Ripple CTO: Decentralization Is Not a Priority for Users
Date: 2025-05-28 Author: Oliver Abernathy Categories: BUSINESS
The debate about decentralization has heated up again in the crypto community in recent days following the high-profile hack of the decentralized exchange Cetus on the SUI blockchain. Against this backdrop, Ripple CTO David Schwartz has made an unexpected point in the debate, saying that users of distributed systems like the XRP Ledger should worry less about how decentralized the network is and more about its actual benefits.
In response to a comment on a social network where one user doubted the decentralization of XRP, Schwartz explained that many terms in the crypto world are interpreted too literally. According to him, although Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse is indeed the public face of the company, XRP as a token has no issuer, and all XRP units were created at the same time as the registry was launched.
He emphasized that the XRP Ledger (XRPL) did not initially include a primary distribution mechanism. Any distribution was voluntary - participants could receive tokens without restrictions. Schwartz believes that this model does not deprive XRPL of its decentralized nature.
In addition, Ripple's CTO emphasized that XRPL has no built-in incentives for competition between network participants - unlike most other blockchains. This makes the registry architecture unique, but at the same time requires users to take a different approach to understanding its decentralization.
Responding to doubts about the true nature of XRP, Schwartz made it clear that the discussion of decentralization often distracts attention from more important aspects: reliability, security, and transparency of the blockchain. He called on the community to evaluate technologies not by theoretical principles, but by their practical applicability and benefits for the end user.
It is worth noting that XRP was originally created using pre-mining - all tokens were issued in advance, without the participation of miners. Despite the fact that XRPL is positioned as fully decentralized, the current price of the asset has not yet met the expectations of many investors, which also affects the attitude towards the project.
In general, Schwartz's statement is aimed at rethinking the priorities of the crypto community: instead of arguing about the purity of decentralization, the emphasis is on the result and ease of use of technologies in real-life scenarios.
