none of them has more than 50% of the total hashrate, then there is not such threat.
    - littlestymaar 6y ago
      But by definition the miners collectively have 100% of the mining power. Miners as a group have converging interests, which doesn't align with users' interest. Remember, bitcoin ain't really a cryptographic money (there's little crypto involved, not much more than when using PGP signed-commits in git) but more of a game-theory money, and as such it's extremely important to maintain a balance of power between miners and users.