Topic: Why the Bitcoin rules can't change (reading time ~5min) - page 3. (Read 12031 times)

Huh. I think this just nailed it for me.

The blocks will fill up, whatever size they are. This is simply human nature's approach to computing technology. Rewriting the rules to expand the size in the hopes of mitigating that is a task that will never end; there will be new calls for a larger block size every year, and before we know it, we'll be outpacing Moore's Law and slowly turning the blockchain into an unusable artifact.

Fortunately, Bitcoin already has a built-in mechanism to counteract overcrowded blocks: transaction fees.

When the blocks do start becoming consistently full, it'll be the ones with the highest priority (as in, smallest size and largest transaction fee) that get first priority, as it should be. If this means that SatoshiDice can't compete, and has to quit since it can't send tons of transactions for little to no fee any longer, why in the world should I or anyone else (except the owner of SatoshiDice... sorry bud, but you should have seen this coming) shed a tear over it? Pushing for a core rule change to Bitcoin to accommodate one current, and multiple future companies that want to fill blocks with their own transactions and not pay for doing so strikes me as just a bad idea.

So does that mean there should never be a block size increase? I'm going to say yes, there should not be one. Maybe it was originally intended, but I don't think it's necessary, and really, it's a pointless endeavor, if allowing "enough" transactions is the goal. (If instead the goal is a set, ideal number of transactions per second, say to match PayPal, and it's intended to be the only increase ever, I'd be more sympathetic... but I doubt that'll ever be the proposal.)

That's not to say that there shouldn't be some way to allow more, smaller-value transactions to flow. It's been pretty clear for a while now (to me, anyway) that Bitcoin needs a silver to its gold. We need a second cryptocurrency--one with larger blocks; smaller, simpler transactions, possibly doing away with scripting and only allowing simple spends; faster difficulty adjustments; a less-demanding full node; and somewhat faster confirmation times.



Hmm. Worth looking into.

I don't know about others, but I don't stand to make a dime on whatever transaction fees and what-not you are talking about.  I'll only mine if I feel the system is at risk, and in that case I expect to absorb the cost out-of-pocket.

I do stand to lose quite a bit monetarily if the system is subverted and I do care about that both for personal and for philosophical reasons.


Firstly, anyone thinking about 'replacing the banks' and 'replacing PayPal' better come prepared.  I think that most in the Bitcoin community are anything but prepared for what lies down that road.  We are likely starting to appear on the distant horizon for these folks, and certain other tangential threats are starting to appear.  This is why I care so deeply about the subject at this time.

Secondly, trying to compete head-on is, in my opinion, not the way to do it.  I'll bet most of my BTC (literally) that we end up smashed like bug if we try, and not only that but there will be massive collateral damage as well.

Thirdly, I have no interest in Bitcoin replacing VISA or PayPal if the results are even less desirable that what these folks already supply.  That also strikes me as a very real possibility.

I thought we'd got that. Is there anyone who still didn't?

Since then its been more about how fast to raise it than about whether to raise it,

plus me saying any increase should never be undone (barring global catastrophe).

(Thus, no adaptive reduction; adapt up if you must, but down is a no-no.)

(Thus be careful with increase: never increase more than you are ready and willing to handle 24/7 every block thereafter forever.)

-MarkM-

...if the bitcoin rules don't change, Bitcoin will be renamed to UselesslySlowCoin, and all the dolts thinking they're gonna cash in on transaction fees for UselesslySlowCoin will realize they have killed their cash cow via artificial scarcity...

So much for the revolutionary thinking that makes Bitcoin Bitcoin...I feel rather harsh disdain for those who wish to kill society's chance at having an open and robust payment network that can actually replace banks because they think they scan squeeze a few more dollars out of someone. A limit of 7 transactions per second will mean BITCOIN WILL NEVER REPLACE BANKS!  In fact, it will never replace PayPal.

Project much?

This.

Thank you! That's what I wanted to see, some explicit numbers and general conclusions, including compartmentalizing issues.


Yes, network connection is the one potential sticking point I see for home-based full nodes too.

Well as I always say "If it feels good, do it."

Oh, and don't forget about the 'ignore' button over on the left there.

Every one of your posts exudes such a slimy malignancy that I want to take a shower after reading them.

Also consider most so called "miners", or many many of them anyway, are actually just "hashers" who never see a block...

...So maybe we should make that really clear, so people aaren't thinking they cannot fill their house with coffeewarmers or run a few mini-rigs in their basement or even some full rigs in their garage, or heck, all the above.

Just being a "hasher" is pretty much trivial bandwidth needed, yes?

-MarkM-

Many of us have felt that Bitcoin was advertised as a peer-2-peer solution where a large percentage of the participants in the economy were capable of being peers.  'peers' were never advertised as being people who could afford datacenter resources, and many of us to not trust a solution which requires such resources in order to function.

So, one group was sold a bill of goods, and unfortunately a lot of people in either group bought it.  Whether this 'false advertising' was deliberate I don't know and largely doubt.  I expect that even for those who did recognize the issue, kicking the can down the road was the path of least resistance.

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.933058


For my part, I feel more comfortable with a solution in which decisions are made in a transparent manner even if it means that people who have different points of view than my own have a voice.  I think it is possible to hold a variety of competing points of view without being 'dishonest'.

