Bitcoin Forum

I have begun experimenting with bitcoins. I've mined my first coin and was going to send 0.1 (approx $3 current value) to my Tradehill account to test the waters there with my first trade. This is when I noticed something terrible, it asked me for 0.01 (mandatory) fee to send the 0.1. 10% fee on a $3 transaction? I realize that I could send more, or wait until I have more... but I personally find this to be unacceptable. What if I wanted to send $1USD worth of bitcoin to someone? That's pretty much out of the question. I realize there are wallets out there, and that bitcoin is supposed to represent a backbone, but I thought this was supposed to be free and righteous and all that. I thought this was decentralized? Is the fee covering an infrastructure? If not, I will donate when and what I want to, but forcing me to send a a hefty % into the authors pocket almost has me turning away from this experiment. Hopefully this is just something I'm doing wrong and someone can guide me to clarity. Also, sorry if this has been posted before.

The fee should be optional - hopefully it will return to that state in the next release.

If you wait a little bit, your coins will age and you can send without a fee.

The fee goes to the miner who solves the block that your transaction is in.

You definitely need to read up more on bitcoin before you get all high and mighty and pointing out 'problems'.

Nothing is going to the author's pockets. The fee is for the miner who puts your transaction in a block.

The reason the client forces this, is because of anti-spamming rules. If a transaction matches certain criteria (age of coins, how small they are, how large the transaction is in bytes, ...), it will be considered spammy, and not be forwarded by most nodes in the network unless it carries a minimum fee.

This minimum fee has been 0.01 BTC for a long time. Nobody expected the current fast rise of bitcoin's exchange rate, making 0.01 BTC a pretty large thing. In a few days, 0.3.23 should be released which decreases this minimum fee to 0.0005 BTC (20x decrease).

"You definitely need to read up more on bitcoin before you get all high and mighty and pointing out 'problems'."

Let's try to be civil to newcomers asking questions. 

Garrett,

I appreciate your info as it pointed out some things I didn't know, but don't tell me I have to read academic papers before I'm allowed to point out obvious user problems (one that you've agreed should be optional). I represent a new user with interest. I've been reading all about this for the last 24 hours heavily, and I didn't come across a page that discussed the reason or the problem with the fee in bitcoin client.

P.S.- If people want this to grow it must be criticized for it's problems so that they can be ironed out for mass adoption.

You're running into the "very low priority transactions require a fee" rule.  Priority depends on the value of the transaction (fewer bitcoins == lower priority) and how long ago you received the bitcoin(s) (older == higher priority).

That rule was in place for 0.3.20.2, but only for most miners.  Most would not include very-low-priority transaction in blocks until they were old enough to have a high priority.  The result was a big backlog of very-small transactions starting to build up.

With 0.3.21, the rules are the same for miners, for relaying transactions across the network, and for the user interface-- if your transaction is very-low-priority, it won't get relayed and the user interface will insist that you pay a fee if you really want it transmitted RIGHT NOW.

If you really really really need to send 0.01 bitcoins right now, then you'll have to pay the fee.  If you're willing to wait a while, you'll find you can send it without a fee after it is old enough and has enough priority.

All of this is to discourage people from "penny flooding" -- constantly sending pennies back and forth to themselves without a fee just because they can.

Footnote:  if you don't upgrade, you can send that 0.01 bitcoins without a fee.  But as everybody else upgrades, you'll find that it will take a long time for that transaction to get confirmed.

I understand, thanks for your help!

The fee needs to be substantially reduced otherwise micro-payments (and soon any other payments) will not be viable in BTC.

Also

Please excuse the other guys comments, technical type have no manners sometimes.

If someone wants to learn more about the specifics of how bitcoin operates, of course they are going to go to the official bitcoin forum to ask the question if the answer is not forthcoming via google searching and what not.

Yes, let's criticize people heavily who point out legitimate issues.  ::)

You're all right. I'd like to apologize for my rudeness. I was a newbie trying to understand this all too at one point, and I can say I wouldn't want to run into the Garrett that responded to your question.

As it stands, I think I need to stop reading these question threads, hearing the same ones all the time is pretty bad for my sanity.

And definitely to get an AC. It must be upwards of 90 in my room right now.

Again, sorry for snapping at you - jhansen858's response is much better :)


Bitcoin was never intended for micropayments - they're just a nice side effect.

As it stands, the fee is supposed to be optional - in the next version IIRC there should be a checkbox allowing you to override and always send without a fee, regardless of how long it will take to confirm.

In other words, the fee is client side. There is nothing in the protocol forcing the addition of a fee.

That fee was instituted when a bitcoin was less than a cent.  The growth has been far faster than we anticipated and this is being worked on presently.

An apology? On my internets?

 :)

Sounds good!.. I will probably be a bitcoin small fry for a while

You are correct. An unajustable thirty cents fee per transaction is too high.  Ignore the trolls and fanboys, they are fanatical idiots.

The client I use has an optional 30 cents fee per transaction, that i obviously turned off. I would have set it to 3 cents or 0.3 cents if I had the option, but it isn't there. I'm using 0.3.20.2, maybe you could try downloading this version so you can at least turn the fee off?

I will look for that version and replace mine until they've fixed the newest version. I was a bit paranoid (from lack of experience) to uninstall bitcoin/reinstall an older version at the fear of losing my BTC but I'll take the risk.

no risk to be taken, just save the wallet.dat file and you will not lose anything.  I have reinstalled so many times already because I cannot connect and download blocks 85% of the time.  So just backup that file.

Maybe you could send your btc to mybitcoin first, then send them back after you do the install. That way there will be less risk. I expcet the software authors were smart enough not to overwrite your wallet, though.

Thanks guys. I uninstalled the old and installed the new. Coin still showing and no mandatory fee when sending to TradeHill. Now it gets more exciting..