{"type":"rich","version":"1.0","author_name":"npub1l3uf9m4yw2y7x8wyjeswhelsqyy8ql4jaca4nyy6en0s474yadssg69pvv","author_url":"https://nostr.ae/npub1l3uf9m4yw2y7x8wyjeswhelsqyy8ql4jaca4nyy6en0s474yadssg69pvv","provider_name":"njump","provider_url":"https://nostr.ae","html":"📅 Original date posted:2015-06-26\n📝 Original message:Planning for a hard forks which change the consensus rules (including\nthe blocksize limit) is something we can all agree is worthy of time and\neffort.\n\nHowever there is clearly not consensus sufficient today to deploy a hard\nfork that changs the blocksize without there being serious and\npotentially experiment ending consequences.\n\nFor a proposed hard fork to reach a level of consensus necessary to be\nsafe requires that there be a clear and self evident course of action.\n\nThat simply does not exist on the blocksize limit question.\n\nOn 06/26/2015 11:23 AM, Jeff Garzik wrote:\n\u003e Failure to plan now for a hard fork increase 6(?) months in the future\n\u003e produces that lumpy, unpredictable market behavior.\n\u003e\n\u003e The market has baked in the years-long behavior of low fees.  From the\n\u003e market PoV, inaction does lead to precisely that, a sudden change over\n\u003e the span of a few months.\n\u003e\n\u003e At a higher level, people look at bitcoin and see people delaying,\n\u003e waiting, dawdling until the barn is actually on fire before taking\n\u003e action to put out the fire.\n\u003e\n\u003e They see a system that is not responsive to higher level externalities\n\u003e of people \u0026 businesses making plans for the future.  Based on current\n\u003e proposal of change-through-inaction, businesses will simply shelve\n\u003e plans to use bitcoin and not bother putting those new users on the\n\u003e network.\n\u003e\n\u003e If you wait until the need to increase block size is acute, it is\n\u003e already too late.  (1) Businesses have permanently shelved plans to\n\u003e use bitcoin and (2) change at that point produces _larger_ disruption\n\u003e to the fee market.\n\u003e\n\u003e Hard forks require planning many months in advance.  Gavin's timing is\n\u003e sound, even though the Gavin/Hearn Bitcoin-XT antics were sub-optimal.\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e On Fri, Jun 26, 2015 at 11:12 AM, Pieter Wuille\n\u003e \u003cpieter.wuille at gmail.com \u003cmailto:pieter.wuille at gmail.com\u003e\u003e wrote:\n\u003e\n\u003e     I am not saying that economic change is what we want. Only that it\n\u003e     is inevitable, independent of whether larger blocks happen or not.\n\u003e\n\u003e     I am saying that acting because of fear of economic change is a\n\u003e     bad reason. The reason for increase should be because of the\n\u003e     higher utility. We need it at some point, but there should be no rush.\n\u003e\n\u003e     I do understand that we want to avoid a *sudden* change in\n\u003e     economic policy, but I'm generally not too worried. Either fees\n\u003e     increase and they get paid, and we're good. But more likely is\n\u003e     that some uses just move off-chain because the block chain does\n\u003e     not offer what they need. That's sad, but it is inevitable at any\n\u003e     size: some uses fit, some don't.\n\u003e\n\u003e     -- \n\u003e     Pieter\n\u003e\n\u003e     On Jun 26, 2015 7:57 PM, \"Jeff Garzik\" \u003cjgarzik at gmail.com\n\u003e     \u003cmailto:jgarzik at gmail.com\u003e\u003e wrote:\n\u003e\n\u003e         It is not \"fear\" of fee pressure.\n\u003e\n\u003e         1) Blocks are mostly not-full on average.\n\u003e\n\u003e         2) Absent long blocks and stress tests, there is little fee\n\u003e         pressure above the anti-spam relay fee metric, because of #1.\n\u003e\n\u003e         3) As such, inducing fee pressure is a delta, a change from\n\u003e         years-long bitcoin economic policy.  Each time we approach the\n\u003e         soft limit, Bitcoin Core increases the soft limit to prevent\n\u003e         \"full\" blocks.  Mike Hearn et. al. lobbies miners to upgrade.\n\u003e\n\u003e         (note - this is not an endorsement of these actions - it is a\n\u003e         neutral observation)\n\u003e\n\u003e         4) Inaction leads to consistent fee pressure as the months\n\u003e         tick on and system volume grows; thus, inaction leads to\n\u003e         economic policy change.\n\u003e\n\u003e         5) Economic policy change leads to market and software\n\u003e         disruption.  The market and software - notably wallets - is\n\u003e         not prepared for this.\n\u003e\n\u003e         6) If you want to change economic policy, that's fine.  But be\n\u003e         honest and admit you are arguing for a change, a delta from\n\u003e         current market expectations and behavior.\n\u003e\n\u003e         7) It is critical to first deal with what _is_, not what you\n\u003e         wish the world to be.  You want a fee market to develop. \n\u003e         There is nothing wrong with that desire.  It remains a delta\n\u003e         from where we are today, and that is critically relevant in a\n\u003e         $3b+ market.\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e         On Fri, Jun 26, 2015 at 7:09 AM, Pieter Wuille\n\u003e         \u003cpieter.wuille at gmail.com \u003cmailto:pieter.wuille at gmail.com\u003e\u003e wrote:\n\u003e\n\u003e             Hello all,\n\u003e\n\u003e             here I'm going to try to address a part of the block size\n\u003e             debate which has been troubling me since the beginning:\n\u003e             the reason why people seem to want it.