what's also really interesting is that currently, i'm not seeing any 0 tx defensive blocks being mined. maybe the Chinese miners are figuring out that it's not necessary. that's more good news b/c we want them munching as many tx's as possible in a consistent manner.
and that's good news b/c they are probably figuring out that a block size increase can't hurt them if done in a "safe" way, whatever that means.
I think that if we see blocks fill up and the network starts functioning poorly, we are going to see a change pushed out far quicker then any of us ever imagined.
As of 12:03pm eastern time blockchain.info is reporting 11.6MB unconfirmed transactions and 1.95BTC in fees (mostly from minimum fees).
Is there another stress test going on? Or did a bunch of guys decide to flood the network to push for larger blocks...
Not sure but as I understand it an increase in value is new information and new information results is market players adjusting and I imagine that means moving their BTC around as a result of changes in behavior.
I'm not expecting a pop just yet but I don't think maintaining as we are with relatively full blocks is an indication that we'll cope with an increase of tx's if we see the growth the market is anticipating.