Bitcoin Forum

https://blockchain.info/charts/transaction-fees

For much of 2016, fees in total were < 50 BTC/day.  Now, they are over 200.
(that's a 4x increase, not even factoring in the increased bitcoin price!)

For the dumbasses who wanted a "fee market", you got it.  
It will only get worse from here.

Hint:  Unless bandwidth increases, fees will rise to be the same as other alternatives
like paypal,moneygram ,etc, which will destroy the incentive for people
to adopt bitcoin.

Earth to jonald fyookball: infinity isn't real, do you read me, jonald fyookball

i guess China is not gonna so do the whole bitcoin. their mining equipment would be abandoned if they could not have sufficient profits upon mining. that's why there is a certain alternative to challenge bitcoin - so bitcoin will have less of that burden if some altcoin becomes popular.

Low fees is not an incentive to use something like Bitcoin/bitcoin.
If you are only using bitcoin for the low fees, you are missing the point.

Satoshi didn't start this for low fees, he did it for paradigm shifts.

Fees are base. Liberty is everything.

i agree but the masses do not understand liberty, all they care about is money.

http://imagizer.imageshack.us/a/img924/2817/1nbTES.png

At the begin, they have nothing.
And at the end, the fees will replace the network reward.

no problem here, only the rules.
http://imagizer.imageshack.us/a/img923/4219/pZYhve.gif




mathematics rules ... not humans rules.
all users PAY THE FEES.
and it's good : http://robinhoodtax.org.uk/ ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYtNwmXKIvM )

This is definitely an interesting development, I have a feeling a lot of the spam attacks might be orchestrated by a source that benefits directly or is removed by a degree or two from high fees.

It's a cascading effect, if the fees ever start to get low again they can just have another attack and push it back up to maintain average priority costs.

Genius in one way, when you think about it.

It's still cheaper than paying a flat fee for bank accounts (where I'm from anyway). It costs money to move money. Who cares. It's still very cheap if you're sending it around the world.

that's because bitcoin is mainly using a flat fee rather than in percent. resulting  a situation that low-amount transactions have relatively high fees.

---

high transaction fees also encourage the consideration of the necessity upon sending, and to sustain the security of bitcoin by keeping sufficient fees to miners to maintain. lower fees can increase the speed of spending yet less people could sustain the larger blockchain size.

I agree with the OP. It is time to unite as one and let our voices be heard in support of Segwit and later an implementation of a network built on top of Bitcoin for offchain transactions. The OP may have a different view of how scalability can be acheived but the aim and sincerity is the same. We want Bitcoin to be better.

At the current exchange rate, the transaction fee is not very high. But ideally, we should aim for more users, more transactions per day, and a moderate increase in  the revenue for the miners. But that is not going to happen if the miners get too greedy. IMO, they should sacrifice some of their revenue now, so that they will get good returns after a few years.

did you just contradict yourself :D
this is not the end! the fees are supposed to go up when miners stop earning 15,000 USD per block and have to compensate for their costs with the fees.
right now we are paying them more than they deserve and that is why they are not adopting any of the solutions.

<3 Snowpiercer

I understand your point of view and support it, but realistically speaking, if you were mining BTC would you reduce the fees?
Miners know that they are monopolizing the market and there is no competition so they chose to exploit that fact and get rich here and now.
Their line of thought is probably something like this: "Why wait for the unknown future, China might ban BTC or worse. We can earn money today!"
Do you think Chinese bitcoin miners care about ideals and future?

It looks like we will touch the ATH of the bitcoin transaction fees.  :o

NO!!!!! This an evidence.
https://coin.dance/blocks
They're too greedy for earning the fees. That's why I hate the rules of the consensus. Those people with a lot of the power can be disrupting the consensus. The consensus is the critical point to prevent the future of bitcoin.

I don't think they use that complex thinking, they use the simple reasoning of a monopoly, since they are the ones maintaining the network they can charge whatever they feel like, and they are not going to accept anything less than that.

That is one of the points of the argument. The miners will have their greed controlled if Segwit is activated more than if a hard fork to Bitcoin Unlimited happens. Who knows what they will do if they have more control in choosing the sizes of the blocks.

The question is : Are we paying more, because Bitcoin reached capacity or are we paying more because someone is spamming the network to fake congestion for their hidden agenda? We are still cheaper than most banks and remittance services, but not cheaper than say PayPal.

The fact of the matter is, we are decentralized and our security is much stronger than any of these other alternative out there. ^smile^

Clearly we have reached capacity -- check the size of blocks, they are all 998, 999 etc.

