Why Gavin is so desperate about his fork? Is he hiding something?

[AGD]

Since this XT drama began, I was wondering about Gavins desperate efford to force bigger blocksize, even after he obv. realized, that there is a strong resistance against this fork. I mean, he could have simply stepped back and wait for the right time to come up with his idea again. When the current blocksize really turns out to be problematic, then he would have a majority and a consensus.
 
Instead he is knowingly dividing/weakening the Bitcoin community (incl. himself) for his idea.

This behaviour doesn't seem appropriate to me. Is there something more behind it, than just a larger blocksize?

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[RoadTrain]

Divide et empera. That seems to be the strategy. If they succeed in taking over Bitcoin, they will rule it. Many of the current devs have stated they will likely stop contributing to the code. Who will then? Gavin has stopped contributing a while ago, Mike didn't do this at all. There are a lot of talented developers here, but very few have as much expertise as the current devs. So it will all be on Gavin, can he shoulder it?

Or maybe magically the new devs appear and start slowly, bit-by-bit to weaken Bitcoin's security model. If done properly, most wouldn't notice until it's completely centralized.

[Amph]

maybe he really want bitcoin to succeed unlike many other? it's true that without bigger block bitcoin can't embrace a large volume of TX and i'm not talking about the stress test volume that was a joke in comparison with a real big volume that awaits bitcoin if become mainstream

or maybe he know that the volume will rise with the halving and he want to go ahead and make the change before that happen

[RoadTrain]

maybe he really want bitcoin to succeed unlike many other? it's true that without bigger block bitcoin can embrace a large volume of TX and i'm not talking about the stress test volume that was a joke in comparison with a real big volume that awaits bitcoin if become mainstream

or maybe he know that the volume will rise with the halving and he want to go ahead and make the change before that happen

Why then make increases so aggressive? There are two BIPs apart from Gavin's that are more reasonable and thus more likely to reach wider consensus. Yet he still take the most radical approach. That's not how consensus is reached, that's how the system is put in jeopardy.

Rusty Russel concludes:

Thus I revise my bandwidth estimates; instead of 17% per annum this suggests 30% per annum as a reasonable growth rate.

30% per annum, good. What's the annual rate of increase in Gavin's exponential function? Well, it's 41.4% per annum, which is clearly beyond the pace of technological advances in bandwidth. Not to mention that the past experience doesn't guarantee the future progress.

[Mickeyb]

maybe he really want bitcoin to succeed unlike many other? it's true that without bigger block bitcoin can embrace a large volume of TX and i'm not talking about the stress test volume that was a joke in comparison with a real big volume that awaits bitcoin if become mainstream

or maybe he know that the volume will rise with the halving and he want to go ahead and make the change before that happen

Yes, exactly this! I think that everybody are making a bad guy out of Gavin and he probably isn't the one. We can all be suspicious, but maybe his will to succeed is just much bigger than all of the rest of us, after all he has been with Bitcoin since the beginning, together with Satoshi.

Now, maybe he did turn bad in the process, but Bitcoin community is huge until now and I am sure that there are some smart people out there who will catch on this, if this is really happening.

[Amph]

maybe he really want bitcoin to succeed unlike many other? it's true that without bigger block bitcoin can embrace a large volume of TX and i'm not talking about the stress test volume that was a joke in comparison with a real big volume that awaits bitcoin if become mainstream

or maybe he know that the volume will rise with the halving and he want to go ahead and make the change before that happen

Why then make increases so aggressive? There are two BIPs apart from Gavin's that are more reasonable and thus more likely to reach wider consensus. Yet he still take the most radical approach. That's not how consensus is reached, that's how the system is put in jeopardy.

Rusty Russel concludes:

Thus I revise my bandwidth estimates; instead of 17% per annum this suggests 30% per annum as a reasonable growth rate.

30% per annum, good. What's the annual rate of increase in Gavin's exponential function? Well, it's 41.4% per annum, which is clearly beyond the pace of technological advances in bandwidth. Not to mention that the past experience doesn't guarantee the future progress.

aren't they implementing an anti-ddos which should be better than the core version? it should solve in part those possible attacks that may occur

[RoadTrain]

aren't they implementing an anti-ddos which should be better than the core version? it should solve in part those possible attacks that may occur

I have no idea of what you are talking about, but the attack suggested by Nick Szabo doesn't seem to be solvable by some kind of magic anti-ddos. It's inherent to Bitcoin and is made easier by larger blocks.

