It is easy for people to fall into the trap of thinking that "the grass is always greener on the other side of the street".  It is a cliche but it does seem to apply in the world of blockchain.  Most look at Hive and attack it for its shortcomings.  The presumption is things are much better elsewhere.

Sadly, for many, this is not the case.  While it is often hard to compare blockchains, there are certain things we can look at to size up where things stand.

One of the biggest complaints about Hive is the token distribution.  It is easy to point to the whales and all the stake they have.  Many profess this to be unfair and the reason why Hive is going to end up as nothing.

Again, if we look at what is taking place elsewhere, we see a different story.

Bitcoin is all the rage right now since the token price is starting to move in big ways.  This has the excitement returning that maybe the crypto Winter is over.   Whether that is the case or not, it is good to see optimism showing its head.

That said, there was a study done to see how Bitcoin was faring when it came to the centralization question.  This research looked at the token distribution to determine how things are progressing.

Here is the big takeaway over a 5 year period.

>The % of supply owned by entities holding ≤ 10 BTC grew from 5.1% to 13.8% in 5 years, while the percent held by entities with 100-100k BTC declined from 62.9% to 49.8%

>This is the first time since April 2010 that the lion’s share of all coins is held by those who own less than 100 BTC

https://u.today/sites/default/files/styles/736x/public/inline-images/xEeuyZgIWsAABmlc.png,qitok=QAT72QeD.pagespeed.ic.vM9zOWEp1V.webp

<center>[Source](https://u.today/bitcoin-getting-more-decentralized-data-shows)</center>





The temptation here is to laugh this off since 100 BTC is now worth just shy of $120,000.  That said, it does, ironically, provide a good metric since today's price means that equates to roughly 480,000 in Hive Power.  This is close enough to whale status for the sake of discussion.

To provide a comparison, I used @arcange's post from yesterday, showing the breakdown of Hive Power holders.

https://images.hive.blog/0x0/https://arcange.eu/hive-images/2020-08-05-Levels-EN.png

As we can see, there are 30 accounts that are considered Whales on Hive according to their holding of Hive Power.  The next chart reveals what they are actually holding.

https://images.hive.blog/0x0/https://arcange.eu/hive-images/2020-08-05-LevelShares-EN.png

Here we see that, rounding it off, 36.5% of the Hive Power is held by Whales.  This is a big difference compared to Bitcoin where it just moved below the 50% level.  Thus, using this metric, the Whales holding is less than on Bitcoin.

Of course, a case could be made that this is not an accurate assessment since Bitcoin is worth a great deal more, in terns of USD, than HIVE.  I will buy that point since we are dealing with much higher numbers on the later.  However, if we take things as a percentage of the whole and who is amassing the wealth, we see that Hive is more than standing its ground.

Another point of debate could be the fact that holding Bitcoin gives one zero power over the network.  That is in the hands of the miners as compared with Hive where Hive Power is what determines the power breakdown.  Again, I would agree with this.  Of course, that might be the discussion even worse for Bitcoin considering the fact that it is estimated that more than half the hashrate is in the hands of 5 miners.  From this perspective, many make the case that Bitcoin is highly centralized.

It is a good time to mention that I find the centralized/decentralized debate to be of little value.  That discussions centers around the idea that decentralization is a destination.  On this I disagree.  For me, it makes sense to think of it as a journey; a path to follow if you will.  The key is to be moving towards decentralization over a specific time period.

Using this barometer, I think we can say Bitcoin is doing well.  Over a 5 year period, the number of wallets holding 100 BTC went from basically 63% to 50%.  That is a trend in the right direction.  At the same time, we see the lower end, those wallets with less than 10 BTC, go from 5% to almost 14%.

Who can argue with this move?  It certainly is heading toward better token distribution.  Some might take exception with the pace yet the trend is clearly defined.

The same holds true for Hive.  For the past few years, each month I post a report about the amount of Hive Power being held.  It might sound like a broken record but throughout all those posts I keep pointing to the trend.  It is on the same path as Bitcoin.  

Here is a chart from the beginning of August 2017, which was chosen since that was the month I joined Hive (Steem).

![acct812017.png](https://images.hive.blog/DQmPtXU3xTwKXGY265CbmmXCYBNGtzQdBaapW1UgaB3Ajho/acct812017.png)

![mvest812017.png](https://images.hive.blog/DQmPjtypoigCnwaLRFjPA4kdeCBSTA6erzn6CbCZELspeHr/mvest812017.png)

Here we can clearly see the Whales numbers 42 and held the overwhelming majority of the stake.  If memory serves me correct, I believe it was more than 75% of those tokens were in the Whale accounts.  

There is another point that we must take into consideration.  The study of Bitcoin covered a 5 year time period.  For Hive, we are dealing with 3 years.  Thus, the move was done in 40% less time as compared to the Crypto King.

When it comes to the value and number of wallets between Bitcoin and Hive, it is evident there is no comparison.  Bitcoin has a lot more people involved with it, giving it an enormous market cap.  However, the network is also just shy of 3 times the age of Hive.  In this regard, since we are dealing with long established trends, time does matter.

I think we can surmise that, for both blockchains, the trend is likely to continue.  One of the things I always felt gave Hive a strong chance was the distribution model.  While not perfect, the fact that people can accumulate Hive and power it up simply through activity is a big advantage.  Over time, the token cannot help but to decentralize.  Again, one could contest the pace at which it is happening yet the fact it is taking place is beyond dispute.

Then there is EOS which is being attacked for being a cartel and a dying chain.  This one started off with a ton of publicity but seems to be going in the wrong direction, at least from the opinion expressed in this article.

https://cryptobriefing.com/eos-ecosystem-dying-bp-collusion-community-fragmentation-high-costs/

Overall, Hive is not doing too bad.  The blockchain is moving in the direction of decentralization at the base layer.  When we factor in the wealth being generated at the second layer, this really takes on new meaning.

From my perspective, the grass is just fine on Hive.

___
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gif by @doze

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