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@ mike
2025-05-09 13:49:29
The Importance of running a node:
The argument discussing if node runners are important was settled in the block size wars of 2015 - 17. But I for one wasn’t deep into Bitcoin back then and while I understand the argument, I have never explored it. I had a big blocker ask me to justify node runners, I dismissed them, but I’m going to address that now as it’s pertinent to the bigger discussions going on in the Core vs Knots debate.
Technically, only miners need to run nodes as they need them to add mined blocks to and gather transactions on the network. So technically, yes, there need only be a dozen or so nodes that miners use to mine with.
But that is VERY dangerous. That is centralisation. The government, any government, could at its whim, shutdown mining farms and pools quickly and easily thus destroying Bitcoin swiftly and decisively for all time.
Now let’s take a hypothetical scenario. The above has happened, but I’m sitting on my dessert island with a BitAxe, a node, solar panels, a Tesla Powerwall and a Starlink Internet connection. (I know, I know, this is a very bad analogy, so bite me).
My node is running away and I generate the next block eventually, once the difficulty adjust has come down to my and other Island dwellers combined, reduced mining rate (I know, I know, this would take for ever, bite me again).
I am running Bitcoin, fully, self sovereign, fully able to transact business around the globe, with other self sovereign Island or mainland dwellers. As the world recovers, more and more sovereign Bitconers re-join the network and it grows again organically.
This is why we need lots of decentralised full nodes across the globe.