With the “Change The Code” campaign, Greenpeace and Ripple rubbed the bitcoin community the wrong way. The reactions kept coming throughout the day. Bitcoiners saw through the campaign’s literal intention and interpreted it as an attack on the protocol. And they weren’t quiet about it. In fact, they wouldn’t shut up.
Related Reading | Ripple Consider Big Triumph Against SEC As Judge Declined Key Motion
For the sake of completion, Bitcoinist compiled the very best reactions from bitcoin thought leaders from all corners of the Internet. Some of them were rougher than others. Readers’ discretion is advised. However, before we get into it, if you’re not familiar read about the “Change The Code” campaign. We described the situation as:
“Another multimillion-dollar attack on bitcoin, once again using the ESG angle and a set of debunked numbers. The new thing is, Larsen spent $5M to bribe Greenpeace into doing his dirty work.”
Did we go too far? Wait until you read what bitcoin intellectuals and influencers had to say about it.
The Greenpeace Campaign According To Experts
- Vijay Boyapati, author of “The Bullish Case for Bitcoin,” went the optimistic route: “Bitcoin is stronger than all the vested interests that have tried to undermine it and it will prevail, immutable and unspoiled.”
First they came to change block size.
Now it’s PoW they’re trying to undermine.
Finally it will be the 21m supply cap.#Bitcoin is stronger than all the vested interests that have tried to undermine it and it will prevail, immutable and unspoiled.
— Vijay Boyapati (@real_vijay) March 30, 2022
- The Human Rights Foundation’s Alex Gladstein went for the throat: “Sickening that people like this who “made” their fortunes by fooling people into buying worthless tokens are now trying to destroy humanity’s best chance at an open, neutral, decentralized currency.”
Sickening that people like this who “made” their fortunes by fooling people into buying worthless tokens are now trying to destroy humanity’s best chance at an open, neutral, decentralized currency.
Thankfully they will fail. https://t.co/HOoyKQKFaG
— Alex Gladstein 🌋 ⚡ (@gladstein) March 29, 2022
- Investor and thought leader Nic Carter, unfortunately, went the ad-hominem route. “We’re dealing with some extremely mendacious, nasty people. Fortunately for us, they’re also very stupid.”
We’re dealing with some extremely mendacious, nasty people.
Fortunately for us, they’re also very stupid. https://t.co/3oqrjkC0wV
— nic ‘it’s over’ carter (@nic__carter) March 29, 2022
- Podcaster and single-issue voter Dennis Porter went with a simile. “Convincing everyone to change the code of Bitcoin has worse odds than trying to convince all chess players to add a 2nd queen to the board.”
Convincing everyone to change the code of #Bitcoin has worse odds than trying to convince all chess players to add a 2nd queen to the board.
— Dennis Porter (@Dennis_Porter_) March 29, 2022
- Bitcoin Magazine went the visual route.
“Change the Code” pic.twitter.com/3wbGsQaqIr
— Bitcoin Magazine (@BitcoinMagazine) March 29, 2022
Just Do It, The Experts Say
- René Pickhardt, developer and co-author of “Mastering the Lightning Network,” offered Greenpeace a simple solution: “Just create a new fork of the code and create a new genesis block and offer it to people. If the switch to POS is more useful to them than the existing Bitcoin protocol then people would start accepting it as money and prefer it over bitcoin.”
How can you verify my claim? Just create a new fork of the code and create a new genesis block and offer it to people.
If the switch to POS is more useful to them than the existing #Bitcoin protocol then people would start accepting it as money and prefer it over #bitcoin
8/11
— Rene Pickhardt (@renepickhardt) March 30, 2022
- Marty Bent, “Tales From The Crypt” Co-Host, echoed the idea in his newsletter. In a slightly harder way, though.
“It’s amazing that this coalition of intellectually lazy hysterics is spending millions of dollars on an ad campaign to “change the code” (a terrible misallocation of capital that will lead to a lot of misallocated energy resources) when all they have to do is commit a PR to the bitcoin implementation GitHub pages or simply fork their favorite implementation, change the code how they see fit, and convince people to download and use it. No one is stopping Chris Larsen from changing the code.”
Why didn’t Greenpeace and Ripple just fork the code and spent their money trying to convince people to use their PoS version of bitcoin? Because the whole campaign is a PR stunt.
BTC price chart for 03/30/2022 on OkCoin | Source: BTC/USD on TradingView.com
Things Greenpeace Needs To Know
- The infamous Der Gigi, author of “21 Questions,” explained why Proof-Of-Work is the only option for bitcoin. “PoW is about trustless conflict resolution, based on the probabilities of math and physics & determinism of computation. Without PoW, any system will become political, moving conflict resolution to a quorum.”
It’s not only less secure, it is completely pointless and insecure. PoW is about trustless conflict resolution, based on the probabilities of math and physics & determinism of computation.
Without PoW, any system will become political, moving conflict resolution to a quorum.
— Gigi ⚡🧡 (@dergigi) March 29, 2022
Related Reading | What Is AOPP? And, Why Is The Bitcoin Community Up In Arms About It?
- Expert bitcoin coder Jimmy Song also went with a simile. “Greenpeace tells birds that flapping wings takes too much energy, they should only glide.”
Greenpeace tells birds that flapping wings takes too much energy, they should only glide.
— Jimmy Song (송재준) (@jimmysong) March 29, 2022
- Podcaster Anthony Pompliano went extra hard. “Bitcoin is not going to abandon Proof-of-Work. This is why bitcoin will always be the most secure digital currency. You can stop wasting your time on this nonsense now.”
Bitcoin is not going to abandon Proof-of-Work.
This is why bitcoin will always be the most secure digital currency.
You can stop wasting your time on this nonsense now.
— Pomp 🌪 (@APompliano) March 29, 2022
- Analyst Dylan LeClair also went the visual route.
Coming across a thread in 2022 about the need for bitcoin to switch to proof of stake. pic.twitter.com/CS6zbjIx86
— Dylan LeClair 🟠 (@DylanLeClair_) March 29, 2022
And that, more or less, is what the bitcoin community thinks about Greenpeace’s “Change The Code” campaign.
Featured Image by MrsBrown on Pixabay | Charts by TradingView
