Bitcoin.com is of the opinion that the current “Bitcoin Core + Blockstream” Bitcoin development team is not taking satisfactory steps to ensure the growth and advancement of Bitcoin in accordance with Satoshi’s original white paper, and is in fact actively harming the health of the Bitcoin economy by stifling efforts to solve some of Bitcoin’s most pressing problems.
Rather than viewing Bitcoin as a fast, affordable, and reliable payments network, as it has been for years, they aim to transform Bitcoin into what they call “a settlement layer”, defined by high fees, unreliable transactions, and a labyrinth of complex overlays that require third-party trust on top of the basic system.
This development team has further prevented the ability of the Bitcoin community to freely discuss this radical change of direction by tacitly, and in some cases explicitly, supporting censorship of Bitcoin’s largest discussion forums, along with the outright banning of many prominent developers, businesses, and community members who have differences of opinion with Bitcoin Core’s current roadmap. After years of stagnation, stalling, and broken promises, it has become clear that positive change will not come from Bitcoin Core, but rather from the diverse group of alternate development teams that have emerged as a result of Core’s tactics.
The following article cites a thorough history with specific examples of the rampant censorship on the “r/bitcoin” sub-reddit:
A (Brief and Incomplete) History of Censorship in r/bitcoin, by John Blocke
As efforts by the community to resolve these problems have failed, it is necessary to resolve them with a different approach:
- By unsubscribing to /r/bitcoin, and subscribing to sub-reddit /r/btc you take a stand against censorship.
- By running an alternate implementation, such as Bitcoin Unlimited, Bitcoin Classic, or Bcoin, you are casting a vote against the current development team.
There are currently cryptocurrencies which perform better than Bitcoin, have more features than Bitcoin, have a more receptive and open development team than Bitcoin, and have a better upgrade path than Bitcoin. The single and only remaining quality that Bitcoin has over these other cryptocurrencies is first-mover advantage and its pre-existing network of users and infrastructure. If these qualities are not preserved, Bitcoin will continue to lose market share to competing cryptocurrencies.
The current Bitcoin Core developers are rapidly eroding this last advantage with poor design choices, a failure to understand basic economic principles, and promoting censorship through their support of censored discussion forums and their vilification of forums committed to free speech.
We encourage all members of the Bitcoin community to make their voices heard, and to stand up for what is right.
Sincerely,
Bitcoin.com
Bitcoin.com
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