For or Against: Decentralization Debate at WOCEE 2024

A debate during a tech event in Pasay City saw experts argue the pros and cons of decentralization, focusing on blockchain’s impact on society

During a tech event in Pasay City, experts engaged in a debate on the pros and cons of decentralization, specifically examining blockchain’s impact on society, financial inclusion, and regulatory challenges.

The significance of the event lies in the growing interest and contrasting viewpoints on web3. While blockchain technology holds the potential to revolutionize various sectors, it also raises substantial concerns regarding regulation and implementation.

As web3 continues to evolve, discussions centered on decentralization are becoming increasingly crucial. Stakeholders must carefully weigh the transformative potential of blockchain against the challenges it presents in areas like regulation, security, and public adoption.

The debate was structured in a revised parliamentary format, featuring rounds of rebuttals, cross-examinations, and audience participation via social media, making the event both informative and engaging.

Each group’s stance was determined by a coin flip, meaning that regardless of their actual beliefs, they had to defend the position assigned by the flip.

The team arguing against decentralization highlighted several points:

BitPinas Editor-in-Chief Michael Mislos argued that not everything needs decentralization because there are already industries that are working well:

“Our team argues that blockchain is very complicated, with not much information available and a lot of scams happening. Some people argue that if something works, there’s no need to change it, and not everything needs to be decentralized. While decentralization might be useful for things like remittances, there are now proposals to use blockchain for all sorts of things, like medical records and fashion. This makes you wonder if people in the industry really believe in decentralization or if they’re just interested in the money that can be made through initial coin offerings.”

The Roundtable Co-Founder Patrik Ferrer emphasized that blockchain lacks a “customer service” option to help when fraud occurs, making it difficult for victims to recover their assets:

“The majority of the people still use a centralized (system) when it comes to their daily lives. It’s really hard to use a decentralized (system) especially when you send money to someone and then nagkamali ka; there’s no governing body that in between you can possibly call on or ask for help…. There’s no authority to handle the case.”

ICP Hub Philippines Co-Founder Nelson Lumbres highlighted that there are still benefits of having a centralized entity than pure decentralized:

“In terms of legal or regulatory. You don’t need naman to decentralize it. Everything, since the dawn of time naman, even ‘yung ating constitution, ay napag-isipan through a governing body, you know, which we can consider a centralized (system).”

On the other hand, the team arguing in favor of decentralization made the following points:

Coins.ph Senior Campaigns Manager Floi Wycoco said that decentralization is needed because blockchain brings transparency:

“One thing good with decentralization is that it helps a lot of people when it comes to tracking all of our transactions through the internet; everyone has access to the internet… We can easily track all of this commerce because all of the transactions can be easily tracked down through the blockchain technology.”

CryptoBilis Co-Founder Mike Biag highlighted that the data recorded on blockchain will be forever, which is useful in this information era:

“Information that is not set in stone can be questioned. So if the information is on the blockchain, you cannot change that information anymore. It is true… If you put blockchain into law – litigation – for example, if someone puts their will on the blockchain and if they passed away, you can track that that person is the one who made the will. If not, it can be contested by the family members.”

Museigen.io Co-Founder Fermin Barrenechea explained that decentralization can be adopted one step at a time, especially in industries that do not perform well with centralized techniques:

“我认为这就是去中心化的全部意义。你不需要一次完成所有工作，你可以分阶段完成......通过去中心化，假设你要通过应用程序在线汇款，它没有物理分支；没有出纳员。这就是为什么您能够更快、更便宜地做到这一点；这对发送者和接收者都有好处……你会看到他们分阶段进行，也许不一定立即 100% 去中心化，但他们从金融开始的原因是因为他们看到当前中心化设置中有很多低效率的地方.”

评委们赞扬了两队在辩论中的表现，但最终将胜利判给了“支持”一方，因为他们相信去中心化代表着未来。

言外之意：这场辩论凸显了 web3 讨论中的一个关键张力：创新与监管之间的平衡。

然而：去中心化系统的成功在很大程度上取决于克服实际的实施挑战，例如监管合规性、安全问题和技术的公众教育。

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