Bitcoin XT - Officially #REKT (also goes for BIP101 fraud)

[brg444]

Well would you look at that, even people within your own little circle jerk are calling you out on your myopic conceptualization of the economy.



Don't you think maybe it's time you exit the vacuum and see if your economic theories apply in the real world?

If you read the thread, you'd see that I posted a two-sentence "proof" (<-- I used the scare quotes to indicate that it probably wasn't a proof), and then asked people to poke holes in it.  

I agree with @molecular.  The economic pressure can also be relieved, for example, by people voluntarily leaving the economic system.  This would drop the supply curve such that it meets the demand curve at a point near the quota (Qmax).

What is interesting, is that either way (by fork or by people leaving the system), somehow the result is that Q* ends up to the left of Qmax!  If this simple result is true, it would imply that it is not possible to use a block size limit to drive up fees.  

Of course if bitcoin becomes too much expensive to use other cheaper systems will get their shares of the market reducing the usage of bitcoin. I don't see how this could be good for bitcoin in any possible way.

It is good because Bitcoin was never about serving the cheap transactions market. People who cannot pay for the security and censorship-resistance it offers are not valuable clients.

Here again:

What is interesting, is that either way (by fork or by people leaving the system), somehow the result is that Q* ends up to the left of Qmax!  If this simple result is true, it would imply that it is not possible to use a block size limit to drive up fees.

It also means less people will indirectly hold bitcoins.

The result is not true so I'm not even sure why you would bring this up. Trace Mayer even addressed this exact situation during the interview:

Another thing that's interesting to look at is looking at a chart, not just of transactions but of transaction fees normalized to USD and comparing that chart to the market cap of Bitcoin. You know what? The market cap follows almost exactly how much people are willing to spend on transaction fees. So the conclusion we can draw is the more people are willing to spend the higher market cap. Then we get to see who's actually willing to pay to use it. That's a hard cost that people incur using the Bitcoin network.

I think it's great to see more hard cost because then we get to filter who the real users are because they are willing to pay money to use  it.

Yeah sure but the real question is how much money they will be willing to pay when there are cheaper alternatives that offers the exact same features around the corner?

Great way to push bitcoin to be a real failure.

So your whole argument hangs on the premise that some imaginary crypto will come through, sponsored by corporations and banks, and will steal Bitcoin's lunch money?

Where does your delusion stops  

A cheaper proposition doesn't need to be sponsored by anybody. Do you know how cheap it is to copy open code and tweak it? The economics and incentives at play will just work by itself.
Do you know how many altcoins are there waiting to catch some spectrum of the market bitcoin would miss? http://coinmarketcap.com/

Bitcoin is not alone and will never be. It needs to compete in terms of value proposition in all. possible. ways. or it will just lose that market share.

That is precisely why you are abjectly wrong.

A ton of altcoin exists right now with enormously more transaction throughput yet not one of them is challenging Bitcoin.

I'm starting to figure you will never understand this but the people who give Bitcoin its value, the holders, the "bitcoin rich list", could not careless about the transaction throughput or higher transaction fees. They will not be driven away from their investment because some noobs complain that they have to pay more than a penny for their transactions to go through.

Without these people it doesn't matter if you altcoin can do 1 trillion transactions a second because it is worthless as no serious investors has any interest holding it on the long term.

No altcoin is actually challenging bitcoin simply because bitcoin already offers everything users and businesses needs at a competitive cost but the day the price of conducting transactions will rise, things will change. There will be an economic incentive to use another system that is simply cheaper, faster that has less friction. Why use bitcoin then as money then? Because it has a 21M limit herp derp?

Holding a useless thing does not make that thing valuable or tulips and Bernie babies would still be on the moon. You can continue to think so and ignore the reality though but the reality won't ignore you.

Read this post here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1162684.msg12506336#msg12506336 let it sink in and until you can present a cogent reply to it then I am not wasting my time with you anymore.

[brg444]

Trace Mayer: "He who holds the gold makes the rules 

[knight22]

Trace Mayer: "He who holds the gold makes the rules 

lol, bitcoin is not real gold and almost nobody care about bitcoin. He might makes some rules for his own backward. Nobody cares.

[knight22]

Well would you look at that, even people within your own little circle jerk are calling you out on your myopic conceptualization of the economy.



Don't you think maybe it's time you exit the vacuum and see if your economic theories apply in the real world?

