You literally have it completely backwards.

People who pay higher fees are actually adding more to the security of the network in exchange for receiving faster service.

The greedy ones are those who rely on the block subsidies to take care of everything for them.

Getting what you pay for... apparently a foreign concept to some.

FTFY.

Yeah, 'cuz no one has given any reasons anywhere why it's a good idea to keep blocks small.

:/

Cold wallets and offline signing. Been around since 2011...

Disruptive technology is disruptive. o_O

Of course. The absolute rejection by the users of any chain containing blocks the deviate from the established size parameters.

I wasn't really looking for an answer. My version was rhetorical. I think you understood that, though.


Storage isn't the real concern. It's RAM (in the short term) and bandwidth (in the slightly longer run).

Yeah! Buy high and sell low! What a bunch of pro speculators we have in this thread.

Is there any practical reason why bitcoin couldn't be patched so miners can set their own blockreward?

And the users determine which fork has value, not the miners.

Now you can argue whether node count is a good metric of where the users stand or not.

I think it's just really hard to pin Bitcoin down because it's so different than anything we've seen before. It doesn't seem to want to play nice with the old rules or fit into any specific boxes.

I've spent a lot of time wondering if it's even possible to "own" a bitcoin. I mean, you can know a secret combination of letters and numbers which allows you to append the block chain in a very specific manner. Is that ownership?

Yet, when compared to all the other assets on the planet, Bitcoin is probably the one that gives he-who-controls-the-private-keys the strongest property rights possible. I mean, you can literally store a Bitcoin in your head. Until technology allows someone to extract your thoughts, that is far more secure than any physical property (which can easily be removed by... well anyone with a bigger gun than you). Please no XKCD.

To anyone attempting to define Bitcoin, I say, "Good luck!"

I think Bitcoin is some combination of free speech and information which has value. It's truth without an oracle.

Endless debate passes the time when the exchange rate is dropping hard and fast!

Also, any of us could be mining pool operators, couldn't we?

You could design a system (website?) where people can vote with signed messages. The signatures and balances could easily be verified.

The biggest problem I have with something like this is that it gives exchanges (or centralized wallet services, do any still exist?) an extremely heavy vote, while users with deposits at such places get no vote.

I'm kind of making myself look like a hypocrite with the above statement since I truly believe the statement in my sig.

I think there was something like this at one point. Perhaps it still exists?

Sure, but then you have to convince them that they should implement this, which they probably see as an admission that they are not the "original chain" or something.

As contentious as this has become, I wonder if either side would be willing to do that. I doubt it, but I have been surprised before!

Used properly, the block size itself can be leveraged to disassociate coins between chains.

I can send a transaction (or a chain of them) which would take ages to confirm on the existing chain, yet on a big block chain it should confirm in the next block. I then RBF on the existing chain to a different address under my control. Voila, easy disassociation.

There is also mining reward "taint", although you have to actually get some of it to use it. Once you've tainted your coins though, they can be used to taint others, and so on.

I'm not sure how broadcasting 0 fee transactions that send bitcoins to myself costs me anything. As I said, I would be paid block rewards. I don't know that the attack is considered pointless if I'm adding bloat to the chain without contributing anything.

The "implemented countermeasures" is what I'm interested in. I mean, how does one tell my transactions from a regular user? Or my blocks, for that matter? As I said, I fully expect BU to eat itself in short time and be more restrictive than a simple you-get-what-you-pay-for fee market.

Huh? I'm getting paid block rewards. I lose out on BU fees, but so what? I'm attacking BU's chain and getting paid to do it! How much are the fees going to be anyway when blocks are big enough to include all these transactions? Isn't that the selling point? Fees are too high, we need bigger blocks?

Fine, I'll just broadcast all those 0 fee transactions first. I wasn't thinking when I suggested keeping them to myself. They are 0 fee, I have nothing to lose!

And remember, I'm here to get paid block rewards to attack the chain. Even if I lose out on some close blocks, so what?

If you are accepting blocks of N size with fee paying transactions, you will also accept my blocks of N size consisting entirely of 0 fee transactions to myself that I've not broadcast but simply put in my blocks. My blocks are valid according to your rules, bloat the chain, do not help reduce the mempool, and still receive block rewards!

So, we've had tons of "spam" on the network, I assume that "spam" will continue post BU (should that happen). I also imagine lots of new "spam" as an attack on BU.

Miners craft blocks to get the highest total fees, means they are accepting blocks of that size? What happens when a malicious miner crafts blocks of the same size but filled with their own transactions, thus not draining the mempool what-so-ever?

I'm not convinced that incentives will simply be mine-blocks-for-rewards if there is a fork. I think we will see all kinds of attacks on both networks (after this long of a stalemate and the bitterness we are seeing today, it would be naive to think otherwise) and I'm interested to see how BU with it's multiple variables (additional complexity) deals with such attacks. I fully expect them to eat themselves before long and hard code rules to prevent certain things from happening, basically ending up even more restrictive than a simple you-get-what-you-pay-for fee market.