[Lauda]

aren't they implementing an anti-ddos which should be better than the core version? it should solve in part those possible attacks that may occur

This is what they're implementing besides the block size increase (their model is unsustainable):

bug fix:
If "relay the first observed double spend" were generally accepted as a bug with a clean fix available, it'd be fixed in Core; superficial searching says it got reverted as problematic and contentious but I don't know the whole story, nor do I have an opinion on the change.
two minor things:
One is for Hearn's Lighthouse project, and also got merged, found buggy, and reverted. Without those eyeballs, would the lack of testing have been addressed and the bug in getutxos have been spotted before it was widely rolled out?
The other is adding back the bitnodes seed node that was removed for behaving in fishy ways, and adding a seed run by Mike

Obviously more will come if people join them and the fork becomes active. The question is why are they doing this and why are people not listening to reason?
Also, Gavin isn't that bad. The real problem is in Hearn and his ideas of a Bitcoin dictatorship.

-snip-
Now, maybe he did turn bad in the process, but Bitcoin community is huge until now and I am sure that there are some smart people out there who will catch on this, if this is really happening.

Obviously the other people are being ignorant and stubborn. Thanks for calling the ones, who caught on, smart. However, it is becoming really tiring posting the same stuff in every other thread.

Update: Read before posting nonsense from their website.

[Amph]

aren't they implementing an anti-ddos which should be better than the core version? it should solve in part those possible attacks that may occur

I have no idea of what you are talking about, but the attack suggested by Nick Szabo doesn't seem to be solvable by some kind of magic anti-ddos. It's inherent to Bitcoin and is made easier by larger blocks.

those are the new features besides bigger block

Bigger blocks
    Double spend relaying
    Better DoS attack defences
    BIP 65 / getutxos support
    DNS seed list refresh

better dos attack defences should mean something, but i don't know how efficient, they will be

[Kprawn]

It must be difficult if you worked hard on something and you want to see it implemented, and now you cannot do it anymore, because you are not the lead developer anymore. It would frustrate the hell out of me

if I spent a lot of time on something, and I must wait for consensus for it to be implemented. He used to make changes and most people just took his word for it... now he is not sitting behind the wheel anymore

and it must be bad for him. His is a brilliant developer, and it would be bad to lose him, if he leaves Bitcoin to follow Mike and his goals. Let's just swap hats for a moment and see it from his perspective for once.

I too, can see that some of these changes could be good for Bitcoin... but some are terrible. 

[chek2fire]

I have no more respect for this guy. When i start with bitcoin Gavin was like a myth in my eyes. Now i see him like a shady person who works for his own dark proposes. He is not working for the bitcoin future but for the financial system future and has nothing to do anymore with bitcoin community. this is shame for him

[AGD]

It must be difficult if you worked hard on something and you want to see it implemented, and now you cannot do it anymore, because you are not the lead developer anymore. It would frustrate the hell out of me

if I spent a lot of time on something, and I must wait for consensus for it to be implemented. He used to make changes and most people just took his word for it... now he is not sitting behind the wheel anymore

and it must be bad for him. His is a brilliant developer, and it would be bad to lose him, if he leaves Bitcoin to follow Mike and his goals. Let's just swap hats for a moment and see it from his perspective for once.

I too, can see that some of these changes could be good for Bitcoin... but some are terrible. 

You are making a good point, but if his ego is driving him away from the core protocol, shouldn't he be aware of his image beeing damaged if he not succeeds with his fork? I really find it strange, that he is risking all that for a simple code change.

[agath]

You are making a good point, but if his ego is driving him away from the core protocol, shouldn't he be aware of his image beeing damaged if he not succeeds with his fork? I really find it strange, that he is risking all that for a simple code change.

The core protocol didn't have any block size limit. It has been introduced as a temporary restriction for testing. What is really stupid is all this stubborn desire of still keeping it active.

[DooMAD]

Since this XT drama began, I was wondering about Gavins desperate efford to force bigger blocksize, even after he obv. realized, that there is a strong resistance against this fork. I mean, he could have simply stepped back and wait for the right time to come up with his idea again. When the current blocksize really turns out to be problematic, then he would have a majority and a consensus.
 
Instead he is knowingly dividing/weakening the Bitcoin community (incl. himself) for his idea.

This behaviour doesn't seem appropriate to me. Is there something more behind it, than just a larger blocksize?

The only "desperation" I'm seeing is people like you trying to stifle discussion and debate.  You're afraid to allow the market to decide.  You don't want to let people to have a choice in case they choose a path you don't approve of.  If you want to use an open-source coin where anyone can make alterations to the code and release their own version of the client, you have to accept it when that actually happens.  If you can't accept that, there are plenty of closed-source coins out there that you might find more to your liking.  Larger blocksizes aren't just "his idea".  It's an idea that many people support.  All you can do is attack him because you're having trouble attacking the idea.  If I were a coder and released another client that supported larger blocks, would you be attacking me as well?

