I'm not sure that Lisk can be called decentralised when it relies on an effectively closed group of 101 delegates.
Rohit Khare's definition of decentralisation states:
"An open decentralized system is one in which the entry of peers is not regulated. Any peer can enter or leave the system at any time."
Does Lisk meet this definition?
I have invested a lot (for me) of BTC into this, so I am not fudding, I want it to work, but this issue is only going to get more pronounced as more money and trolls come into the scene - it needs sorting, one way or another.
I was originally fairly keen on the lottery idea, but my thoughts are changing. It seems to me that if any voting system is going to give advantage to the already well-off, why not just auction the delegate positions? I don't see that there is much difference between an auction and the DPOS voting system as it stands, except it would be more honest. It would also remain true to the ideals of "the market".
This is a problem all smart contract technology has , even ethereum , augur especially . they might as well be called "dumb contracts "
The blockchain is a ledger , secured by a consensus mechanism that is economically difficult to attack the larger it gets . any smart contract that requires any sort of "proof" of the contract being fulfilled , be that an escrow , and exchange , a betting market , anything outside of the blockchain. Then you have shifted the consensus to outside of the security of the blockchain.
People need to confirm the events that took place for the smart contract to be fulfilled, this is why augur runs on reputation because inside the blockchain the smart contract has no single clue what happened outside of the blockchain it is beyond its powers to be able to confirm or verify. So you have to rely on people to confirm what actually happen , Offering an incentive for them to not lie , because the consensus of people is centralized and a hell of alot less secure than the mathematical proofs of a blockchain ledger.
101 delegates isn't exactly fully decentralized but any coin with smart contracts cant be currently , it is impossible, they rely on an outside source to confirm the actions and fulfillment's of the smart contracts that aree outside of the blockchain.
With things like AT (atomic transactions) now there are ways to be able to do trades cross different currencies while still not needing someone to confirm that the transaction went thru , the smart contract can confirm for itself , it has bridged the gap and expanded the purview of the blockchain to another connected blockchain , but still for the majority of tasks people claim smart contracts can deal with, the inescapable truth is , that without a centralized authority that can confirm consensus to events outside of the blockchain , smart contracts are useless.
This is what i think Mal is talking about, this is a temporary solution to the fact that outside consensus is impossible for smart contracts to function without something in place to allow outside consensus , 101 delegates does seem like one of the best solutions currently to allow smart contract to function outside of the blockchain. but obviously as technology develops in the coming years and there are expansions to blockchain tech and the ability to reach consensus on events that take place outside of the blockchain , then it can become more deentralized , more secure and remove any potential bad human actors within the system