Gavin Threatens to Quit Bitcoin Development and Join Hearn's Fork

[tvbcof]

Hearn has blatantly admitted his authoritarian leanings on more than one occasion.   I don't trust him.

Ironically, these sorts of admission are about the only reason I do 'trust' him insofar as I think it plausible that he simply has his personal feelings about what Bitcoin should be.  I happen to think that most of his ideas are flawed, totalitarian, and that they suck is all.

[MicroGuy]

I think it's possible to make Bitcoin decentralized but it will take some sort of creative voting mechanism integrated into the client.

The best approach until that system is achieved is to go with the person that Satoshi hand-picked to succeed him.

[achow101]

I think it's possible to make Bitcoin decentralized but it will take some sort of creative voting mechanism integrated into the client.

The best approach until that system is achieved is to go with the person that Satoshi hand-picked to succeed him.

What do you mean "Make bitcoin decentralized"? Bitcoin is already decentralized. Are you talking about the development? The development is somewhat centralized, but it is still decentralized since anyone can alter the source and try to commit to it. Not one developer has any final say about anything. Due to consensus, which is decentralized, no developer can force anyone to do anything.

[MicroGuy]

I think it's possible to make Bitcoin decentralized but it will take some sort of creative voting mechanism integrated into the client.

The best approach until that system is achieved is to go with the person that Satoshi hand-picked to succeed him.

What do you mean "Make bitcoin decentralized"? Bitcoin is already decentralized. Are you talking about the development? The development is somewhat centralized, but it is still decentralized since anyone can alter the source and try to commit to it. Not one developer has any final say about anything. Due to consensus, which is decentralized, no developer can force anyone to do anything.

In my world, a purely decentralized currency would not have a central point of command. It would have the ability to exist autonomously.

[jonald_fyookball]

I think it's possible to make Bitcoin decentralized but it will take some sort of creative voting mechanism integrated into the client.

The best approach until that system is achieved is to go with the person that Satoshi hand-picked to succeed him.

What do you mean "Make bitcoin decentralized"? Bitcoin is already decentralized. Are you talking about the development? The development is somewhat centralized, but it is still decentralized since anyone can alter the source and try to commit to it. Not one developer has any final say about anything. Due to consensus, which is decentralized, no developer can force anyone to do anything.

In my world, a purely decentralized currency would not have a central point of command. It would have the ability to exist autonomously.

Did you read what knightdk just said? It doesn't have "a central point of command", as you put it.

[MicroGuy]

Did you read what knightdk just said? It doesn't have "a central point of command", as you put it.

I think there is a central point of command, Gavin. But without an integrated voting system, Gavin is mandatory.

[hhanh00]

Did you read what knightdk just said? It doesn't have "a central point of command", as you put it.

The lack of central point of command is the reason why Gavin is 'threatening' to leave bitcoin core.
He can't get agreement to change this code base but he can start or in this case join another one.
If he gets enough miners to switch to his version, by virtue of the decentralization, it becomes the new
standard.

Obviously, he can choose to work on whatever he wants but in my opinion it should not be called Bitcoin
anymore. It is a new coin since the change in the consensus rules were not approved by a majority of core
developers.

[tvbcof]

I think it's good Gavin finally understood he needs to make an altcoin.
I just hope he'll leave Bitcoin alone then.

I hope he takes a lot of the so-called 'derp majority' with him.

This conversation about block size has been going on for years (literally.)  It seems to me that around a year and a half ago many of the 'whales' had concluded that the pipe-dream of Bitcoin being everything to everyone and buying every cup of coffee was retarded and Bitcoin was best used as a backing store upon which a myriad of market tuned solutions could ride.  Several of the old-time economics folks were saying this (though not so much on this forum were most of them stopped wasting their time years ago.)

If I were a whale and in coordination with a few others, and wanted one last good buying opportunity, I might be inclined to engineer a situation whereby a lot of FUD surrounding this fork was promulgated and reflected in the price.  Then I would time things to buy with both hands.  Whether Gavin's exponential growth fork happened or not would not matter much.  If it did it would probably die off eventually as people realized how useless it was.  The solid core would be the original Bitcoin doing the one thing it is actually suitable to do.

