ya thats fine, if you can easily spot is as spam or and require more fees to process spam by all means do it. shouldnt be hard to get miners to do that.
but nothing is stopping the spammer to make his spam taste better, and with the current blocklimit with blocks often full its not very expensive for the spammer so spam with good tasting spam.
There isn't? I thought making it considerably more expensive to push spam transactions might act as a disincentive towards doing so. I don't understand this idea that "if blocks are often full (which is not true on average), it is not expensive to spam." Blocks being full doesn't make it cheaper to push transactions; quite the opposite. cuz the spammer does not need to fill the block completely they are already half full on avg. if block where on avg 99% full it would be cheap to spam it up so blocks are always 100% full fee would go up and make the spam attack more expensive but not by much because spammer only really needs to "fill in the gaps" so to speak. now imagine that blocks are 100% full all the time, how much does it cost to spam the network and create a 365day backlog? its already headed there naturally without spam, so not much! "All the time" would be a very inaccurate description. If the spammer does not need to fill 100% of blocks himself, that doesn't make it any cheaper for him on a per-size or per-output basis. The point of addressing spam is itself an end goal -- we don't have to consider it in the context of "OMG, a full block!" The disincentive is there, no hard fork is required, and this may considerably mitigate capacity issues (it may not) while reducing unnecessary bloat. Sure, transaction volume is increasing on the long term. But I'm not convinced on the proportion of transactions that are "legitimate" (i.e. without spam). The capacity question is a perpetual one -- how do maintain efficient incentives in a constantly evolving economy? This is part of that question. |
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I don't like what "someone" is doing. They are not testing anything, will just spam dust transactions. There will be no new conclusion to draw from this round of "tests". Sad part is we cannot stop them. If the attack transactions have enough fees in them. They will be included in blocks and hold up more legit transactions. Miners can filter them if they wanted to, but will raise concerns on the blacklisting issue.
There is already a default threshold for "dust" under ~550 satoshis (I believe it is 546 satoshis) in the Core client. This is not "blacklisting" but rather opting not to relay uneconomical transactions in which the outputs are default unspendable. We can raise this threshold or otherwise penalize dust outputs. |
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ya thats fine, if you can easily spot is as spam or and require more fees to process spam by all means do it. shouldnt be hard to get miners to do that.
but nothing is stopping the spammer to make his spam taste better, and with the current blocklimit with blocks often full its not very expensive for the spammer so spam with good tasting spam.
There isn't? I thought making it considerably more expensive to push spam transactions might act as a disincentive towards doing so. I don't understand this idea that "if blocks are often full (which is not true on average), it is not expensive to spam." Blocks being full doesn't make it cheaper to push transactions; quite the opposite. |
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I don't think it is. At this time mempool is <2mb and unconfirmed transactions at < 2000.
Interesting fact is that there are 6 blocks found in under 5 minutes, which is uncommon i believe, so maybe that helped with faster processing of transactions
Where are you getting this information from? Only blockchain.info? Interestingly enough 2k (unconfirmed) transactions on blockchain info take around 1.6MB, but 7.3k transactions on Blocktrail 52MB. The difference is huge.  Note: This image was made 1 minute before a block was found and the post was written. To answer your original question, there is no attack right now. There is no "test" either as the planned one was canceled due to legal pressures. We can debate the definition of "attack" in this context..... the dust outputs involved in some of the original attacks are now being redeemed by the public. The transactions containing these spent outputs are approximately 75kB in size. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1175321.msg12373932#msg12373932 |
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how expensive is it to fill a block?
cheap like dirt when blocks are already full of legitimate TX
we need to push the block limit higher to make these spam attack more expensive?
Maybe we should actually address the spam itself -- nodes and miners don't have to relay spam. We can raise the default threshold in the Core client. Or we could consider a "per-dust-output" fee as suggested here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1171182.0. All with the added bonus of reducing UXTO load and therefore increasing the efficiency of all nodes. sounds good. but then the spammer might get smart and make his spam TXs undisguisable from legitimate TXs and if the blocks are already mostly full with legitimate TXs it won't cost much to fill the remainder with solid spam. What is a "legitimate" transaction, then? The point here is to make it considerably more expensive to spam the network with dust outputs. If a given set of transactions are undisguisable from legitimate ones, they are legitimate, and the issue of spam has been mitigated. Consider the difference between a dust output of 0.000005 or 0.00001 and a "legitimate" (read: spendable with default fees) output of 0.0005. This is the distinction I am making. |
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how expensive is it to fill a block?
cheap like dirt when blocks are already full of legitimate TX
we need to push the block limit higher to make these spam attack more expensive?
Maybe we should actually address the spam itself -- nodes and miners don't have to relay spam. We can raise the default threshold in the Core client. Or we could consider a "per-dust-output" fee as suggested here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1171182.0. All with the added bonus of reducing UXTO load and therefore increasing the efficiency of all nodes. |
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At some point the miners will push for not including transactions with zero or low fees at all, then Bitcoin will be another mainstream banking product.
