Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

Re:Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus by ertian on Sunday November 28, 2021 @02:12PM (#29371869)

It's a temporary state, until the PoS coin market cap gets too large to be attackable. Bitcoin's market cap is in the 1T range now, Ethereum is close to half that. Buffet couldn't do a thing against a PoS coin that large, and it would be a serious commitment and risk even for a nation state. Buffet could take down some random smaller coin, maybe, at the cost of most of his personal fortune, but if he did so the world would not burn.

It's _possible_ that a government might choose to attack a random small coin just to discredit the notion of PoS cryptocurrencies, but it's hard to picture a government gaining consensus to do it, and it would be obvious to knowledgeable onlookers that larger coins are immune (or anyway, much better protected), so the resulting disruption would probably be temporary.

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Re:Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus by bitcurious on Sunday November 28, 2021 @02:17PM (#29371929)

PoS encourages centralized exchange-held staking, which means that there are only a handful of failure/pressure points. In other words, a government doesn’t have to buy 66% of the stake - merely compel the exchanges.

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Re:Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus by yellowapple on Sunday November 28, 2021 @04:00PM (#29372972)

> PoS encourages centralized exchange-held staking

Not when the protocol actively encourages decentralization by cutting off staking rewards to larger pools, like what Cardano does (as one example). Sure, the exchanges can (and probably do) run multiple pools, but so can anyone else, and for far less expense than is required for mining.

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