Bitcoin Forum

I was wondering what would be Satoshi's opinion on the blocksize debate. I mean : would he be pro-Classic or pro-Core, a.k.a. 2 MB or 1 MB blocks ? Maybe someone has a quote from him that show what he would think about it.

Satoshi figured the network would eventually have to support more transactions (http://www.mail-archive.com/cryptography@metzdowd.com/msg09964.html). He didn't specify how, I think, but maybe someone that followed him through the years can maybe dig up a quote.

Whatever he thought, thinks or may think is irrelevant now.

After studying his white paper, and reading each of his posts on this forum (at least 3 times), I can tell you unequivocally he would fire off a 2MB maintenance patch so fast your rig would spin. That's because he wasn't controlled by Coinbase (Gavin/Hearn) or Blockstream (*cough, cough*)!

So he would increase the blocksize to 2 MB, but would still stick on Bitcoin Core ? Satoshi's generelly really briliant, and if he thought that the blocksize should be increased, it should have a reason. He never told why it would be needed ?

The quote from Rocketsingh basically says directly that he would put larger block sizes after a certain block.

This means he would actually increase the max blocksize, and only that. He would not put in some other sneaky patches and stuff that is going on now.

See my comment here: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/3giend/citation_needed_satoshis_reason_for_blocksize/ctygzmi


The point of that block number was to show how to make this change with reasonable advance notice, not to suggest a particular block number for doing the change. That post was made on Oct 4, 2010 when the block height was about 83530. Probably how he got block #115000 was that he rounded this to 80000 and added the expected number of blocks in 9 months (~35000). If he was actually suggesting that the change be made at that block number, then he would've had to have actually put this code into Bitcoin very quickly after his post there for his statement "it can start being in versions way ahead" to make any sense at all. (And clearly he didn't do this.)

This "flag day" approach is in fact the preferred way of doing hard forks among the Bitcoin Core devs.

...

(Disclosure: non-professional here)

This blocksize problem likely will come up again and again as the years go by.  Let's assume that the developers come to a consensus on the path forward, and that that solution takes care of things for a few years.  If BTC gets more popular in the coming years, it looks like we would revisit this problem.

Would it not make some sense to build in, "hardwire", the code so that when the Block Number reaches, say, 600000, then the blocksize goes up another 100% (example)?  

Then at block 900000 another 100%?  (Or at least PLAN for a blocksize increase so that we do not have to go through all of this drama again)

He would not have been influenced by personal gain for one thing. He will also not worry about not having enough experience to do a hard fork, if it was needed. He will also not allow for a <hostile takeover> or a power grab. His objectives and his goals was centered around the improvement of the technology.

The developers working on BIP proposals now, seems to concentrate on their own personal gain <monetary or power>

Pro-classic!

But he/she may also be OK with letting the community decide...the problem is that the miners control the transaction activity and which they prefer to use.

remember that at the beginning the limit was soemthign like 32mb, so much higher than what we know, because of ddos problem and other thing, that with the time were mitigated by a long shot

so i believe he is pro the capacity increase, not agianst it, all the other fuss around the block limit, and some of the concerns are not even a real problem, their are magnified like no tomorrow

Perhaps someone could PM Satoshi and see if he replies?

Nothing to lose by trying obtain his opinion.

All this war for only 1MB difference. As for me this is a shame for everyone of developers involved in such mess. If they are not able to agree about this problem anyone couldn't imagine what could happen if would be others more complex. Satoshi probably wouldn't give any kind of attention to this problem. And if would be some discussion about this matter between the other devs it would be resolved within a day by him. According to me all the fault of this overall "world" discussion begin from Gavin. He had the codes from Satoshi. If wouldn't give those to the others in this moment wouldn't be any kind of problem. And not only today but even in the times to come. The lack of courage of Gavin to play the role of leader when was chose to do so by Satoshi himself is the only cause of every problem that bitcoin has and will have in the future (in the development as a product).

It might have been a bit easier for Satoshi to make decisions back in those days. The Core Developers now have a Billion dollar responsibility on

their shoulders. That makes decisions like these much more complex. If they failed for some reason, they would be held responsible for that failure and

their whole career will be flushed down the drain. You do not want to have that on your CV  ::) .... Give them time to make sure that 2 MB block sizes or

even more than that are secure and safe, before we implement something on the fly.

Lightning Network solution didn't exist back then. I guess he would be pro-conservative block size rather than hard forking, also segwit didn't exist back then as well. A lot of new stuff that satoshi didn't predict.

i am sure he never care about that ;D if he care about blocksize or anything about bitcoin change and debate,he will come and give press conference :D

I see we can guess that his opinion will be what the majority holds today: that limit has to be raised. I have not been for too long in this forum, but I have come to see almost everybody wants some sort of blocksize raise sooner or later.

His first opinion would be to don't spread fud that without hard fork bitcoin will be dead and trust the core developers for they will make it good as they always have.

Pro-classic mean pro-secession (or hard fork), and I don't think that it would be something that I like that much...

lets not confuse the debate

blocksize vs segwit
is different to R3/toomin vs blockstream

basing the debate just on the code.. (blocksize vs segwit) is a better discussion to have as ANYONE can release an implementation of 2mb or segwit. and so WHO is not as important as WHAT.

