Review on Decred by Fabrizio Zampieri
Decred launched its mainnet on February 8, 2016. The goal is to build a…
Decred launched its mainnet on February 8, 2016. The goal is to build a cryptocurrency that runs autonomously, with improvements voted on and enacted directly by the miners and holders of the currency. Decred incorporates some fundamental changes from the Bitcoin protocol.
Decred’s developers are crypto-enthusiasts and early Bitcoin adopters, but they spotted an inefficiency in the way Bitcoin operates. As mining operations have grown, Bitcoin’s decision-making process has become more centralized, with the largest mining companies holding large amounts of power over the Bitcoin improvement process. In addition, while some Bitcoin improvements can be implemented via a soft fork, almost all improvements that involve a significant change to the Bitcoin software require a hard fork from the old blockchain.
Pros
- Decred’s developers and community believe Decred’s protocol for incorporating improvements and changes will allow it to become the optimal cryptocurrency on the market in the long run. Decred aims to reduce or eliminate hard forks, especially ones that divide the community. While a hard fork is possible on Decred, and in fact Decred recently navigated the first fully user-driven hard fork, Decred’s voting protocol makes it so that users can vote on changes before activation. Then upon passage of the vote, the changes go live. Decred accomplishes its voting protocol on the blockchain using a hybrid design that combines proof of work and proof of stake. Decred also plans to implement Lightning Network. Decred’s largest strength is its community. The founding development team is made up of former developers from major crypto projects.
Cons
- Great potential but DCR is not well known yet. Marketing and communication should be improved.