If you read the thread, you'd see that I posted a two-sentence "proof" (<-- I used the scare quotes to indicate that it probably wasn't a proof), and then asked people to poke holes in it.  

I agree with @molecular.  The economic pressure can also be relieved, for example, by people voluntarily leaving the economic system.  This would drop the supply curve such that it meets the demand curve at a point near the quota (Qmax).

What is interesting, is that either way (by fork or by people leaving the system), somehow the result is that Q* ends up to the left of Qmax!  If this simple result is true, it would imply that it is not possible to use a block size limit to drive up fees.  

Of course if bitcoin becomes too much expensive to use other cheaper systems will get their shares of the market reducing the usage of bitcoin. I don't see how this could be good for bitcoin in any possible way.

It is good because Bitcoin was never about serving the cheap transactions market. People who cannot pay for the security and censorship-resistance it offers are not valuable clients.

Here again:

What is interesting, is that either way (by fork or by people leaving the system), somehow the result is that Q* ends up to the left of Qmax!  If this simple result is true, it would imply that it is not possible to use a block size limit to drive up fees.

It also means less people will indirectly hold bitcoins.

The result is not true so I'm not even sure why you would bring this up. Trace Mayer even addressed this exact situation during the interview:

Another thing that's interesting to look at is looking at a chart, not just of transactions but of transaction fees normalized to USD and comparing that chart to the market cap of Bitcoin. You know what? The market cap follows almost exactly how much people are willing to spend on transaction fees. So the conclusion we can draw is the more people are willing to spend the higher market cap. Then we get to see who's actually willing to pay to use it. That's a hard cost that people incur using the Bitcoin network.

I think it's great to see more hard cost because then we get to filter who the real users are because they are willing to pay money to use  it.

Yeah sure but the real question is how much money they will be willing to pay when there are cheaper alternatives that offers the exact same features around the corner?

Great way to push bitcoin to be a real failure.

So your whole argument hangs on the premise that some imaginary crypto will come through, sponsored by corporations and banks, and will steal Bitcoin's lunch money?

Where does your delusion stops  

A cheaper proposition doesn't need to be sponsored by anybody. Do you know how cheap it is to copy open code and tweak it? The economics and incentives at play will just work by itself.
Do you know how many altcoins are there waiting to catch some spectrum of the market bitcoin would miss? http://coinmarketcap.com/

Bitcoin is not alone and will never be. It needs to compete in terms of value proposition in all. possible. ways. or it will just lose that market share.

That is precisely why you are abjectly wrong.

A ton of altcoin exists right now with enormously more transaction throughput yet not one of them is challenging Bitcoin.

I'm starting to figure you will never understand this but the people who give Bitcoin its value, the holders, the "bitcoin rich list", could not careless about the transaction throughput or higher transaction fees. They will not be driven away from their investment because some noobs complain that they have to pay more than a penny for their transactions to go through.

Without these people it doesn't matter if you altcoin can do 1 trillion transactions a second because it is worthless as no serious investors has any interest holding it on the long term.

No altcoin is actually challenging bitcoin simply because bitcoin already offers everything users and businesses needs at a competitive cost but the day the price of conducting transactions will rise, things will change. There will be an economic incentive to use another system that is simply cheaper, faster that has less friction. Why use bitcoin then as money then? Because it has a 21M limit herp derp?

Holding a useless thing does not make that thing valuable or tulips and Bernie babies would still be on the moon. You can continue to think so and ignore the reality though but the reality won't ignore you.

Read this post here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1162684.msg12506336#msg12506336 let it sink in and until you can present a cogent reply to it then I am not wasting my time with you anymore.

Your whole post does not take care of the competitive environment bitcoin is facing. Top kek.

You should revise it otherwise it is completely meaningless because it misses a whole bunch of variables.  

[VeritasSapere]

It's obvious you'll never come around as you are just here to promote XT.  Nevertheless, I'll address this tired underlying assumptions that "people would still need to choose to download and install the new implementation" somehow magically protects Bitcoin for generations to come:

False assumption #1: Everyone who downloads the program completely understands the code.

The vast majority of people do not understand the code, and most are not programmers.  Most of us, even those of us who program and can read code, downloaded and ran Core without having any idea about the details of what it does. (e.g., does it log IP addresses?)  The reason I take time to post on this forum about the risks of XT is so people can make a more informed decision, and if they decide to install XT, will at least hopefully be wise enough to question each upgrade.  Ditto for Core upgrades.  Hopefully, discussion like this help broaden awareness of the risks of new code.  