I don't think the former entails the latter at all. Decentralized =/= another mainstream banking product. That's completely impossible. Whether or not the former is an acceptable outcome is debatable, but the association with "mainstream banking" is fallacious. |
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There is indeed spam -- for instance, what is the use of pushing outputs that require significantly more fees than the output is worth in order to re-spend them? It's pure spam.
Fees as a "spam" disincentive isn't working very well then, is it? If you need to send someone Sataoshis, the recipient doesn't care about the fees-they still demand the Satoshis. How so? Most people default to the lowest fee that will secure their transaction on the next block. Do all economic incentives work 100% as in theory? Of course not. Game theory prevails. Those "investing" in spam attacks may indeed have incentives that outweigh the disincentive of fees. I'm not sure where that leaves us, though. |
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Interestingly enough, the UXTO is being reduced considerably, when we thought these outputs would never be spent.  |
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Each output = ~75,000 bytes. that must mean a nice fee for the miners? I guess that depends on your definition of nice. I suppose a 0.00447 fee to include a 0.00053 output is pretty nice from a percentage standpoint. But I don't think anyone is getting rich off of these 2.5BTC keys.  |
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There is no "spam" there are no "junk" transactions. There are only "unprofitable" transactions. The more I look at all these "issues", the more it seems that miners are the problem and we need to find another alternative to secure the block chain instead of relying on naked greed.
Sounds like you don't really want a proof-of-work system at all! That's cool, and lots of altcoins have explored alternative incentive regimes. However, this would fundamentally change bitcoin and is unlikely to be supported by those who support the principles it was built upon. There is indeed spam -- for instance, what is the use of pushing outputs that require significantly more fees than the output is worth in order to re-spend them? It's pure spam. |
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pps: peter r is one helluva shady character.
Can confirm; hellashady. You like to debate with devs that are well known and identified in the community if not directly criticize them yet there is nothing we know about you. If you really stand for your words, prove your identity, your references, your curriculum vitae and any information that are relevant for taking you seriously. Else you're just a shady "let's kill bitcoin core" anon that words spew (and fancy graphs) should be taken with much caution, if not completely ignored Which they are anyway, besides from that little fools army (probably half faked too - just look at the number of noobs accounts that instantly popped up here and there exclusively shilling for XT in august) you Gavin et al. have managed to brainwash with your mainstream socialist garbage. PS: Can't wait on how you'll elude my question tho: who da friggin fuck are you?  You were against Gavin who was the main maintainer of the bitcoin github until recently! You perfectly fit in the category that you just stated. If you stand for your words prove your identity, your references, your curriculum vitae and any information that might be relevant for taking you seriously. Oh wait! You will not do that. Hypocrisy at its best. To be fair, in academic discussions and papers, it is customary to identify yourself and your credentials. It's kind of odd that he hasn't. If I had the desire to enter into academic discussions, I wouldn't scoff at the idea of identifying myself. |
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The current price of bitcoin is based largely on expectations of future growth. Choke off that growth and I suspect a large portion of its current valuation will evaporate.
Doesn't that imply that the priority is maintaining bitcoin as a payment system? Or rather, that the only way towards "future growth" is with low fees/fast confirms? It seems that the digital gold crowd doesn't necessarily see things that way. I, for one, don't see the payment protocol as the primary value; it is wholly secondary to that of decentralized store of value. I can't imagine how this would positively affect price. primary value or not, price WILL be affected. at this point if devs don't fix the TPS limit ( bumping the block size limit slightly is a fine solution for now), i'm stepping out, not because it would imply bitcoin will never be a payment system, but because I will no longer trust the dev team to make smart decisions, or make any hard decisions at all for that matter, and would deem bitcoin's development process borken. but i am confident they will up the TPS limit in some form or another in due time. I guess I take the opposite approach. If the devs were to implement something so reckless as BIP101 (as an example), my confidence in bitcoin would be crushed and I would largely exit my investment position. At least, I would never transact on the XT chain -- outside of double spending -- should a valid chain coexist with it. Many don't realize it, but the robust, secure system that we have now, the consensus on the protocol that exists now -- these are the priorities. When it comes to "the dev team mak[ing] smart decisions," I hope that whatever populist arguments and arbitrary timelines that segments of the community produce are tertiary to those concerns. Conceding to those largely arbitrary and tertiary concerns would indicate to me that the development process is broken. this is perfect example of ivory tower thinking. in reality the system would be no less robust & secure should the the limit be bumped to 2MB or even 8MB, MAYBE at 32MB your arguments would START to make SOME sense beyond ideological interest. Re: ivory tower thinking -- cool story. The converse of that ad hominem: your opposition is based on the populist pleb argument: "Nothing can go wrong, full steam ahead, opposition is nothing more than ideology, exponential adoption, $100k bitcoins, rabble rabble." That issues of scaling are taken so lightly is worrisome. I can entertain the argument that conditions now are testable for a 2MB limit regime. 32MB and beyond (or even 8MB) is exactly what I'm talking about -- if certain groups are so focused on a drastic (and particularly an exponential) increase, we will remain at an impasse. You nor anyone else can guarantee network security under those conditions, so let's not get ahead of ourselves. That people have such tunnel vision that the essential definition of scaling = increasing block size limit is part of the problem. Imagine that: a spam attack of dust transactions comes along, and everyone has their panties in a wad because they are terrified that there isn't enough room on the blockchain for the spam? |
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The current price of bitcoin is based largely on expectations of future growth. Choke off that growth and I suspect a large portion of its current valuation will evaporate.