EG
R3/toomin have lost out due to their agenda..
although nearly everyone including core says that 2mb is a way forward. doing it via R3's implementation may also have other ramifications later, unrelated to 2mb upgrade. so lets put a line in the sand and kick r3/toomin to the curb.. and just talk about the code, blocksize vs segwit.

EG if gmaxwell, luke jr, adam back, hundreds of other programmers and even CIYAM released a 2mb implementation.. of CLEAN code.. the drama would settle and we can concentrate on the real code debate. and decide what to upgrade to based on code preference rather than social agenda of corporations

Since you seem really aware of what's going on, could you explain simply, in a few lines, what is exactly Segregated Witness ? I still don't what it is after reading posts talking about it many times :(.

imagine a normal 1mb block is
{TXID: input : output : signature}{TXID: input : output : signature}{TXID: input : output : signature}{TXID: input : output : signature}

segwit 1mb block is not including signatures.. twisting whats included to fit more transactions in
{TXID: input : output}{TXID: input : output}{TXID: input : output}{TXID: input : output}{TXID: input : output}{TXID: input : output}
and a second block (merkle tree)
{TXID: signature}{TXID: signature}{TXID: signature}{TXID: signature}{TXID: signature}{TXID: signature}

by default people will only get the main 1mb block (no sigs) (making older non segwit clients not validate signatures
and if you want the signature data to be a full node (fully verifying node) you will receive:(1.5mb-2mb) if you add a parameter to ask for it
{TXID: input : output}{TXID: signature}{TXID: input : output}{TXID: signature}{TXID: input : output}{TXID: signature}
{TXID: input : output}{TXID: signature}{TXID: input : output}{TXID: signature}{TXID: input : output}{TXID: signature}

So only updated clients will be able to send 2 MB blocks, assuring the compatibility with the older ones by not rejecting them ?

"compatibility" yes.. but then making those older ones still "compatible" to receive 70% data.. but no longer fully validating it.. so making them no longer full nodes. and just "compatible" nodes.

which is a bit pointless as fullnodes will want to be full verifying nodes and so they would upgrade just to be full nodes again.. so if they are upgrading. they might aswell upgrade to include the 2mb hard limit. rather than segwits twist of data..
or even both..

EG why wait till 2017 to need to upgrade a second time causing the debate and delays all over again..

users should upgrade sooner, to allow them to have a buffer.. then in 2017 miners can upgrade in their own time when they are ready to push more transactions. that way users have had a whole year to prep for the miner upgrades

You say that people should strat to upgrade. Does that mean than the Segregated Witness Core version is already avalaible to everyone ?

no i mean when people who want to be full nodes, have to upgrade due to segwit in the near future of 2016. part of that upgrade should also be 2mb hard limit ontop to allow for enough buffer space ready for any surprises in 2017..

He would help his own project and would increase the bocksize to 1 or 2 mb does not matter much, but at least he would increase it.

This seems nice, I'll search informations about it.




Everyone seems to agree on this, but would he increase it via Core or via Classic ?

I think with the oldest one and the 'fundamental' which i think is Core, i don't like the Classic one.

This question is a little too "WWJD" for me.

Satoshi was just a man. His invention was brilliant but we shouldn't deify him.

His opinion on this matter isn't known because we do not know who he is, and I think he was brilliant enough to understand the only way bitcoin truly would meet his objectives was if there wasn't someone with god-like influence over the project.

At least I agree with you. I don't like Classic too. I hope and think that Satoshi would think like us.I don't like Classic because they're doing a secession, by breaking the consensus rule, one of the most important of all the Bitcoin protocol. And you, why do you don't like it ?




Satoshi is Bitcoin's father. The father near always know what's better for his son, and the same rule applies here. Satoshi is certainly the most brillaint man of the Bitcoin ecosystem, and what he would think is fundamental.

There's really no room for debate on what Satoshi would favor.  He originally coded a 32 MB cap for block size, and implemented a 1 MB cap as a stopgap anti-spam measure, expressly intended to be temporary.  Unless he plans to poke his head out and provide an opinion, this is the best information we have on the subject.

Didn't satoshi also say anyone against increasing it "is a first class grade A faggot"?

It wouldn't surprise me at all if it would come from you, Bitcoin Classic-lover...

It was a joke obviously.  Not taking your troll bait.

He wouldn't have an opinion to share as he is rather anonymous and keeps to himself now.

At this point, what satoshi would think is probably irrelevant, yes it was great to get it started but now that bitcoin has a massive adoption and some great minds involved it really dosn't matter ehat satoshi woould think..... :-\

Speculating on what his opinion would have been is as silly as asking WWJD

We can't answer without bias, and all asking such a question is give us a false sense of authority to our biased answer.

"I did this because Jesus would have" type of BS.

I believe using his name to give authority to one position or the other is the last thing the architect of a decentralized payment system would have wanted.

-=-

Now for my opinion, I believe Satoshi would be behind SegWit and would increase the core block size when SegWit is shown to not be enough.

But I can't claim that would have been his position, because that actually is my opinion, so the bias is obvious.