Yesterday, when the spam was in the off position, there were plenty which weren't full.

Then why do the miners avoid activating Segwit or do the hard fork to Bitcoin Unlimited? Instead it is possible that someone from their side is spamming the network. Did last year's halving hurt their profit and earnings?

There is another thread somewhere, where some are saying "its spam" and others are saying its actually some kind of 'komodo' service (I havent investigated deeply).

In any case, I think if we continue to see periods of congestion become more frequent, and unconfirmed backlogs grow larger, the situation will be brought to a head and something will give one way or another. 

It is possible that people who wanted to implement BU or any other BS will be spamming the network to create havoc when the price of the coin is increasing so that the team would be forced to accept to the demands so that they could create a monopoly. Hope these things will be controlled in the future and hope the core team will come up with a solution.

I'm curious why do you feel "BU is BS"?

Why do you assume the core team should be the ones to come up with a solution? 

Yes, and why is that? Answer : Scaling is stalled to path the way for SegWit & LN. Satoshi did not invent this to be a commodity, he clearly stated in his white paper that this is a A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System --> Source :
https://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf

Why do we want to turn this into something else now?

On chain scaling isn't a solution, it's a band-aid that comes with nasty side effects. Every full node has to keep a record of every transaction forever. Can't you see that a solution which writes every transaction (coffee purchases!) in the block chain isn't a solution at all?

Core is working on a solution which ultimately involves a layer(s) on top of Bitcoin. This allows the underlying protocol, the thing that gives Bitcoin it's unique properties which in turn gives it immense value, to remain robust to whatever may come in the future should some authority decided that Bitcoin shouldn't be allowed to exist. The less data required to keep the network functioning, the easier it is to defend from an attack. If you think that Bitcoin won't come under attack, in a world where authorities everywhere continue to introduce ever more stringent capital controls, then you are seriously naive. At least we'd have the option to peel back layers should the need arise. We'd also have the ability to upgrade or swap to alternative layers should a better solution come along.

I think this is the battle between greed LOL.  The other faction said the opposite faction is greedy and they wanted to reap all the rewards by implementing segwit while the other faction said otherwise.  All I can see, the increase in fee at this point is not because block is full but because miners only picks the transaction that have higher fees.  Who to blame here? The code or the miners?

This was Satoshi's vision all along -- that eventually full nodes will be costly to run.  However the alternative (what you and Core are promoting) ensures that only institutions will be able to transact on chain.  I don't see how this is any more resistant to external authorities; Indeed, I think I am choosing the lesser of the two evils and perhaps you also believe that you are as well.

Satoshi disappeared long ago, so let's not appeal to authority. His idea was fantastic, and his implementation was good enough to get the ball rolling, but he made plenty of mistakes. And... again, he isn't here to give us his opinion today, so let's leave him out of it?

How does building layers on top of the protocol make it easy for an external authority to prevent me from transacting on chain? Why will only institutions have this ability?

im scared the fees are going to keep going up forever :(

using low cost is not an incentive to use Bitcoin. most users will accept Bitcoin with their charges, however, the high cost is not a good thing, I think it will dilute the market distribution, although higher fees are sent faster speeds, but if the cost is increasing, the people we can not meet the needs of its float. Everything will be a lot worse

uh isn't it clear? miner get more fee and more profit, why should activate segwit? the halving hurt their profit, but it's also because of the halving that they have this higher value of bitcoin

they are indeed making more now than ever, regardless of the difficulty

at this point it is only greed not profit or survival. if block reward was 3.125BTC and price was still low then it was for profit and from day one it was supposed to be like this, fees go up to compensate for their cost. but right now miners are earning nearly $16,000-$17,000 per block and with the price going up it is already a big profit and covers the costs which is a lot less than this.

In reality (not jonald fyookball's favourite venue), 2nd layers take the capacity burden away from the on-chain 1st layer, so he'll be able to pay < 10,000 satoshis for his frapuccinos when he could have paid 1 satoshi on a 2nd layer just fine.

It's what's known as "healthy competition", competition that strengthens the Bitcoin network instead of weakening it.

I think bitcoin can be either a payment system or a commodity/investment. But it's be difficult to be both.
Maybe bitcoin will really be part of several funds in the near future (etf).
Then the average amount in a transaction will rise a lot, even to a point where 5$ fees per transaction does not matter.
But in such a case bitcoin can't be used as a payment system anymore.
I am really wondering how this is going to play out..

