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A comment on Bitcoins up another 42% since August 1st. Parent comment

Re:Bitcoins up another 42% since August 1st by hnolable on Thursday August 16, 2012 @11:53AM (#4391884)
You're still thinking very US-centric. So what if US makes it illegal, maybe that kills the US market for it, but there is still the rest of the world. And maybe the rest of the world using it while the US cannot even provides them some advantage over the US (of course this isn't necessary).

On the other hand a 51% attack on the blockchain by _anyone_ would have a near 100% chance of destroying Bitcoin.

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Re:Bitcoins up another 42% since August 1st by LyndsySimon on Thursday August 16, 2012 @12:03PM (#4391948)
Not true, necessarily. There have been proposals to form a "web of trust" for miners, which would prevent this sort of thing from happening.

Miners who have been on the network for longer would have greater authority than new miners, regardless of computational ability. If a 51% attack occurs, it would in effect fork the blockchain, because the WoT-enabled miners would not accept their signed blocks.

You can fork the blockchain now if you want - it's just a matter of getting enough people to agree with you for those coins to have value.

I'm not saying it would be _good_ for Bitcoin - but this is not an insurmountable problem from a tech standpoint.

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