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102 sats \ 8 replies \ @028559d218 OP 19h \ parent \ on: Murch and Chris have a conversation - What is Going on Here??? bitcoin
Which is exactly why I think that the "number of nodes" with various software versions running...
Doesn't really mean anything.
If the node isn't used for anything, if it never broadcasts a transaction, or verifies a user's balance of received sats...
Its impact on the network is very small/negligible. This is because in the event of a consensus change/fork/disagreement a node that isn't associated with 'hard-purchased-value' AKA Bitcoin and energy isn't really worth anything.
All the more reason why a government-sponsored series of nodes, that run a certain version of software or certain filters cannot really have an censorship-like impact on the network.
How do we know that all the Core nodes... or even all the Knots nodes aren't running on Amazon AWS? Any number of nodes can be spun up in the cloud and make it 'look' like they are "more of the network". Otherwise a government could spin up their own nodes with their OWN filters and somehow that would censor the Bitcoin network? Really??? That doesn't make sense.
I find it nonsensical that this "percentage of nodes" metric keeps getting repeated... many of the Knots nodes (or Core nodes) could just be AWS and verify... nothing.
What matters is fees and demand for blockspace.
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If "run Knots" would meaningfully impact the ability of certain transactions to get confirmed...
What's to keep a government from spooling up their OWN nodes, and lots of them in a cloud with their own relay policies that start to censor certain kinds of transactions?
If "run knots" will effectively filter...
What about "run government"???
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So why haven't they done it?
The answer is that unless Bitcoin Core changes default policies this sybil attack would be expensive and ineffective. If Bitcoin Core decides that the policy level is irrelevant to consensus then it's a trivial attack
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They haven't done it because the defense doesn't work?
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What's to keep a government from spooling up their OWN nodes, and lots of them in a cloud with their own relay policies that start to censor certain kinds of transactions?
You ask:
So why haven't they done it?
I answer: because they recognize that doing it wouldn't achieve anything, because filters do not prevent transactions from getting mined on a censorship resistant network.
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Because doing so wouldn't implicate existing nodes in the propagation of CSAM. Changing the default policies in Bitcoin Core would implicate nodes in CSAM propagation. Bitcoin Core is so synonymous with Bitcoin that if it is corrupted in this way then not even Knots users could cleanse themselves of me taint associated with the Core users, including most of the miners, relaying such transactions.
The sybil attack you're describing simply isn't worth to effort, it would defeat itself. They need us to stab ourselves in the eye and you are willing entertain the idea for them.
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I think the capital gains taxes rules are having their intended effect - they are keeping people from accepting Bitcoin especially on the business side. The tax compliance is too difficult.
Beyond that I think some of the runes/ordinals didn't "start out" as a government attack... but it represents more or less how I would attack the network.
The best government attack is one where the government pays miners to mine junk that keeps the hashrate high, blocks full, but bloats the UTXO set...
Or where the government directly bloats the UTXO set with OR without the arbitrary data component - the growth in UTXO set is actually what harms nodes from what I understand.
Eventually it makes nodes harder to run and with fewer nodes and more expensive hardware eventually the network will be starved of fee pressure, miner revenue, privacy, and a manageable UTXO set.
Then it just kind of... collapses or at best/worst is nerfed relative to central banks and the money printer which is the whole point anyway.
That's the approach I would take if I were government.
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