No Craig Wright, I’m not a communist
Some time ago, I wrote an article promoting a mechanism to reward developers of cryptocurrencies alongside the miners.
Fingers hurt from clicking all day? Try Auto Mouse.
Want to use Notion as a CMS for your website? Try Local Notion.
Some time later, Craig Wright (who claims to be Satoshi Nakamoto, the inventor of Bitcoin) wrote a disparaging rebuke indirectly implying I’m a “techno-communist”.
Since his article doesn’t allow responses, I’ve responded to it here.
Nothing in Craig Wright’s article addresses the points made in my original article.
1. Craig claims Bitcoin 2010 was global adoption ready and didn’t need any more development yet NChain are clearly paying protocol developers to develop the BSV layer-1 client. It’s a total contradiction. If Bitcoin was global adoption ready in 2010, why do BSV insiders pay for protocol development? (Not referring to infrastructure or rolling back post-2010 updates). If Craig’s claims were true, they could simply revert the BSV codebase to 2010 with one git command and BSV should be global adoption ready. Instead they’re paying developers (likely into the $millions) out of their own pockets. (NOTE: Bad news guys, you’re going to need $billions to reach global adoption system).
2. BSV is an example of funding model (3) in my article. It’s pretty clear to outside observers that Calvin is subsidizing a lot of the BSV eco-system. Whilst they’re making some progress towards global-adpotion readiness, arguably more so than BCH has currently managed, it’s unclear whether BSV will receive any further wider adoption beyond their current core base. There appears to be a price for having a centralized funding model. The “centralization stench” repels users, prevents wider investment and hampers long-term adoption.
3. Craig claims that I’m implying
“something being voluntary is all that is necessary for it to be right”
but my article says nothing of the sort. Notions of “right” are subjective, not objective. What’s “right” for a criminal cabal attempting to seize a currency is not necessarily what’s “right” for a developer seeking to enhance a decentralized effort, or a user, or a business, etc.
What I am saying is that private property is an actual “legal right” and that source-code repositories are private property of the developers, not a “community” or “miners”.
Also Craig’s statement
“such disingenuous individuals seek to change the rules at a whim. To change the rules for all other people, without a say.”
presupposes the notion that the source code is “common property” of a “community of other people”. That’s actually socialism. A source code repository belongs to the developers who wrote it or the individuals they transferred it to by gift or sale. It does not belong to anyone else, including miners. Developers are free to change their private property arbitrarily. Miners are free to run whatever software they want.
What I am suggesting is a way to incentivize developers to not constantly split with each other (as they did with BTC-BCH-BSV and continue to do in BCH dramas). What I suggested was an in-protocol reward mechanism that incentivizes developers to cooperate in order to maximize their dividend, resulting in an eco-system wide win-win for all (whilst retaining decentralization).
Certainly not communism or socialism, only pure voluntarism.
