Dear Adafans_io, I just spent some more time reading EOS’ whitepaper. Overall, I agree that it is no competition to Cardano, but I think we should be more precise in our evaluation of EOS because it’s not accurate for us to assume their blockchain is based on ERC-20. Most of the people in my network are very smart and have the resources to rigorously investigate the merits of any blockchain; so, I have to be more precise in my logic when I describe why Cardano is superior to EOS because people will not trust our judgement if we are sloppy or inaccurate with our evaluations. With that in mind. . . .
Based on their whitepaper (WP), only EOS’ ongoing ICO is based on ERC-20, but the actual blockchain that they claim to be developing is not based on ERC-20. The WP states:
PLEASE NOTE: CRYPTOGRAPHIC TOKENS REFERRED TO IN THIS WHITE PAPER REFER TO CRYPTOGRAPHIC TOKENS ON A LAUNCHED BLOCKCHAIN THAT ADOPTS THE EOS.IO SOFTWARE. THEY DO NOT REFER TO THE ERC-20 COMPATIBLE TOKENS BEING DISTRIBUTED ON THE ETHEREUM BLOCKCHAIN IN CONNECTION WITH THE EOS TOKEN DISTRIBUTION.
There are many people today drinking the EOS cool-aid and if we incorrectly say that the EOS tech is based on ERC-20, they will say things like, “Haha! See, you don’t even know what you’re talking about. EOS is based on a completely new blockchain architecture that blows everything else away. . . .”
Additionally, their WP states:
EOS.IO software utilizes the only decentralized consensus algorithm capable of meeting the performance requirements of applications on the blockchain, Delegated Proof of Stake (DPOS).
This will lead many people to believe that EOS’ “Delegated Proof of Stake” implementation is exactly the same as Cardano’s DPoS. As a community, we should be prepared to explain why Cardano’s DPoS is better and/or why EOS’ DPoS is just vaporware that will never actually work. Since most people are probably not technically sophisticated enough to describe the technical differences, I think we should focus on the comparative credibility of the projects. So. . . .
The most significant issues that I see with EOS are as follows:
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Untrustworthy Documentation. Their FAQ is filled with weasel words and constant hedging to avoid making any kind of concrete statement about the functionality, viability, or value of EOS.
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Confusing Token Distribution. The relationship between the ERC-20-based ICO and the EOS tokens is deliberately vague and confusing; thus, many people have expectations about the value of their current EOS tokens that are inaccurate and/or unrealistic. When their ICO has ended, this issue will become much more obvious to their users, which is when they will likely have a user insurrection that will cause their EOS brand to implode.
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No Technical Substantiation. They claim their WP is a “Technical White Paper,” but it would be more accurate to call it a “Marketing White Paper” because it’s really just a glorified marketing pitch. There are no math/logic proofs, no verifiable mathematical examples of the EOS system’s logic, and it’s primarily a bunch of technical buzzwords strung together to create the illusion of technical rigor, but I have not seen any working examples of their TestNet systems; and obviously they have no MainNet. (Has anybody here ever compiled and tested their TestNet from their GitHub code? Unfortunately, I don’t have time to doing any meaningful testing with it, but I would be willing to keep an open mind if somebody here has any experience testing EOS.)
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Lack of Team Talent, Skills & Experience. Their block.one website only displays Larimer and Blumer, with nobody else listed. Are we supposed to believe that a two-man company is going to change the world with a “revolutionary new operating system-like construct”? Based on their GitHub, they only have 5-8 programmers that consistently contribute to their project, including Larimer. Of that group, only 2-3 of them appear to have some solid and relevant experience for a project of this kind. And as far as I can tell, those people are working on EOS part-time because they also work for Object Computing, Inc. A project of this size and scope requires dozens of developers and engineers across many domains. Thus, there is no meaningful chance that the tiny EOS team could ever build anything close to the “operating system-like construct” described in their WP.
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Untrustworthy Financial Flows. Nowhere in their documentation, website, WP, GitHub, etc. is there any concrete information about how they intend to use the proceeds from their ETH-based ICO. They currently have a $9 billion “market cap” (which should be called “network marketing hype value” because “market cap” is totally misleading); so, they have more than enough money to hire 100s of developers if they wanted to. Yet, they only have a few part-time programmers working on their project? (Playing devil’s advocate: Maybe they hide all their other devs in a top-secret underground bunker, but that seems unlikely.)
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Lots of Hype, But No Substance. Their EOS website has videos of Larimer and Blumer giving speeches and interviews in rooms full of non-technical people. These people even admit they’re non-technical, saying things like, “I’m a graphic designer and I don’t understand how all this tech works, but it’s truly amazing and will change the world!” (That was a paraphrase of several statements I heard in their videos.) Thus, there is no meaningful peer-review process. No meaningful technical audits. No meaningful verification or accountability whatsoever regarding their technical claims.
Bottom Line: I have only scratched the surface of all the questionable technical, economic, ethical, and governance issues associated with EOS, but I think the points above should be sufficient to help our community come to a definitive conclusion about the long-term viability of the EOS project. This should also be useful in giving us all the ability to persuasively communicate why EOS is not even in the same universe as Cardano. In fact, EOS/block.one is operating in a parallel universe where marketing = technical prowess and hype = market cap.
Viva la Cardano!