[QuestionAuthority]

What a baby. He's going to throw a tantrum and quit to make his own altcoin? Talk about centralization! Bitcoin is gavincoin already. Bitcoin is completely controlled by Gavin and this proves it.

[BitcoinEXpress]

What a baby. He's going to throw a tantrum and quit to make his own altcoin? Talk about centralization! Bitcoin is gavincoin already. Bitcoin is completely controlled by Gavin and this proves it.

If Gavin goes, a substantial amount of the hash rate will follow him.

Take notice that not a single major pool has said otherwise.

All it will take is ONE major pool to jump, Bitcoin price will crash and the rest of the pools will switch.

Once any two major pools switch, it's game over for "Legacy Satoshi"

Gavin is going to win has won this tug of war.



~BCX~

[tvbcof]

What a baby. He's going to throw a tantrum and quit to make his own altcoin? Talk about centralization! Bitcoin is gavincoin already. Bitcoin is completely controlled by Gavin and this proves it.

If Gavin goes, a substantial amount of the hash rate will follow him.

Take notice that not a single major pool has said otherwise.

All it will take is ONE major pool to jump, Bitcoin price will crash and the rest of the pools will switch.

Once any two major pools switch, it's game over for "Legacy Satoshi"

Gavin is going to win has won this tug of war.

~BCX~

I'm betting that you are wrong.

What you are failing to recognize is that me and probably a lot of hodlers can sit things out for long periods of time.  I'm perfectly happy to have 'legacy bitcoin' freeze for months while we let things shake out.  I've not made a Bitcoin transaction for a year anyway so it won't effect me one iota as long as there is good transparency into the going's on.

What I would really like to see happen is that Gavin's exponential growth fork is used as an opportunity for some significant improvements to better fill a niche that is important to me which is primarily broadly distributed infrastructure.  A dream-come-true would be a scheme whereby POW consisted of a group of randomly shifting CPU-friendly algorithms in conjunction with reward for providing transmission infrastructure.  I'll not hold my breath for that, but if we have to endure a work-stoppage to deal with superior resource attacks anyway I'd much rather re-start with some Achilles's heals of Bitcoin-1 patched up.

[BitcoinEXpress]

What a baby. He's going to throw a tantrum and quit to make his own altcoin? Talk about centralization! Bitcoin is gavincoin already. Bitcoin is completely controlled by Gavin and this proves it.

If Gavin goes, a substantial amount of the hash rate will follow him.

Take notice that not a single major pool has said otherwise.

All it will take is ONE major pool to jump, Bitcoin price will crash and the rest of the pools will switch.

Once any two major pools switch, it's game over for "Legacy Satoshi"

Gavin is going to win has won this tug of war.

~BCX~

I'm betting that you are wrong.

What you are failing to recognize is that me and probably a lot of hodlers can sit things out for long periods of time.  I'm perfectly happy to have 'legacy bitcoin' freeze for months while we let things shake out.  I've not made a Bitcoin transaction for a year anyway so it won't effect me one iota as long as there is good transparency into the going's on.

What I would really like to see happen is that Gavin's exponential growth fork is used as an opportunity for some significant improvements to better fill a niche that is important to me which is primarily broadly distributed infrastructure.  A dream-come-true would be a scheme whereby POW consisted of a group of randomly shifting CPU-friendly algorithms in conjunction with reward for providing transmission infrastructure.  I'll not hold my breath for that, but if we have to endure a work-stoppage to deal with superior resource attacks anyway I'd much rather re-start with some Achilles's heals of Bitcoin-1 patched up.

Apparently you don't understand the most basic principle of Bitcoin.

Once a majority of the hashrate follows Gavin, it really doesn't matter how much you "Hodl".

The size of the wallet has absolutely zero to do with "majority hash rate" rules.



~BCX~

[tvbcof]

What a baby. He's going to throw a tantrum and quit to make his own altcoin? Talk about centralization! Bitcoin is gavincoin already. Bitcoin is completely controlled by Gavin and this proves it.