Hiding or discounting one point of view and decision making processes would create the most doubt in my mind.

Since Hazek isn't very explicit, ill summarise his point.

Hazek wants to ensure that he can run a full node with whatever hardware/network he posses at that time without having to fork out additional funds or make special group funding arrangements to host a node in a datacenter.

Personally i can accept a Block size increase as long as a low end commodity PC with an average broadband connection can run as a full node(Should cover 90% of people with PCs). Note that miners will need a much faster connection than full nodes to reduce orphan rates + investment in ASICs.

CPU wise, this is not a problem today, nor will it ever be. You could run a full node on your average low-end smartphone CPU. Even if we were to scale block size by 100x, your average CPU could handle it(Not for mining, as speed is paramount in mining). Plus if need be, much of the intensive processing could be offloaded to the GPU.

Disk Space wise, an increase of block size by 100x would not be an issue once pruning is implemented. Big Bitcoin businesses and block chain explorers could run archival nodes which provide all blocks.

Network wise,  256Kbps could keep up with a 10MB block size if it were running 24/7. For a 1Mbps connection, you would need to run it 6hrs a day.

As we can see the network connection is the biggest hindrance to increasing block size, but a 10MB block size would still allow the majority of people to run full nodes. The biggest problems will be faced by miners who will not be able to compete with the bigger miners/pools due to connection speed. Which after some thinking, is fine as long as we have people running full nodes to "vote"(not relaying) against any predatory changes that large mining pools may introduce.

Yes.

We need to find out how large of a block size the network can support 24/7, every block that large, without problems. If it does cause problems, that is flooding, which is what that limit absolutely protects us against.

-MarkM-

Those of us who where paying attention in 2010 were promised the block size limitation was a temporary anti-flooding rule that would be removed when it was no longer needed so that Bitcoin could indeed support higher transaction rates.

If the devs changed their minds between now and then they should openly admit this. Publicly say the original plan changed, and why.  Stop lying by claiming 1 megabyte blocks were originally intended as an economic feature when anyone can debunk this by reading the old threads.

What's most appalling about this debate is the blatant dishonesty by those in favour of leaving the limits in place, even reaching up to some of the most prominent developers. Observing that dishonesty and evasion raises grave doubts in me about the viability of the project, much more so than any external attack.

they dont need to understand bitcoin inorder to understand that a promise was made to them. a promise that, for better or worse, the fundamental rules of the currency were concrete. let alternative cryptocurrencies solve this for us if it is infact a problem (which i think i can make a very good case for why it isnt).

Okay... and those points are mutually dependent. It's still hard for you quickly transfer a full gold coin across the ocean.

are you claiming that hazek doesn't own himself?

Yet there do seem to be people who have a vested interest of some kind in increasing the maximum block size beyond what current nodes are comfortable with yet are seemingly also not willing or able to even come up with enough paying transactions per day to demonstrate a real need* and simultaneously demonstrate the network can even handle the current maximum.

* Some economist wrote that demand and want, or demand and desire, are totally different creatures. Want and desire are subjective, demand is objective, it is quantifiable, it is an actual number of units of some unit of account, actual dollars and cents or actual bitcoins, that kind of thing. Would it be reasonable to suggest that "need" should be measurable, like "demand", rather than being just some lobby group or chatty geek in Botswana's wish or desire or dream or hope type of thing?

-MarkM-

I can't imagine why capital would leave bitcoin in mass-exodus only because of block times and block-sizes. I presume people would move slowly and only ever partially. That said, I don't think at the moment block times and block size are really a driving force between most peoples interest in bitcoin.

Presumably Terracoin probably has a one-megabyte max block size, like Bitcoin?

Litecoin too has more blocks per span of time, and probably also has one-megabyte max block size.

The fact that there has not yet been a mass exodus of capital to such chains seems to indicate that unproven, theoretical ability to handle more transactions per span of time, even along with faster confirmation times, is not a big enough deal to even be worth speculating serious amounts of capital on.

-MarkM-

Well it depends on which "smaller chain" people give their blessing to. In the alt-coin world a lot of chains have come and go- without affecting Bitcoin in anyway.


There actually already is another chain that could be perfect for running as a parallel chain- Terracoin. It's been around a few months and is pretty much a straight copy of bitcoin, with shorter block times (2 minutes), faster diff retarget, lower reward that halves every 4 years (20TRC per block). It's updated by adding the new patches for bitcoin, so it keeps the same consistency with bitcoin as well in terms of security and reliability. The address format is even the same- so there is no need to migrate addresses, your Private key for bitcoin yields the same private key for Terracoin. Although at first some people thought this would lead to confusion, the result has been the opposite. One Public key works for both TRC and BTC, making it very convenient.

The chain is young enough that an increased block size could probably be implemented without much trouble, or so many users to disturb. There is even talk about having it merge-mined to boost its security.

Currently it's traded at Vircurex, Bitparking and Zaptos exchanges. There are several Satoshi Dice like sites, and even an 'instawallet' that is in beta development. It has it's own forums as well: www.terracointalk.org (because the alt-forum is a bit of a cesspool).

Perhaps terracoin would be fertile soil to test some of these ideas? The user base is very open to testing new ideas.