\n\u003e\n\u003e             People say that larger blocks are necessary. In the long\n\u003e             term, I agree - in the sense that systems that do not\n\u003e             evolve tend to be replaced by other systems. This\n\u003e             evolution can come in terms of layers on top of Bitcoin's\n\u003e             blockchain, in terms of the technology underlying various\n\u003e             aspects of the blockchain itself, and also in the scale\n\u003e             that this technology supports.\n\u003e\n\u003e             I do, however, fundamentally disagree that a fear for a\n\u003e             change in economics should be considered to necessitate\n\u003e             larger blocks. If it is, and there is consensus that we\n\u003e             should adapt to it, then there is effectively no limit\n\u003e             going forward. This is similar to how Congress voting to\n\u003e             increase the copyright term retroactively from time to\n\u003e             time is really no different from having an infinite\n\u003e             copyright term in the first place. This scares me.\n\u003e\n\u003e             Here is how Gavin summarizes the future without increasing\n\u003e             block sizes in PR 6341:\n\u003e\n\u003e             \u003e 1. Transaction confirmation times for transactions with\n\u003e             a given fee will rise; very-low-fee transactions will fail\n\u003e             to get confirmed at all.\n\u003e             \u003e 2. Average transaction fee paid will rise\n\u003e             \u003e 3. People or applications unwilling or unable to pay the\n\u003e             rising fees will stop submitting transactions\n\u003e             \u003e 4. People and businesses will shelve plans to use\n\u003e             Bitcoin, stunting growth and adoption\n\u003e\n\u003e             Is it fair to summarize this as \"Some use cases won't fit\n\u003e             any more, people will decide to no longer use the\n\u003e             blockchain for these purposes, and the fees will adapt.\"?\n\u003e\n\u003e             I think that is already happening, and will happen at any\n\u003e             scale. I believe demand for payments in general is nearly\n\u003e             infinite, and only a small portion of it will eventually\n\u003e             fit on a block chain (independent of whether its size is\n\u003e             limited by consensus rules or economic or technological\n\u003e             means). Furthermore, systems that compete with Bitcoin in\n\u003e             this space already offer orders of magnitude more capacity\n\u003e             than we can reasonably achieve with any blockchain\n\u003e             technology at this point.\n\u003e\n\u003e             I don't know what subset of use cases Bitcoin will cater\n\u003e             to in the long term. They have already changed - you see\n\u003e             way less betting transactions these days than a few years\n\u003e             ago for example - and they will keep changing, independent\n\u003e             of what effective block sizes we end up with. I don't\n\u003e             think we should be afraid of this change or try to stop it.\n\u003e\n\u003e             If you look at graphs of block sizes over time (for\n\u003e             example, http://rusty.ozlabs.org/?p=498), it seems to me\n\u003e             that there is very little \"organic\" growth, and a lot of\n\u003e             sudden changes (which could correspond to changing\n\u003e             defaults in miner software, introduction of popular\n\u003e             sites/services, changes in the economy). I think these can\n\u003e             be seen as the economy changing to full up the available\n\u003e             space, and I believe these will keep happening at any size\n\u003e             effectively available.\n\u003e\n\u003e             None of this is a reason why the size can't increase.\n\u003e             However, in my opinion, we should do it because we believe\n\u003e             it increases utility and understand the risks; not because\n\u003e             we're afraid of what might happen if we don't hurry up.\n\u003e             And from that point of view, it seems silly to make a huge\n\u003e             increase at once...\n\u003e\n\u003e             -- \n\u003e             Pieter\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e             _______________________________________________\n\u003e             bitcoin-dev mailing list\n\u003e             bitcoin-dev at lists.linuxfoundation.org\n\u003e             \u003cmailto:bitcoin-dev at lists.linuxfoundation.org\u003e\n\u003e             https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/bitcoin-dev\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e _______________________________________________\n\u003e bitcoin-dev mailing list\n\u003e bitcoin-dev at lists.linuxfoundation.org\n\u003e https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/bitcoin-dev\n\n-------------- next part --------------\nAn HTML attachment was scrubbed...\nURL: \u003chttp://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/bitcoin-dev/attachments/20150626/6adbfdb4/attachment-0001.html\u003e"}