Doesn't that imply that the priority is maintaining bitcoin as a payment system? Or rather, that the only way towards "future growth" is with low fees/fast confirms? It seems that the digital gold crowd doesn't necessarily see things that way. I, for one, don't see the payment protocol as the primary value; it is wholly secondary to that of decentralized store of value. I can't imagine how this would positively affect price. primary value or not, price WILL be affected. at this point if devs don't fix the TPS limit ( bumping the block size limit slightly is a fine solution for now), i'm stepping out, not because it would imply bitcoin will never be a payment system, but because I will no longer trust the dev team to make smart decisions, or make any hard decisions at all for that matter, and would deem bitcoin's development process borken. but i am confident they will up the TPS limit in some form or another in due time. I guess I take the opposite approach. If the devs were to implement something so reckless as BIP101 (as an example), my confidence in bitcoin would be crushed and I would largely exit my investment position. At least, I would never transact on the XT chain -- outside of double spending -- should a valid chain coexist with it. Many don't realize it, but the robust, secure system that we have now, the consensus on the protocol that exists now -- these are the priorities. When it comes to "the dev team mak[ing] smart decisions," I hope that whatever populist arguments and arbitrary timelines that segments of the community produce are tertiary to those concerns. Conceding to those largely arbitrary and tertiary concerns would indicate to me that the development process is broken. |
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So The People will rush to cash in those private keys thus creating their own tidal wave of transactions. Nicely played.
I'm having trouble even loading the unspent outputs for the first address. Blockchain.info just timed out trying to load them. I wonder what it would cost to move these outputs....  Over 45,000 default unspendable outputs.... |
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No one has real data to show that a higher block limit = more fees overall for miners, it is simply a misunderstanding of how transaction fees work in real life.
Here is real data that shows that over the last five years, higher block sizes = more fees overall for miners.  , this is what I mean by people fundamentally misunderstand the issue… What are you talking about? Block size has unquestionably changed (increased) over the last 5 years. The increase in the block size--such that it's now approaching the anti-spam limit--is what has precipitated this debate. Peter your chart is misguiding obviously as it shows an increase in transactions, not block size, all happening under the same limit. The increase in fees paid is a result of more transactions, not bigger blocks. There's nothing "misguiding" about that chart. It clearly demonstrates that more transactions equals more fees collected. That's why we should alter the blocksize limit to allow more transactions. If we don't raise the cap, the only way for revenues to continue to rise is to raise the fee itself. But if that gets prohibitively expensive for the average user, they'll simply transact on another chain and miners will get less revenue than they would with a larger blocksize limit. Forcing an unnatural fee market will not help scalability and will deter new users. A cautious, responsible and preferably (IMO) flexible increase that keeps centralisation to an absolute minimum is the best way forward. The only people still denying that are the ones who envision Bitcoin as an exclusive little club for the wealthy and frankly I can't wait to leave all those people behind. Of course more transactions = more fees collected. This does not logically entail anything that you are saying. Mere capacity is not the only concern. And reducing the complexity of a fee market to being "unnatural" and "will not help scalability," or assuming that it is necessarily a deterrent to adoption -- I don't buy it. I'm not convinced by your sectarian perspective, either. |
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The current price of bitcoin is based largely on expectations of future growth. Choke off that growth and I suspect a large portion of its current valuation will evaporate.
Doesn't that imply that the priority is maintaining bitcoin as a payment system? Or rather, that the only way towards "future growth" is with low fees/fast confirms? It seems that the digital gold crowd doesn't necessarily see things that way. I, for one, don't see the payment protocol as the primary value; it is wholly secondary to that of decentralized store of value. |
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The bigger picture is difficult to place a finger on. Hard to say if we are ranging or still continuing the epic down trend from the end of 2013. I'm looking at 4h and daily though -- it certainly looks to me like we are approaching the end of a C wave..... I believe we will top out in the high 240s/low 250s (if we haven't already). Don't know if we can expect a B wave in a longer term range situation, or the beginning of a strong move down. But I do believe we are near a local top. I have closed longs and am waiting in USD, considering the right time to enter a short position.
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But technical matters that affect network security can't be determined by the mere possibility that a corporation might make a marketing push, which might result in increased adoption. That is simply too far removed from reality. If we are averaging 400 kB, it seems like more than doubling transaction volume would be quite a feat in and of itself. Why don't we start with that?
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