False assumption #2: Those who do have a better understanding of the features of the program they download are guaranteed to understand the implications of those features.  

The reality is that unless they do understand the implications, they are likely to take the purpose of the code at face value for what its author claims it will do.  Undoubtedly, there are some who installed XT who feel protected from DoS attacks because of the patch Mike put in it.  Unfortunately, had they read the thread with the Core devs when they rejected it, they would of known that (a) the only claim of a Tor attack was on Gavin's node with no evidence that any other node ever had an attack via Tor, (b) neither Gavin nor Mike provided logs or other evidence of the attack when the Core devs requested it, (c) the Core devs listed many reasons why most DDoS attacks are likely to come from non-Tor sources, (d) even Mike acknowledged that innocent Tor users would be harmed by it and (e) when the attack came from likely non-Tor sources, only Tor would effectively be blocked, not the DoS sources it was supposedly intended to counter.  Additionally, (f) this is intended to evolve, and could evolve with enough critical mass combined with XT whitelisting to make it very difficult to unseat XT as the primary code for Bitcoin nodes.  

Does the XT website discuss any of this?  No.  Not only does it ignore all concerns raised by the Core team, Mike has even publicly made statements about the process in which this patch was rejected by Core that very deceptively try to make the Core team look like the bad guys but conveniently leave out the truth of why Core rejected it.  Fortunately, the dialog between the Core devs and Mike on his pull request is very public for those interested in reading it.

https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/pull/6364

I am sorry to oversimplify your argument but you are essentially saying that people can not be trusted to make the best decision in terms of what implementation to run. This is however where I believe the fundamental choice and source of the voluntarism of Bitcoin should and does lie. Not governance structures build on top of an implementation or on top of the Bitcoin blockchain, since then we would run into some of the same old problems that large organizations and states run into. The consensus mechanism for resolving such disagreements already exists and it depends on what code people choose to run and where the miners direct their hashing power. Maybe you are correct and the economic majority will not make the best decision, however this freedom of choice is so important and fundamental for maintaining the freedom and decentralized nature of Bitcoin that this would still be the best path to take. There is an irony in accusing XT of dictatorship while simultaneously saying that people should not be trusted with the freedom of choice.

Trust?!?  I'm simply pointing out the obvious that applies to ALL OF US -- myself included.  Nearly every one of us who uses software runs it without thoroughly understanding what it is doing under the hood, even those of us who have been programming for many years in many languages, and have the best capabilities to break it down -- IF WE HAD ALL THE TIME IN THE WORLD.

Heck, yesterday I just debugged a production system where code I wrote relied on JSON4J, which is open source, because I didn't know about its undocumented behavior of a constructor I was using.  Could I of looked at the source beforehand to predict it behave different with different numeric data types?  Yes.  But, as  general practice, we use a lot of open source libraries without ever looking at any of their code because no one has the time to inspect it all or discuss it on a forum.  

Now, I do believe there is a good percent of Bitcoin users, particularly today in its early stages, who are largely informed, in large part, not because they read the code, but because they spent time on this forum and read up on how it works elsewhere, truly interested in learning.  It was some time after I first ran Core before I really understood what it did and didn't do under the hood, and as a programmer still have more questions than answers, and in large part because of this forum, despite having over a decade of C++ experience since I will never have the time to peer review all the code.  

And, while I would like to believe that nearly everyone on this forum understands Bitcoin, and am encouraged by the many people who do, I'm at the same time amazed at how many people defend XT and defend the blacklists based on the claimed intent of the person who submitted the code without even trying to understand the implications of it, both in the present and the future (Mike clearly states he plans to evolve it.)  Yet, many who defend XT haven't even taken the time to read the discussion on Github when Core reviewed his pull request to see what his peers thought -- and, for most of the discussion, they held back quite a bit, trying to be nice about it, and not being too blunt about how incredibly bad of an idea it was. Yet, this incredibly bad idea is in the download from the nicely marketed XT website.  While miners appear to be rejecting it for now, the best news of all, I'm shocked that 10% of nodes are actually running it (setting aside the impossible to calculate spoofing on both sides). 

My point still stands, that you do not "trust" people with the freedom of choice in the form of alternative implementations of Bitcoin.