If Gavin goes, a substantial amount of the hash rate will follow him.

Take notice that not a single major pool has said otherwise.

All it will take is ONE major pool to jump, Bitcoin price will crash and the rest of the pools will switch.

Once any two major pools switch, it's game over for "Legacy Satoshi"

Gavin is going to win has won this tug of war.

~BCX~

I'm betting that you are wrong.

What you are failing to recognize is that me and probably a lot of hodlers can sit things out for long periods of time.  I'm perfectly happy to have 'legacy bitcoin' freeze for months while we let things shake out.  I've not made a Bitcoin transaction for a year anyway so it won't effect me one iota as long as there is good transparency into the going's on.

What I would really like to see happen is that Gavin's exponential growth fork is used as an opportunity for some significant improvements to better fill a niche that is important to me which is primarily broadly distributed infrastructure.  A dream-come-true would be a scheme whereby POW consisted of a group of randomly shifting CPU-friendly algorithms in conjunction with reward for providing transmission infrastructure.  I'll not hold my breath for that, but if we have to endure a work-stoppage to deal with superior resource attacks anyway I'd much rather re-start with some Achilles's heals of Bitcoin-1 patched up.

Apparently you don't understand the most basic principle of Bitcoin.

Once a majority of the hashrate follows Gavin, it really doesn't matter how much you "Hodl".

The size of the wallet has absolutely zero to do with "majority hash rate" rules.

~BCX~

Apperently you understand the flexibility one has with code.

If I'm sitting on a high value in Bitcoin and someone successfully attacks the blockchain, I'll patch my client with anything which solves the problem.  Even if that means something radical such as ignore sha256 hashes after block {n} and switch to a different algo I'm absolutely going to do it rather than throw up my hands and walk away.  The main requirement would be have enough of the right kind of like-minded fellow hodlers to form a workable system.  That's where a group of proven and trusted developers comes in.

Put another way, good luck attacking such a fork, and especially using data-centers full of sha256 asics to do so.  This can also be read as read "Fuck your 'most basic principles of Bitcoin.'"

Granted, this would no longer be Bitcoin, but neither is Gavincoin.  I'll favor these two (and probably countless other forks which would happen simultaneously), based on whether they promise to provide enduring value.

[achow101]

The miners aren't in control here. If the miners make poor choices, they might end up mining worthless tokens.

The miners are in control. They choose which version to use, the new or the old. If enough of them use the new version, then the blockchain forks. If enough of them use the old version, then the blockchain doesn't fork. Either way, most miners will not be mining worthless tokens because the fork will only occur first with a soft-fork when the majority switch, and second with a hard-fork when the super-majority switch. If less than the majority switch, then all miners will still be mining valid blocks and the tokens are then not worthless.

[BitcoinEXpress]

@tvbcof


Are you seriously trying to put forth that miners are not in control?

The miners, be they pools or scores of independents are absolutely the ones that will decide.

If enough ASICS in datacenters follow Gavin guess what, that becomes the new legit fork.

Also this is not an "attack", it's an evolution just the way Satoshi intended, with majority ruling.

Evolution is imminent, like it or not you will be part of Gavin and Hearn's fork.


~BCX~

[tvbcof]

@tvbcof

Are you seriously trying to put forth that miners are not in control?

The miners, be they pools or scores of independents are absolutely the ones that will decide.

If enough ASICS in datacenters follow Gavin guess what, that becomes the new legit fork.

Also this is not an "attack", it's an evolution just the way Satoshi intended, with majority ruling.

Evolution is imminent, like it or not you will be part of Gavin and Hearn's fork.

~BCX~

I agree that miners are in control.  If there is a shake-up then it might be a good opportunity to go back to the good old days when 'everyone is a miner.'  Such a fork which achieved that (and protection against attack from ASIC farms in the process) might be a pretty interesting proposition.

I fully expect Hearndresen's fork to be successful and am hoping for that and plan to 'be a part of it' so to speak.  I plan to try to take advantage of a window of opportunity to dump that fork at a profit before people realize that it is just PayPal except less convenient and more useless.

