To get a grip on how regulation might work, we first have to understand the Bitcoin ecosystem. It mainly relies on miners and node operators. Miners tackle complex math problems to find blocks and add them to the blockchain, while node operators make sure all transactions added to the ledger by miners are legit.
So, let’s say, in a wild hypothetical situation, if governments worldwide managed to take over all the major mining operations and enforced a ban where only they could mine Bitcoin, would Bitcoin still be considered decentralized?
I know this scenario sounds super far-fetched, but if it did happen, could Bitcoin really hold onto its decentralized nature?
Before that can happen the whole world government would have to be one, with the present state of the world every government is looking for an advantage over another and if a government place a ban on mining the other government will welcome Bitcoin miners because they will be having the edge.
It is extremely unlikely for ever government to take hold of all Bitcoin mining and place a ban on it at the same time when we don't operate under one government.
Yes if you want to think fictionally and have imagination it is possible to regulate the whole Bitcoin ecosystem but it is not realistic.
I do not know what the average person would do. If this take over would somehow make people think Bitcoin will become worth more than ever, they may even support it so they can make more money.
I do know however what us who want a DEcentralized currency would do. We would move away either through a fork or straight to Monero. I am assuming Monero would be a good choice instead of even forking away from the controlled Bitcoin considering in your scenario governments are visibly draconic already and would clearly target anyone who is not willing to be controlled.
No, it is not possible to control the entire Bitcoin ecosystem together. If this has to be done, then the miners of the whole world have to be brought together. The government of each country will have to classify it as prohibited and bring it under control. And this is never going to happen, Bitcoin has been known as a decentralized currency since its inception, so there is no possibility of such a thing happening in Bitcoin. Because starting from node developers, miners are spread across different countries of the world. And to do something like this, first of all, pressure will have to be put on all Bitcoin investors to bring it under control. And Bitcoin has been created in such a way that no one can control it. Look at the blog system. Here we can see everyone's transactions very easily and this is the real quality of Bitcoin that nothing is secret except your wallet key, everything is being managed publicly. So according to your idea, it will never be implemented. And even then, it is a matter of a lot of time, and the government does not allow such a waste of time.
That's right, not much of a point in hypothetising such unlikely scenarios, however I believe even then Bitcoin would still be considered decentralised due to its immutable and anonymous nature. They would still be incapable of targeting individual holders and their belongings.
It's definitely and imagination because it's really unlikely to happen.
But let's just go to the imaginary world for a sec what will happen in this situation
Bitcoin will still be decentralised, but barely
Privacy will decline,
The reason why it will still be decentralised is simply because Bitcoin's decentralisation is not only based on miners alone, it also depends on developers, independent nodes etc..
Bitcoin will become centralized when all mining pools refuse to include a transaction that was previously blacklisted by government. At that point, a hard fork will occur, and new blockchain will gain value due to the pools migrating to it.
Old chain will remain centralized and its value will decrease over time. We will get Bitcoin V2 and it will be decentralized.
You have made an excellent point haha they have to be one before they end up on the same platform but sometimes they do end up on the same platform but only when that benefits all of them. But in this case, it could only benefit those who are in the business way before doing something like this.
Because those who started early have more, know more and could earn even more after. But that is not necessary too. Anyway, I don't think all the countries would ever be on the same panel on the same thing, they can't force people out of mining business. This would be an attack. What about El Salvador do you think they would also do the same. Although they might not resist international pressure but just a question?
Currently, they could do so. But what is the crucial goal, overriding the country's internal problems that should be resolved first?
The government must also consider all the impacts and benefits. If Bitcoin becomes centralized in this scenario, it will certainly not have a fair market value, and interest in its use will diminish over time. Ultimately, Bitcoin will be abandoned, and all government efforts, including the state budget spent on controlling it, will be wasted.
How can they take control of all mining operations? Even China, which banned Bitcoin mining in 2021, still can't crack down on all mining activity in its country, let alone all governments worldwide, this is unrealistic. The most governments can do is perhaps issue regulations restricting Bitcoin mining, but expecting them to stop all Bitcoin mining activity globally and instead take control of it entirely is nearly impossible.
If this were to happen, then the idea of Satoshi having a decentralized financial system which is free from external and government control would be a complete nullity.
