Vitalik Buterin entered a debate on Twitter with Matt Odell, a podcast host, and bitcoin advocate, regarding the matter of premined cryptocurrencies.
Premine is the phenomenon of mining the crypto before the code is released to the masses, and is by some considered to not be the fairest of means to attain the currency.
Buterin's Tweet that started the debate off went:
I personally am really proud to have helped set the precedent of small premines being legitimate. It's an appalling idea that people operating boxes burning huge piles of electricity are somehow the only ones who should be allowed to gain from crypto seignorage revenue.
— Vitalik Non-giver of Ether (@VitalikButerin) October 5, 2018
To which Odell responded:
1. Admits to legitimizing the premine/ICO model.
— Matt Odell (@matt_odell) October 5, 2018
2. Still doesn't understand(or feigned ignorance) mining economics or the unique value of distributed permissionless PoW. https://t.co/dl9SrhKKP5
In general, Buterin is fine with having been a popularizer of the premined initial coin offering (ICO) model that saw a rise in 2017. The ethereum creator is not a fan of proof-of-work (PoW) mining (the first to finish a block gets a reward), being an advocate of the proof-of-stake system (no reward is given, and the miners receive a transaction fee.)
Odell, on the other hand, is against premined cryptos, like Bitcoin (Bitcoin), he believes that it is an unfair system that puts the miners at a disadvantage.
WHY IS IT IMPORTANT?
- Ethereum was the first major crypto with a premine system to be accepted by the community.
- There are worries regarding premine digital assets that they centralize the control of the crypto, which later can be used to manipulate the price of the coin.
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