David Schwartz, Ripple‘s CTO, has done the crypto equivalent of walking into a room, yelling “Checkmate!” and then casually explaining why no one-not even Ripple itself-can take control of the XRP Ledger (XRPL). The design, you see, is intentionally stubborn. It’s like a toddler who refuses to share a toy with anyone, even the parent who bought it.
This came just hours after Justin Bons, the founder of Cyber Capital, threw his hat into the ring, claiming that XRPL was actually a walled garden-basically, a permissioned network that is more centralized than a fast-food drive-thru menu. Bons went on about how the Unique Node List (UNL) gives Ripple more control than a chess master playing against a toddler. But Schwartz wasn’t having it. He called the accusation “objectively nonsensical,” which, in Schwartz-speak, is basically a polite way of saying, “That’s just wrong.”
Clash Over Control and the Unique Node List
Bons, never one to back down from a good debate, took to X (formerly Twitter, because, you know, rebranding) on February 24, stating that networks like Ripple, Stellar, and Algorand are all playing the same game, one where the “permissioned” elements give them the ultimate power. He pointed out that XRPL’s UNL could cause the chain to fork if it deviated from the approved validator list. In other words, Bons thinks the validators are just following Ripple’s orders like a bunch of overzealous interns.
But Schwartz wasn’t about to let that fly. He countered by saying that each XRPL node is a free spirit, deciding on its own which validators it wants to trust. If a validator tries to pull off a double-spend or censor a transaction, an “honest node” will just say, “Nope,” and continue on its merry way. It’s like a rebellious teenager refusing to do their homework because they just don’t feel like it.
That said, Schwartz did admit that a group of validators could, theoretically, cause some trouble by halting the chain. However, that’s not the end of the world, because node operators can simply switch to a different UNL-kind of like switching your Netflix password when your friend stops paying for it.
“The best way to be able to say ‘no’ is to have to say ‘no’ because you cannot do the thing asked,” Schwartz wrote.
Regulatory Pressures and Network Resilience
Meanwhile, back in the real world, XRPL’s metrics have been looking a little… well, sad. Active users dropped from a healthy 200,000 to a mere 38,000, and payment volume plummeted from 2.5 billion XRP to just 80 million. Ouch. Analysts, however, have chalked it up to the activation of XLS-81 on February 18, which is a permissioned decentralized exchange system designed to hide institutional transactions from the public eye-because who doesn’t love a little mystery in their crypto portfolio?
Last year, Schwartz even floated the idea of a two-tier staking model to add rewards without putting all the power in Ripple’s hands, which sounds like trying to balance a see-saw with a giraffe and a mouse. The new model would have introduced a governance token, which would, ideally, let anyone manage the validator list. But in the world of crypto, nothing is ever as simple as it seems.
In the end, the February 25 exchange highlights a classic crypto divide: critics argue that publishing a validator list is just a sneaky way of asserting control, even though anyone can run a node. Schwartz, however, stands firm in the belief that XRPL’s consensus model was specifically built to keep the power of validators-and Ripple itself-at bay. Even if it means Ripple can’t play the hero when regulators come knocking.
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2026-02-25 20:47