The idea behind bitcoin is on its very nature- no one can regulate, control, and change what are indicated on the blockchain. Assuming that the government absolutely regulates information and mining, then its price would definitely crash. Basically, there's no real reason to use BTC for and the idea behind it would crumble instantly.
The most that the government can do is to prohibit its utilization/transaction in a given country but they cannot prevent its creation, utilization, and regulation world-wide.
I agree with you. The price would crash instantly given that you're valuing something that can be created by anyone who tries to have access over it. The idea of having 21 million mineable BTCs is aimed towards its deflationary asset and value to make it valuable as it decreases its supply.
In the economic sphere, everyone is an opportunist. The fewer miners there are, the more the other miners benefit. If a country imposes a ban on mining activities, other countries or other individuals will take advantage of that opportunity, because everyone cannot be united in terms of money.
If you talk about control, then I would say that this is never possible. For government control of all major mining activities, every country and government will have to come to an agreement or work together, which is never possible. If this were possible, then there would never have been any war in the world. There has been conflict between people since the beginning of the world, which can never be eliminated. So no matter how much you plan to centralize Bitcoin, it will be limited to planning, not implementation.
Your actually right
But I was just speaking based on what he said, he was talking about miners, but to come to think of it, a situation where government take over mining they can definitely do the same with developers too, lol.
But also in that situation like this one government will struggle to keep up, so government around the world will need to cooperate to do such,
And if that is the case Bitcoin will become a centralised asset
Well bro you are right they can literally affect the Bitcoin structure if they do that, and I don't think it would be wrong to say that Bitcoin won't stay decentralized anymore if they do it because when they control the miners, they can do a lot of damage like, the 51% attack becomes real, they could decide which transaction gets into a block and which don't. They could blacklist specific addresses, block transactions from certain regions or refuse any transaction that won't include taxation or who knows maybe KYC even.
They could even rewrite the recent blocks with 100% in their hands. But they could not print more BTC, they can't steal our existing bitcoins, they can't change the supply because these things would be stopped if there are people who are taking the risk to run a node. As they could force us from mining BTC but they can't stop us from running a node, because we can run it on a Raspberry Pi or an old laptop and it won't even draw a noticeable amount of electricity. Some say it will only draw electricity equal to a lightbulb. So, if they stop you from mining, at least run your nodes.
Yes
Mining would just be more centralised than it is now.
The ban wouldn't be in the consensus level except majority accept
So if they change it from the consensus level without support then it's a fork
But if it's through power then Bitcoin itself is still decentralized.
Mining decentralisation is an aspect of it's decentralisation not the only.
This is assuming that the government around the world are united
Which is something that don't even happen in fairy tales.
Bitcoin would obviously not be considered a decentralized asset if such should happen, but let's not forget that the Bitcoin system is a government on its own because of the shared power between the network nodes and the miners.
Independent nodes still hold the most power and can reject invalid blocks anytime.
It's simply going to be a war that the intended regulators won't win because of the way Bitcoin is built by design and by mathematical schematics.
And WHY would a government want to do this exactly? Whom would it benefit? It's not like they could prevent other countries to mine it, so why would they even try it with individuals? Sure, some countries could ban mining, but it's not because they want to mine it themselves.
It's way more convenient and profitable for them to regulate everything outside of it and tax the gains. And answer to your last question in form of question: aren't huge mining farms already threat to decentralization?
The reason why Bitcoin is decentralized isn't only because of miners but power is distributed between miners, node operators, developers exchanges and users so even if the government succeeds in controlling the activities of miners, they still will not be able to control Bitcoin unless the people that are operating node also accept to operate as the government instruct.
It is the duty of miners to produce blocks but they'll need nodes to verify wether those blocks actually follow Bitcoin's rules so if government decides to push invalid changes, independent nodes will most likely reject their transactions. The only thing that can happen if government succeed to take over mining operations is that they'll reduce decentralisation but definitely not gaining total control of Bitcoin.
Governments could take control of major miners, but couldn't prevent other miners from mining as well. The government would only win in this case if they controlled mining operation business, what means they should be active on this activity, spending resources to prevail in influence.
Would it worth for them, especially taking into consideration their final goal is to discourage or forbid Bitcoin adoption?
Meanwhile, there is always the risk decentralized miners join forces together in an indirect way to stand against government's domination inside mining industry.