[BitcoinEXpress]

@tvbcof

Are you seriously trying to put forth that miners are not in control?

The miners, be they pools or scores of independents are absolutely the ones that will decide.

If enough ASICS in datacenters follow Gavin guess what, that becomes the new legit fork.

Also this is not an "attack", it's an evolution just the way Satoshi intended, with majority ruling.

Evolution is imminent, like it or not you will be part of Gavin and Hearn's fork.

~BCX~

I agree that miners are in control.  If there is a shake-up then it might be a good opportunity to go back to the good old days when 'everyone is a miner.'  Such a fork which achieved that (and protection against attack from ASIC farms in the process) might be a pretty interesting proposition.

I fully expect Hearndresen's fork to be successful and am hoping for that and plan to 'be a part of it' so to speak.  I plan to try to take advantage of a window of opportunity to dump that fork at a profit before people realize that it is just PayPal except less convenient and more useless.

"Hearndresen's Fork"  <--- Love it!

Glad to see we agree and more power to turning a profit by selling at the right time.


~BCX~

[QuestionAuthority]

@tvbcof

Are you seriously trying to put forth that miners are not in control?

The miners, be they pools or scores of independents are absolutely the ones that will decide.

If enough ASICS in datacenters follow Gavin guess what, that becomes the new legit fork.

Also this is not an "attack", it's an evolution just the way Satoshi intended, with majority ruling.

Evolution is imminent, like it or not you will be part of Gavin and Hearn's fork.

~BCX~

I agree that miners are in control.  If there is a shake-up then it might be a good opportunity to go back to the good old days when 'everyone is a miner.'  Such a fork which achieved that (and protection against attack from ASIC farms in the process) might be a pretty interesting proposition.

I fully expect Hearndresen's fork to be successful and am hoping for that and plan to 'be a part of it' so to speak.  I plan to try to take advantage of a window of opportunity to dump that fork at a profit before people realize that it is just PayPal except less convenient and more useless.

That's a good idea to make some quick cash. We dump at just the right time and we could turn a tidy little profit off of this mess.

[tvbcof]

I agree that miners are in control.  If there is a shake-up then it might be a good opportunity to go back to the good old days when 'everyone is a miner.'  Such a fork which achieved that (and protection against attack from ASIC farms in the process) might be a pretty interesting proposition.

I fully expect Hearndresen's fork to be successful and am hoping for that and plan to 'be a part of it' so to speak.  I plan to try to take advantage of a window of opportunity to dump that fork at a profit before people realize that it is just PayPal except less convenient and more useless.

That's a good idea to make some quick cash. We dump at just the right time and we could turn a tidy little profit off of this mess.

The best part is that we can do so and still sit on value in an eventual worthwhile system.  This is important because it provides incentive to cooperate in working toward one.

Believe it or not I hypothesized about this back in 2011 when I was taking a position and it was a factor in deciding how much of a position to take.  I'm sure I've spouted off about it from time to time in my (way to many) posts on this forum.

edit: slight

[Lauda]

Ahh I see.  Well, this is a bit overblown IMO to say Gavin's been compromised or crazy.
This is Greg relaying third hand what Gavin said in private "long term" about the
security, and speculating about other consensus algorithms as many people do.
It doesn't mean he's advocating get rid of PoW.

I understand Greg's position...presumably, there may be better ways to deal with
scalability than huge block size increases which could lead to centralization,
but I also understand Gavin's position that we should do something now to
avoid issues.

I'm not too worried, I think the situation will work itself out as it always does.

Well it is a bit exaggerated as both Gavin and Maxwell overreacted to the situation. As I've previously stated rather than going with this rubbish plan of his of supporting XT because he has been rejected he should stick with Core. However the developers should have proposed better solutions and implement on time as Gavin was trying. It is better to prevent a problem rather to fix in once it occurs.

I'm saddened to see so many comments saying that it is okay because we will probably be able to profit from this situation. The humanity's greed at its finest.