On the 09/25 mumble session, bytemaster mentioned the importance of defense mechanisms for a distributed, digital asset exchange. Paraphrasing what I believe I picked up, on the technical side, a network such as BitShares should be sufficiently decentralized to prevent very easy physical attacks, but the technical defenses may not be sufficient if BitShares is not sufficient in it its political defenses. To increase political defense, it was suggested that the "mob" or large group of people find lots of value in the network; to the point that, if the the network were shut down, it would have large negative effects for the group who shut down the network. I bring this up again to ask, how can we most easily and quickly increase our political defense?
One way BM outlined to increase political defense is by increasing the number of consumers using/loving bitshares-based apps.
Other than successful applications, are there any other ways we might increase Bitshares defense? I have a feeling there could be some "growth-hacks" in this regard, such as putting a celebrity in charge of proxy or witness positions, but I am curious to hear what others took away from that discussion.
Bytemaster is one of the smartest most balanced minds in the crypto space which is why I spend a lot of time on this forum. On other forums the concept of political defense isn't even discussed, people often believe if you just build a cool technology that somehow that will be enough.
The referral concept is great and can allow Bitshares to adopt celebrities. Security has to be measured not just in technical ways, not just physically, but also politically. If the people using Bitshares are all persecuted then no one will want to be associated with Bitshares so it is very important that Bitshares be designed in a way to make it so delegates are able to resist political persecution and that is possible by allowing decentralization, global delegates, in different political environments.
As for the users, as long as there is a way to use Bitshares while also complying with the laws and social norms, it can help the users reduce their own risk of political and legal attack. As much as it sounds nice to talk about just ignoring the laws or just allowing anything goes, in the real world people who do that are risking their freedom or in some cases their reputations.
Bytemaster said something I agree 100% with. He said reputation is ultimately what keeps everyone in line. The biggest risk for a participant is the loss of reputation and that is what protects us from scammers. That is the fabric which allows for decentralized order.
Whether a person is complying with their local regulation or not might depend on if they are in the middle of a political conflict or not. That is really not for us to concern ourselves with or for Bitshares. However people who want to remain on friendly terms with their government need to be able to comply with all regulations, and as long as Bitshares can balance between being a tool for activists and being designed for mainstream adoption then it's going to work.
The mainstream in my opinion just wants to lower their risks. They want political security and do not want to be politically persecuted as online activists or freedom fighters. So they might not be the people pushing for total anonymity, and certain other features which make a lot of sense to political activists but which will get bank accounts shut down, account holders blacklisted, fired from their jobs, divorced by their spouse, etc.
So ultimately every user or participant has to be able to determine the level of risk they are willing to take to support freedom. I would say everyone who uses Bitshares is supporting freedom but not every supporter is going to support freedom in the same way, or be willing to take the same risks. This means you can actually invite Wall Street onto Bitshares while also inviting activists, just so long as you take the approach of total flexibility of the protocol so that certain accounts are whitelisted by the regulated entities, and unregulated entities can have whitelists of their own if they choose to only deal with people who meet certain criteria suitable for being an activist.
With Bitcoin I don't think you can have the granularity to do that. It seems Bitcoin has a fork in the road where it either has to appeal to activists or to Wallstreet but not both at the same time because unlike Bitshares, Ethereum and other newer platforms the Bitcoin platform is not programmable enough to have whitelists without losing fungibility, and for activists having anonymous transactions, having the ability to protest the drug war or send money in a civil war, is of critical importance.
I understand both are important, both adoption and activism. It's just a matter of getting the balance between the two right so that neither negatively impact the other. I would hope Bitshares and all the newer blockchains focus on activism and adoption, having a strategy to appeal to both key demographics of politically active and mainstream.
Topic: BitShares' Political Defense (Read 3780 times)