Bitcoin core is not a permanent authority on what Bitcoin is or should be.  Neither are its developers.  Bitcoin is not a dictatorship and one group of developers doesn't get to make all the decisions forever.  If you don't understand that, why are you even here?

[gentlemand]

There's a bomb implanted in Gavin's wife by evil big blockers. Unless a 1.1mb block appear in the middle of January then up she goes.

[chek2fire]

I think we have the first strike from financila system against bitcoin and community. It seems that Gavin and Hearn is with the bank side.

[desired_username]

Anyone who supports blockstream is an idiot from this point.

If an alternative client won't achieve majority by January then the experiment is fucked.

I expect this comment to be deleted shortly. Search for uncensored forums!

[jubalix]

yeah no, satoshi had what,,,33 MB blocks?

good enough for me to make block size bigger.

/thread

[TransaDox]

The only "desperation" I'm seeing is people like you trying to stifle discussion and debate.  You're afraid to allow the market to decide.  You don't want to let people to have a choice in case they choose a path you don't approve of.  If you want to use an open-source coin where anyone can make alterations to the code and release their own version of the client, you have to accept it when that actually happens.  If you can't accept that, there are plenty of closed-source coins out there that you might find more to your liking.  Larger blocksizes aren't just "his idea".  It's an idea that many people support.  All you can do is attack him because you're having trouble attacking the idea.  If I were a coder and released another client that supported larger blocks, would you be attacking me as well?

Bitcoin core is not a permanent authority on what Bitcoin is or should be.  Neither are its developers.  Bitcoin is not a dictatorship and one group of developers doesn't get to make all the decisions forever.  If you don't understand that, why are you even here?

The problem as I see it is that the Bitcoin Core software is the reference software. If you want software guaranteed to have no back-doors,spying code or malicious spamming. Where do you find it? You have to trust an implementation and be able to judge other implementations against it. We need to trust that those that know and are experts in their fields, are actively defending against malicious changes and they can't do that across 10,000 different implementations.

Gavin has been there since the start. He has "form", as they say and the respect he has, was earned. That's not to say he could not be convinced into bad ideas, I just think its not his modus operandi to be malevolent and I don't see any factual basis to not continue with this assessment. He seems to feel passionately about bitcoin and argues for things he wants to see. Has he been "subverted" and moved to the dark side? Maybe. But I only see reasoned articles for debate at the moment fro a topic and decision he feels passionately for.

I sometimes feel that people want to piss in the developers' garden that they are tending because they can and there is nothing they can offer. Its a sort of reaction to a feeling of helplessness. There is nothing wrong with criticism and debate as there is nothing wrong with others wanting a different route but there must be a plan and plans by committee are slow laborious processes that don't please everyone.
Others just want to stamp on your plants because they don't like people having nice things

The problem is that most people don't know what the implication of these sorts of issues really are or, perhaps more importantly, what the interests of those in the debate are. What we do know is some people want change and the debate is about how much rather than not at all. So. Bitcoin is a hard concept to see in its entirety and most can only grok small chunks at a time. There are some that can grok everything and for us muggles, we have to listen to their arguments and vote with our confidence in those we trust.

My opinion is, I don't have an opinion on this particular change. I am dead set against centralisation and see many discussions that will ultimately lead us there but this isn't one of them. To me, this discussion is like "how pregnant should we be" and see all proposals as not being efforts to increase the distributed nature of Bitcoin.

[Carlton Banks]

Since this XT drama began, I was wondering about Gavins desperate efford to force bigger blocksize, even after he obv. realized, that there is a strong resistance against this fork. I mean, he could have simply stepped back and wait for the right time to come up with his idea again. When the current blocksize really turns out to be problematic, then he would have a majority and a consensus.
 
Instead he is knowingly dividing/weakening the Bitcoin community (incl. himself) for his idea.

This behaviour doesn't seem appropriate to me. Is there something more behind it, than just a larger blocksize?

The only "desperation" I'm seeing is people like you trying to stifle discussion and debate.  

What, by starting a thread? That's kind of like the opposite of stifling debate, it's almost as if it's promoting or inviting debate  


One thing that I take a great deal of comfort from from this XT nonsense; almost none of the so-called supporters are credible members of the forum, most come across as the usual sock puppets. I suspect that very low numbers of real people actually support GavinMikeCoin.