Since its launch, Bitcoin Classic ‘s node count has steadily increased. The latest release of the alternative Bitcoin implementation even topped the charts , with almost 3,000 Bitcoin Classic 0.12 nodes reachable on the network.
But a closer look at these statistics reveal some odd details.
First, IP-data suggests that many Bitcoin Classic nodes might not really be many Bitcoin Classic nodes at all. Instead, a single node could use multiple IP addresses to spoof total node count. This possibility appears more likely in light of the observation that very few Bitcoin Classic nodes seem to be replacing existing Bitcoin Core nodes, indicating that these are new nodes, rather than node operators actually make the switch.
That said, it is theoretically possible that many new users are simply firing up (and shutting down ) Bitcoin Classic nodes in the same geographical area simultaneously.
However, it is certain that a lion’s share of all Bitcoin Classic nodes are hosted in data centers, predominantly by Amazon Web Services and Choopa . That’s unsurprising, as dedicated websites offer such services, and this practice is encouraged by Bitcoin Classic supporters. Recent data analysis , moreover, shows that a vast majority of nodes in these data centers are almost certainly paid for by a relatively small group of people.
This raises the question: Is it useful to run full nodes from data centers at all? Does the sharp increase of Bitcoin Classic nodes in any way benefit Bitcoin, Bitcoin Classic or both?
Let’s take a look at why anyone would want to run a full node.
Validation Perhaps the most important reason to operate a full node is validation.With a full node, users can check whether transactions are valid according to all of Bitcoin’s rules. Using nothing but the open source software, node operators can verify that any bitcoins they […]