To be clear I do not like how the DDOS prevention feature has been implemented, and if you do want to support BIP101 it is better to run the version of XT that only implements BIP101 or just run Core with a BIP101 patch. I am not an unreasonable person, I would support most proposals to increase the blocksize it is just that BIP101 is the only proposal that has actually been implemented now, and as soon as a new proposal is implemented I would most likely support that instead especially if it represents a middle ground between these two extreme positions. Regardless of what you think of XT and what the future holds for BIP101, it has been a catalyst for change, this in itself should be seen as being a positive thing.

[erik777]

I'm not so sure that altcoins have a lot more throughput than Bitcoin after reading this summary of testnet limitations of BitShare 2.0, which is claiming it an reach 100k TPS in the real-world:

Bitshares full nodes are very different to Bitcoin. Bitshares is delegated proof of stake, as far as I understand it there are only 100 full nodes which are incentivized and voted into position by the users based on the amount they hold. Other examples would be Dash which has fully incentivized full nodes implemented in a more decentralized fashion compared to Bitcoin. Ethereum also has some interesting solutions to scalability as well.

Yes, and that is sort of my point.  You can throw out PoW, relieving a lot of CPU/GPU/ASIC intensive work (without getting into security implications), and, like Bitcoin, the primary bottlenck is still networking.  

I am not referring to PoW in these examples, I was referring to full nodes which are dealing with the primary bottleneck of networking.

At the cost of sacrificing decentralization.  This is just trying to find a happy place between Bitcoin and Visa.  Yet, it is clear that they acknowledge, that the primary issue is networking.  

We agree on the primary point.  So, let's apply that to the discussions on this thread.  

Does XT solve the primary scalability issue facing Bitcoin today... networking load and latency?

[knight22]

I'm not so sure that altcoins have a lot more throughput than Bitcoin after reading this summary of testnet limitations of BitShare 2.0, which is claiming it an reach 100k TPS in the real-world:

Bitshares full nodes are very different to Bitcoin. Bitshares is delegated proof of stake, as far as I understand it there are only 100 full nodes which are incentivized and voted into position by the users based on the amount they hold. Other examples would be Dash which has fully incentivized full nodes implemented in a more decentralized fashion compared to Bitcoin. Ethereum also has some interesting solutions to scalability as well.

Yes, and that is sort of my point.  You can throw out PoW, relieving a lot of CPU/GPU/ASIC intensive work (without getting into security implications), and, like Bitcoin, the primary bottlenck is still networking.  

I am not referring to PoW in these examples, I was referring to full nodes which are dealing with the primary bottleneck of networking.

At the cost of decentralization.  This is just trying to find a happy place between Bitcoin and Visa.  Yet, it is clear that they acknowledge, that the primary issue is networking. 

We agree on the primary point.  So, let's apply that to the discussions on this thread. 

Does XT solve the primary scalability issue facing Bitcoin today... networking load and latency?

No because these issues did not arise yet so there is no incentive to solve them yet?

[adamstgBit]

I'm not so sure that altcoins have a lot more throughput than Bitcoin after reading this summary of testnet limitations of BitShare 2.0, which is claiming it an reach 100k TPS in the real-world:

Bitshares full nodes are very different to Bitcoin. Bitshares is delegated proof of stake, as far as I understand it there are only 100 full nodes which are incentivized and voted into position by the users based on the amount they hold. Other examples would be Dash which has fully incentivized full nodes implemented in a more decentralized fashion compared to Bitcoin. Ethereum also has some interesting solutions to scalability as well.

Yes, and that is sort of my point.  You can throw out PoW, relieving a lot of CPU/GPU/ASIC intensive work (without getting into security implications), and, like Bitcoin, the primary bottlenck is still networking.  

I am not referring to PoW in these examples, I was referring to full nodes which are dealing with the primary bottleneck of networking.

At the cost of sacrificing decentralization.  This is just trying to find a happy place between Bitcoin and Visa.  Yet, it is clear that they acknowledge, that the primary issue is networking.  

We agree on the primary point.  So, let's apply that to the discussions on this thread.  

Does XT solve the primary scalability issue facing Bitcoin today... networking load and latency?

Right Exactly!

the block size debate is kinda besides the point, block should be as big as they need too, period the end. and we should be focused on solving this core issue.

the scalability debate should be more about,figuring out what the "max load"  or "min requirements" we expect from full node users ( 15MBPS + reasonable computer?? ) and reducing the load to accommodate as much traffic as possible.

