In the discussion of Bitcoin SV and CSW in the BCH community, there is a clear difference of opinion as to whether BCH’s development path should lead the market or cater to the market. Leading the market means making choices for users. CSW believes that when BCH can accommodate more transactions, large enterprises will be reassured to start using it. Catering to the market refers to making timely adjustments according to market trends and catering to users. The point of view is derived from existing BCH development routes, such as the concept of “pre-consensus” proposed by Bitcoin ABC to optimize trading, the concept of shortening block production time proposed by BCH community, and the wormhole protocol launched in the context of the popularity of smart contracts.
The two views are not contradictory, but both sides are difficult to convince each other, just like a debate competition, there is no absolute right or wrong point of view, each can cite countless examples, the real victory or defeat depends on whether the argument of the defense can really stand. In addition to this, it also depends on whether the views are suitable for the current time period. For example, the debate of “Do you support homosexuality?” In feudal China, it would be difficult for the opposing side to win even if the opposing side had a good tongue, but now, the pro side may be a kind of political correctness.
In the eyes of supporters of Bitcoin SV and CSW, who agree that leading the market is the right path for BCH’s current development, an example commonly used is the history of Apple’s mobile phone. Apple launched the first full-screen mobile phone and led the mobile phone market. Before that, there was no similar design in the market, as Steve Jobs said: “Don’t ask consumers what they want, create something they can’t imagine.” For this point of view, I don’t think it is wrong, but I think the market-leading development idea is not applicable to the current BCH. On the contrary, I prefer to cater to the market and make adjustments, at least from now on.
There are several reasons why BCH at this stage is better suited to cater to the market than to lead it.
First, the blockchain market is competing with each other, and BCH currently lacks the market share and does not have the ability to lead the market.
As much as I hate to admit it, BCH still lags behind Bitcoin in terms of active addresses and total market capitalization. Not only Bitcoin, ethereum is ahead of BCH in trading volume. Talk of leading the market before it is officially established is a dubious business. What BCH is doing now should never be proud to face users. Helping businesses and businesses make choices is not a wise thing to do, at least for now. , for example, what apple launched the “Liu Haibing”, but also by other mobile phone design, imitation, is based on apple is already the world’s top mobile phone maker, if “Liu Haibing” not by apple technique, but by millet, other phone makers will still rushing so?
Locking the top-level protocol to attract users simply by expanding the capacity is not a bad approach, but the effect is limited and there are certain deficiencies. In the beginning, supporting BCH was the same as supporting the big block. BCH solved the problem of Bitcoin congestion by expanding its capacity, but the expansion of Bitcoin SV to 128MB has made the identity of the “big block supporter” controversial. The big block in the era refers to no congestion, not unlimited expansion. After solving the existing congestion, BCH attracts a part of people, but only a part of people. At this time, the attraction of expansion is very limited. Therefore, BCH needs to attract people through other means and make changes to cater to the market.
Second, pandering to the market is shameful but useful.
Both the “pre-consensus” proposed by Bitcoin ABC and the shortening of the block time proposed by the community have been seen by some as a move away from Bitcoin to cater to the market, and these things have been frequently mentioned, especially during the time of the Bitcoin SV node. In my opinion, these concepts proposed by the development team and the community all hope to give users a better experience. After all, no one wants to wait for 10 minutes to confirm when checking out, and the white paper of Satoshi Nakamoto did not mention that the block delivery time is fixed at 10 minutes, only one piece in N minutes.
Wormhole protocol is BCH developers to cater to the market made a very important measures, but because it is a reference to the ommi protocol, and existing Ethernet fang on the market can complete the issue of token, so someone to criticize BCH approach is a bit like the early tencent, pushing it for your own good part, some disgrace, Lack of innovation. That’s true, but I don’t see anything wrong with it, because when you don’t have enough power, some borrowing is inevitable, and in blockchain, open source and decentralized development are meant to advance together.
Third, the user is always king.
It’s an old saying, but a practical one. Real users don’t care how much you increase the BCH cap, whether the underlying protocol is changed, whether the sorting is TTOR sorting? They care about whether transactions flow smoothly, whether assets are secure, whether they are truly anonymous, etc. If the BCH changes are optimized in these aspects, then no one will care about the specific changes, just like alipay users will not care about what language your program is written in. For example, when Apple first introduced the “bangs”, why did other businesses quickly imitate it? In the eyes of other mobile phone manufacturers, whether it looks good or not is of secondary importance, and what matters is that users are willing to pay for the design. Therefore, if the vision and evaluation criteria are attached to a fixed framework, the adoption of BCH is not practical help.
The development direction of BCH should be decided by the market, rather than by a certain organization or developer. If CSW decides for users and leads the market, users will not necessarily pay the bill, and those who do not respect users will eventually be abandoned. The decline of nokia, MOTOROLA and other big brands is the best example.