AGR4BS: A Generic Multi-Agent Organizational Model for Blockchain Systems

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

First of all, congratulate the authors for the excellent article. Although I am not currently very active in the field of Blockchain I have been able to understand the need and the excellent approach of the article. To put a problem, I would recommend putting the vertical images like fig. 16 horizontally and adding the enlarged images in an appendix at the end of the article. That would improve the reading of the article and allow access to a more complete image if necessary. For the rest, my congratulations.

Author Response

First of all, congratulate the authors for the excellent article. Although I am not currently very active in the field of Blockchain I have been able to understand the need and the excellent approach of the article. To put a problem, I would recommend putting the vertical images like fig. 16 horizontally and adding the enlarged images in an appendix at the end of the article. That would improve the reading of the article and allow access to a more complete image if necessary. For the rest, my congratulations."

 

Thank you for your comments and feedback, we did the following changes :

 

•  Figure 2 was clarified

 

Additionally :

 

• Figure 16 (Bitcoin cheeseboard) is now vertical.
• Figure 19 (Ethereum cheeseboard) is now vertical.
• Figure 22 (Tendermint cheeseboard) is now vertical.
• Figure 25 (Hyperledger cheeseboard) is now vertical.

 

A full page version for each of those figure is present in the newly added Appendix section as per your recommendations.

 

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

This is a well-written and structured paper, the investigation results are nicely presented with a proper conclusion. 

Author Response

 “This is a well-written and structured paper, the investigation results are nicely presented with a proper conclusion.”

 

Thank you for your comments and feedback.

Reviewer 3 Report

The paper uses a generic multi-agent organizational modeling for studying blockchain systems, namely AGR4BS. Based on the Agent/Group/Role (AGR) organizational modeling approach, the authors try to identify and represent the generic entities which are common to blockchain systems. The modeling approach is innovative, for studying blockchain systems, and I believe it is highly promising.

 

However, two points need to be emphasized: 1) the significant role of "intelligence" of the interacting agents, and 2) the risk of diffusion of “false knowledge” among the interacting agents. Therefore, the authors should add the following 3 relevant papers, making also "a link" with their work within the context of blockchain systems:

 

https://doi.org/10.3390/math9010103

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.physa.2018.06.003 

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijinfomgt.2019.01.016

Author Response

"The paper uses a generic multi-agent organizational modeling for studying blockchain systems, namely AGR4BS. Based on the Agent/Group/Role (AGR) organizational modeling approach, the authors try to identify and represent the generic entities which are common to blockchain systems. The modeling approach is innovative, for studying blockchain systems, and I believe it is highly promising.

 

However, two points need to be emphasized: 1) the significant role of "intelligence" of the interacting agents, and 2) the risk of diffusion of “false knowledge” among the interacting agents. Therefore, the authors should add the following 3 relevant papers, making also "a link" with their work within the context of blockchain systems:

https://doi.org/10.3390/math9010103

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.physa.2018.06.003 

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijinfomgt.2019.01.016

"

Thank you for your comments, feedback and references, we did the following changes :

•  Figure 2 was clarified

Additionally :

• Figure 16 (Bitcoin cheeseboard) is now vertical.
• Figure 19 (Ethereum cheeseboard) is now vertical.
• Figure 22 (Tendermint cheeseboard) is now vertical.
• Figure 25 (Hyperledger cheeseboard) is now vertical.

A full page version for each of those figure is present in the newly added Appendix section as per the reviewers recommendations.

After reading your references, we found the first one to be the most relevant considering our work, and we use it with citation in our argumentation flow within the introduction.

Once again, we thank you for your comments.

 

 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf