Vitalik Buterin
@vitalik.eth
Make Ethereum cypherpunk again https://vitalik.eth.limo/general/2023/12/28/cypherpunk.html
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Freddy Mertens
@freddymertens
Everything built should be built to not depend on the social layer. No matter how strong and effective the social layer is the probability of it degrading is non 0 and only increases with time.
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Vitalik Buterin
@vitalik.eth
The problem is that building things to rely solely on incentives is in many cases impractical. A purely in-protocol automated system has no way to "pay people to be decentralized".
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parseb
@parseb.eth
"has no way" your mind seems made up about it. The forces at play are knowable quantities. A problem to consider with the virtuous ethereum non-financialized governace is that it lacks analytical transparency. You can't prove that it is not a cartel. It is objectively indistinguishable from decentralization theater.
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Vitalik Buterin
@vitalik.eth
I feel like I've been trying for a decade to solve centralization issues with in-protocol economic means, and it always end up coming up short. Meanwhile, core devs yelling at people for using [overly powerful thing here] plus Twitter sentiment pointing in the same direction... actually works.
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Vitalik Buterin
@vitalik.eth
This is why I think the goal of economics in protocol design should step back and be a bit more modest: instead of assuming that it alone can turn bad guys into good guys in all circumstances, focus on at least ensuring that good guys (of which there are a lot) can stay competitive and don't go backrupt.
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Freddy Mertens
@freddymertens
Works for now but how about 100 years from now? Is something as fragile as social checks and balances really robust enough to uphold the values ethereum is trying to solve for? The least that can be done is to aspire to minimise the dependence on the social layer. Which is a paradox lol but still should be done
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