Ripple CTO David Schwartz has once again defended the decentralized nature of XRP Ledger amid criticism from Justin Bons, founder of Cyber Capital. As reported by U.Today, Bons had claimed that XRP, as well as Binance Coin (BNB) and Stellar Lumens (XLM), are centralized due to their permissioned blockchain architecture.
Alex DovbnyaSchwartz countered by stating that XRPL achieves the same level of decentralization as proof-of-work (PoW) blockchains, but in a different manner. He explained that XRPL has no special authority to change rules, and transactions cannot be censored for more than a brief period of time. Additionally, XRP Ledger uses consensus to decide which transactions should be included in a block, which Schwartz believes is more decentralized than a PoW system, where a single person can decide which transactions are included in a block.
Furthermore, Schwartz emphasized that XRPL is cheaper to operate than PoW or proof-of-stake (PoS) systems, as there is no need to pay for the energy consumption of miners. He also highlighted that no single entity has any special right to receive rewards or control transaction flow on XRP Ledger, which contributes to better decentralization.
This is not the first time that XRPL has faced criticism regarding its decentralization. However, Schwartz's response provides a clear explanation of how XRP Ledger achieves decentralization and how it differs from other blockchain architectures.
Dan Burgin
Alex Dovbnya