Yes that's why I agree with the OP for the call for an increase in the block size because the fees are killing our incentives for Bitcoin as a payment system. It's rising gradually and we seem to have list our way for what Bitcoin was meant to be. We need to find our way back and make transaction fees as affordable and low as possible for us to enjoy that financial freedom Bitcoin was created to bring.

>We want Bitcoin to be better

Aren't there later-generation coins that fix problems in BTC like this one?

Or is this something that all altcoins would eventually face?

I feel like eventually we have to look in a mirror and look where the long-term trends are going with tx-fees and comfirmation times, uncomfirmed transactions, etc.
What coin will fix these issues?

It's gradually getting  out of hands and if something isn't done to salvage an incentive of Bitcoin (low fees) then we are all going to abandon it one day. How can you charge so huge for a little transaction yet with acsekwy d confirmation so where lies our financial freedom we sought for with the introduction of Bitcoin. If this persists Bitcoin might not be different from the other already established systems like PayPal.

There are several schools of thought.

When you are supplying a scarce resource of limited size, there will be no end in escalation fighting for that space. Small blocksize, high fees, further escalating. That's drawing away customers they will discover cheaper to use money transfer possibilities.

If you are supplying unlimited resource you will just run into the tragedy of the commons. So there has to be a fixed rate at least to avoid getting spammed straight into the ground.

There seemingly isn't any possible way to offer cheap or even for free resource. People of the sorts like PayPal or Western Union will sniff out their chances of undercutting Bitcoin with ease.

The problem is with the mining situation in the bitcoin industry. There are no solutions made to increase the mining blocksize up to this moment and such fees are increasing again and soon small time users will no longer have that privilege to use bitcoin since the miner fees are much bigger than their balance. Hope the mining situation will be answered and the mining fee will reduce back to normal rates.

The increase in bandwidth is MUST at this stage because no one would pay such high fees every time. There are plenty of things available at the price of current average bitcoin transaction fees so technically using fiat currencies is more profitable at this moment especially on local level. Being a bitcoin fan I would use bitcoin for some time until it is not putting a hole in my pocket and I guess everyone other will do the same.

It is not about increasing the bandwidth ,it is about increasing the block limit and both are entirely different thing. Hope you will read about that before commenting as you are in the bitcoin world for some time. The increase in fees is a concern for small transactions and people have to adapt and plan on sending everything in a batch to save the fees.

The one thing you have to think about when people begin to see an increase in the price of transaction fees is the point that some people are always going to attempt to pay more in order to get their transaction done faster and faster, this will simply just lead to the average transaction fee increasing so people will just have to keep paying more and more for the same time of transaction.

It's going to show an exponential growth of the transaction fees and we're easily going to go over quadrupling if nothing is put forward in order to lower this fees and make transaction times much faster to allow mass adoption.

This is an alarming news because this is will be one of the cause of bitcoin to fall from its peak because of high and more expensive fees if the developers or team behind bitcoin will not reduce then this threat will be stronger and somehow the time will come that we can't handle too much expensive fees and we don't have a choice but to migrate to another coin.

The way I see it even though the block size increases, there is no a reasonable solution in transaction fees and network confirmation. That is, there will be no dramatic improvement because it has already increased the number of bitcoin users and consequently the number of daily transactions and in many cases the transactions size. For example, if we consider that the nowadays median number of transactions in 1MB blocksize is approximately 3.3 tx/sec an increase of the block about 2X or 4X or bigger would we believe that would be an effective solution?  Imho for small transactions only off-chain scaling solutions, although these implementations require changes to the underlying protocol, could be cost-effective and quick solutions.

maybe in future if the conditions is not change, we can see that the fee is increase more high so there is need to be fix from the developer and the teams and the fees can be back to normal again. the fees for transaction is really makes us to thinking twice before we want to send our bitcoin and i think it is better to use normal fees or maybe little high than normal fees so we don't have to wait too long to be seen in the network and we can get confirmed in short time.

For me this isn't so much an issue of the fee's being too high (although they certainly are starting to take the living piss, especially for small payment amounts), but more about what  to actually set as the fee so your transaction gets confirmed.

If it's constantly changing how is your normal everyday person supposed to keep up with it and ensure that they are selecting the correct amount?

Bitcoin is a system where the user has complete control over his funds, and therefore must take full responsibility.

If you do some basic research (use a website which has all the info already provided for you), you should have no issue what-so-ever choosing the correct fee for the size of your transaction and how fast you want it to confirm.