[brg444]

I'm not so sure that altcoins have a lot more throughput than Bitcoin after reading this summary of testnet limitations of BitShare 2.0, which is claiming it an reach 100k TPS in the real-world:

Bitshares full nodes are very different to Bitcoin. Bitshares is delegated proof of stake, as far as I understand it there are only 100 full nodes which are incentivized and voted into position by the users based on the amount they hold. Other examples would be Dash which has fully incentivized full nodes implemented in a more decentralized fashion compared to Bitcoin. Ethereum also has some interesting solutions to scalability as well.

Yes, and that is sort of my point.  You can throw out PoW, relieving a lot of CPU/GPU/ASIC intensive work (without getting into security implications), and, like Bitcoin, the primary bottlenck is still networking.  

I am not referring to PoW in these examples, I was referring to full nodes which are dealing with the primary bottleneck of networking.

At the cost of sacrificing decentralization.  This is just trying to find a happy place between Bitcoin and Visa.  Yet, it is clear that they acknowledge, that the primary issue is networking.  

We agree on the primary point.  So, let's apply that to the discussions on this thread.  

Does XT solve the primary scalability issue facing Bitcoin today... networking load and latency?

Right Exactly!

the block size debate is kinda besides the point, block should be as big as they need too, period the end. and we should be focused on solving this core issue.

the scalability debate should be more about,figuring out what the "max load"  or "min requirements" we expect from full node users ( 15MBPS + reasonable computer?? ) and reducing the load to accommodate as much traffic as possible.

The min requirement is simple: being able to run a node over an anonymous low-bandwidth connection

I’d ignore mundane expenses like hardware and power. Instead, recall that, if a full node cannot be run anonymously, “the network” (full node entry) is effectively controlled by law enforcement, a central entity. Therefore, my view is that the current largest “cost” (and current bottleneck to Bitcoin scalability) is therefore the threat of persecution.

[adamstgBit]

I'm not so sure that altcoins have a lot more throughput than Bitcoin after reading this summary of testnet limitations of BitShare 2.0, which is claiming it an reach 100k TPS in the real-world:

Bitshares full nodes are very different to Bitcoin. Bitshares is delegated proof of stake, as far as I understand it there are only 100 full nodes which are incentivized and voted into position by the users based on the amount they hold. Other examples would be Dash which has fully incentivized full nodes implemented in a more decentralized fashion compared to Bitcoin. Ethereum also has some interesting solutions to scalability as well.

Yes, and that is sort of my point.  You can throw out PoW, relieving a lot of CPU/GPU/ASIC intensive work (without getting into security implications), and, like Bitcoin, the primary bottlenck is still networking.  

I am not referring to PoW in these examples, I was referring to full nodes which are dealing with the primary bottleneck of networking.

At the cost of sacrificing decentralization.  This is just trying to find a happy place between Bitcoin and Visa.  Yet, it is clear that they acknowledge, that the primary issue is networking.  

We agree on the primary point.  So, let's apply that to the discussions on this thread.  

Does XT solve the primary scalability issue facing Bitcoin today... networking load and latency?

Right Exactly!

the block size debate is kinda besides the point, block should be as big as they need too, period the end. and we should be focused on solving this core issue.

the scalability debate should be more about,figuring out what the "max load"  or "min requirements" we expect from full node users ( 15MBPS + reasonable computer?? ) and reducing the load to accommodate as much traffic as possible.

The min requirement is simple: being able to run a node over an anonymous low-bandwidth connection

I’d ignore mundane expenses like hardware and power. Instead, recall that, if a full node cannot be run anonymously, “the network” (full node entry) is effectively controlled by law enforcement, a central entity. Therefore, my view is that the current largest “cost” (and current bottleneck to Bitcoin scalability) is therefore the threat of persecution.

ya tell that to kim dom

[adamstgBit]

I'm not so sure that altcoins have a lot more throughput than Bitcoin after reading this summary of testnet limitations of BitShare 2.0, which is claiming it an reach 100k TPS in the real-world:

Bitshares full nodes are very different to Bitcoin. Bitshares is delegated proof of stake, as far as I understand it there are only 100 full nodes which are incentivized and voted into position by the users based on the amount they hold. Other examples would be Dash which has fully incentivized full nodes implemented in a more decentralized fashion compared to Bitcoin. Ethereum also has some interesting solutions to scalability as well.

