On 7/11/2017 7:12 PM, Tao Effect wrote:
Paul,

There is a difference between replying to an email, and addressing the issues that were brought up in it.

I did read your reply, and I chose not to respond to it because it did not address anything I said.

In that case you should clarify, which is exactly what you are doing now.


Here's an example:

It would not be accurate to say that miners have "total" control. Miners
do control the destination of withdrawals, but they do not control the
withdrawal-duration nor the withdrawal-frequency.

So, if miners wish to 'steal' from a sidechain, they _can_ initiate a
theft, but they can not change the fact that their malfeasance will be
[a] obvious, and [b] on display for a long period of time.

Here, you admit that the security of the sidechains allows miners to steal bitcoins, something they cannot do currently.

If that were the case, then DC would need to be a hard fork. It so happens that it is *not* the case -- if users choose to deposit to an anyone-can-spend output, then miners can take the Bitcoins, which *is* something that miners can do currently.


You next tried to equate three different types of theft, what you called "Classic Theft", "Channel Theft", and "Drivechain Theft", saying:

I do not think that any of the three stands out as being categorically
worse than the others

To anyone who understands bitcoin, there is a very clear, unmistakeable difference between double-spending ("Classic Theft"), and *ownership* of the private key controlling the bitcoins.

Similarly, to anyone who understands bitcoin, there is also a very clear, unmistakeable difference between censorship ("Channel Theft"), and *ownership* of the private key controlling the bitcoins.

I am not sure what you are disagreeing with. The three thefts involve different attacker resources and behaviors, and in that way they are different. But in all three cases the user has lost the BTC they would have otherwise owned, and in that way they are not different.

And users are under no obligation to use DC, just as they are under no obligation to open a LN channel (or use P2SH, etc).


I am not sure how else to respond to that email, given that none of the issues were really addressed.
Other than your complaint about being freely given the option to upgrade to software which will give you the option to freely opt-in to a different security model that you can otherwise ignore, feel free to bring up any other issues you feel need to be addressed.

Drivechain is an unmistakeable weakening of Bitcoin's security guarantees. This you have not denied.
That is false. I do deny it. Per the logic of the soft fork, the security properties are at best unchanged (as I think almost everyone else on this list would acknowledge). And even for those users who opt-in, I feel the risk of theft is low, as I explain in the very passage you've quoted above.

And please try to avoid going off-topic -- this is supposed to be about the idea of a new roadmap.

Paul