If you want other people to take responsibility for your choices, you'll have to pay for that service. As with all services, YMMV.

Currently, there are some of the plans by the bitcoin developers. We just need the blocksize increase to make a block can be containing more transaction. It will keep the fees are in the stable condition. Because i always pay a dollar for every transactions.

I've always some trouble getting the size of my transaction though :/

Finding the right fee isn't a problem I agree on that, or at least finding the right fee/bytes isn't hard.
But finding the right fee for the transaction means you know exactly the size of it ^^'

That maybe true but that is also going to be a major problem when it comes to widespread adoption if they don't sort something out.

I'm no computer noob by any stretch of the imagination, but have only been a BTC user for about 8 months. If I'm having issues trying to work this out how do you suppose somebody that has no clue whatsoever about these things is going to manage?

IMO the single thing preventing more people from using BTC right now, from what I've learned over the past 8 months, is that certain aspects of it (like this) are so unnecessarily complicated and user unfriendly for newcomers. For instance, why not just have a few set in stone staged fee's (depending on how fast you want it confirmed) as standard. They shouldn't rise as the value of BTC goes up or drop as it's value goes down.

Sure this might prevent people from spending smaller amounts of BTC but that's starting to happen with the inflated fees and the USD value of BTC now anyway. If BTC ends up going where some people are predicting the TX fees alone could potentially cost hundreds or thousands of dollars which is just going to render the whole thing completely out of reach for the vast majority of people on the planet and the dream of decentralized currency is going to end up in the hands of a few multi national corporations, in other words, the same shit we have with the banks / fiat right now.

Mainstream adoption is a pipe dream by those who want to use Bitcoin as a get rich quick scheme. Unfortunately, not that many people care about freedom in today's world. The typical response to a problem is to ask the government for help. Bitcoin is the antithesis of that attitude.

These issues aren't unnecessarily complicated. Quite the contrary, the design choices are very necessary to the decentralized nature of Bitcoin. The very thing which gives it value!

Security and convenience are on opposite sides of a sliding scale. The closer you move towards one, the further you get from the other. Sometimes a brilliant engineer designs something which can sidestep this scale and bring you a bit of both.

Security __________|__________Convenience

Hundreds of thousands of dollars?! How much will a single Bitcoin be worth if transactions cost hundreds of thousands of dollars? How are we going to get there? How long is that going to take? That's a lot of time for solutions to some of these problems to be designed.

I agree with what you say with regards to security and convenience but how decentralized do you honestly think Bitcoin is going to be in 10 or 20 years time when the only people that can afford to mine it will be billion dollar corporations?

Oh and I said hundreds "or" thousands, not "of" ;)

And if some of the predictions out there come true - $100k BTC for example, then those TX fee's which are buttons right now are gonna have your trousers right down!

Maybe fees are replacing the halving of bitcoin mining. I mean, the volume of bitcoin and also the hashrate increased significantly.

The increased demand, though, has pushed Bitcoin up against its block size limit.

I mean you can just set the fees lower but your transaction will be marked as low priority and held up, that means a longer confirmation time and who wants that? Actually it is quite good for the bitcoin for having more people adopting it, but with the price of higher fees with halving every 4 years or so.

Whoops! LOL. Oh well, my point still stands, just reduce the time frame.


I don't think many people here today are going to be complaining much if one Bitcoin is worth $100k, regardless of the fees to send it. ;)

Haha very true, but I guess that depends on how much things cost in the future.

You could be a millionaire today, but would you be happy paying 10 grand to wire some money to somebody?

If the fees keep increasing by the year, and the transactions more than double, by the time the common masses know about bitcoin, there wouldn't be any incentive to use it as a form of currency. The ones who are going to benefit are those who have bitcoin as an investment because five years down the line, we could be talking of bitcoin prices not lower than $5000.

I will have to look into that later before I can make a comment. I do not even know what "komodo" means except for the giant lizard found in Borneo.


Of course. A real compromise must take place. From what I heard activating Segwit and then a hard fork to larger block sizes is good because Segwit fixes many issues Bitcoin presently has. 

What can I say? If that time will happen I will surely be rich with bitcoin. I have my investment ready to cash out the moment I see that price, it's good to be optimistic all the time as who would have thought that we can break that all time high price of bitcoin just early this year.
With the recent success in terms of value and adoption, I think bitcoin will not be back on the price lower than $1,000 after this year.

yes right. we really need a solution for this as early as possible and now i cant transact small small amount like $5 or because it charges me about $0.5 to $1 for that aand everytime i cant afford such high fees.