nostr:npub1h8nk2346qezka5cpm8jjh3yl5j88pf4ly2ptu7s6uu55wcfqy0wq36rpev explaining #drivechains on Bitcoin Audible is definitely worth listening to š„
I still donāt know how I feel about it, but I think itās an important topic
Discussion
My biggest concern is that Bitcoin full nodes will become more complex and need to validate against external side-chains too, thus require more data.
As it is, the steady blockchain growth-rate makes full-node storage capacity predictable.
This removes that predictability.
Thanks to BIP300 it has no impact on nodes, all they have to do is verify that 50% of miners "voted" for a peg-out, over multiple months.
So there is impact, even if small. Just trying to guage the severity.
If part of the validation process is to index over side-chains, then it becomes unacceptable IMO.
If validation stays 100% on the Bitcoin blockchain, and increases validation complexity (and time) with a small and predictable amount, OK.
They don't have to know what's going on on the sidechain, the impact is similar to verify a proof of work, just make sure that during the N last blocks, most miners accepted the transaction.
But that's what creates most of the ongoing debates, are the incentives correctly aligned to trust most miners?
Good episode.
Drivechain folks are very optimistic. In reality it will be experimental R&D on the side of bitcoin, where we might make some new discoveries.
IMHO as long as folks know the risks and that it's custodial, they could risk a few sats in a different play ground.
Easy to get rekt, but imho wont spread main chain.
My reasons for opposing Drivechain:
1. Today, miners are purely profit driven. Work in -> Bitcoin out. Drivechain introduces political incentives: which chains to activate/deactivate and when.
2. Since miners vote on sidechain activation/deactivation, a 51% miner can unilaterally decide each side-chainās fate. Including the ability to take all sidechain coins for themselves. This is a new incentive for 51% attacks that did not previously exist.
3. Pegs are made to be broken. The time lag for peg in/out guarantees arbitrage. The second-order incentives around sidechain rollbacks are unpredictable.
4. Drivechain will not kill shitcoins. The main point of shitcoins is pump-and-dump. If the pegs are successful, shitcoiners are disincentivized from choose them over spinning up their own chains.
5. Contrary to supportersā claims, Drivechain cannot increase miner revenue. The subsidy schedule of Bitcoin is immutable. So the only way miner revenue increases is by fee pressure. But a supposed benefit of Drivechain is to move transactions off of main-chain, which would reduce fee pressure.
6. Drivechain requires softforks to implement, because new OP codes must be enforced by nodes. But regular main-chain users have no incentive to adopt these rules. This makes the risk of total reversal greater than previous softforks that directly benefitted regular users.
7. Drivechain proponents systematically ignore these concerns. A common refrain is that activating Drivechain will not affect users of main-chain. But the risks of arbitrage schenanigans, miner politicization/centralization and softfork rollback deserve clear answers.