Yes, and that is sort of my point.  You can throw out PoW, relieving a lot of CPU/GPU/ASIC intensive work (without getting into security implications), and, like Bitcoin, the primary bottlenck is still networking.  

I am not referring to PoW in these examples, I was referring to full nodes which are dealing with the primary bottleneck of networking.

At the cost of sacrificing decentralization.  This is just trying to find a happy place between Bitcoin and Visa.  Yet, it is clear that they acknowledge, that the primary issue is networking.  

We agree on the primary point.  So, let's apply that to the discussions on this thread.  

Does XT solve the primary scalability issue facing Bitcoin today... networking load and latency?

Right Exactly!

the block size debate is kinda besides the point, block should be as big as they need too, period the end. and we should be focused on solving this core issue.

the scalability debate should be more about,figuring out what the "max load"  or "min requirements" we expect from full node users ( 15MBPS + reasonable computer?? ) and reducing the load to accommodate as much traffic as possible.

The min requirement is simple: being able to run a node over an anonymous low-bandwidth connection

I’d ignore mundane expenses like hardware and power. Instead, recall that, if a full node cannot be run anonymously, “the network” (full node entry) is effectively controlled by law enforcement, a central entity. Therefore, my view is that the current largest “cost” (and current bottleneck to Bitcoin scalability) is therefore the threat of persecution.

By low bandwidth you mean a 56K external modem? You never answered my questions about how do you plan to make the protocol measure the "cost" of running a node btw.

he wants full node to run behind TOR which is retardedly slow, he's bonkers.

go make a shit coin brg444, we want to make a really good digital currency not enable childporn.

[knight22]

I'm not so sure that altcoins have a lot more throughput than Bitcoin after reading this summary of testnet limitations of BitShare 2.0, which is claiming it an reach 100k TPS in the real-world:

Bitshares full nodes are very different to Bitcoin. Bitshares is delegated proof of stake, as far as I understand it there are only 100 full nodes which are incentivized and voted into position by the users based on the amount they hold. Other examples would be Dash which has fully incentivized full nodes implemented in a more decentralized fashion compared to Bitcoin. Ethereum also has some interesting solutions to scalability as well.

Yes, and that is sort of my point.  You can throw out PoW, relieving a lot of CPU/GPU/ASIC intensive work (without getting into security implications), and, like Bitcoin, the primary bottlenck is still networking.  

I am not referring to PoW in these examples, I was referring to full nodes which are dealing with the primary bottleneck of networking.

At the cost of sacrificing decentralization.  This is just trying to find a happy place between Bitcoin and Visa.  Yet, it is clear that they acknowledge, that the primary issue is networking.  

We agree on the primary point.  So, let's apply that to the discussions on this thread.  

Does XT solve the primary scalability issue facing Bitcoin today... networking load and latency?

Right Exactly!

the block size debate is kinda besides the point, block should be as big as they need too, period the end. and we should be focused on solving this core issue.

the scalability debate should be more about,figuring out what the "max load"  or "min requirements" we expect from full node users ( 15MBPS + reasonable computer?? ) and reducing the load to accommodate as much traffic as possible.

The min requirement is simple: being able to run a node over an anonymous low-bandwidth connection

I’d ignore mundane expenses like hardware and power. Instead, recall that, if a full node cannot be run anonymously, “the network” (full node entry) is effectively controlled by law enforcement, a central entity. Therefore, my view is that the current largest “cost” (and current bottleneck to Bitcoin scalability) is therefore the threat of persecution.

By low bandwidth you mean a 56K external modem? You never answered my questions about how do you plan to make the protocol measure the "cost" of running a node btw.

he wants full node to run behind TOR which is retardedly slow, he's bonkers.

go make a shit coin brg444, we want to make a really good digital currency not enable childporn.

Hey brg444, why don't you go create Torcoin? I'm sure there will be a niche for it. I might buy some.

[erik777]

I'm not so sure that altcoins have a lot more throughput than Bitcoin after reading this summary of testnet limitations of BitShare 2.0, which is claiming it an reach 100k TPS in the real-world:

Bitshares full nodes are very different to Bitcoin. Bitshares is delegated proof of stake, as far as I understand it there are only 100 full nodes which are incentivized and voted into position by the users based on the amount they hold. Other examples would be Dash which has fully incentivized full nodes implemented in a more decentralized fashion compared to Bitcoin. Ethereum also has some interesting solutions to scalability as well.

Yes, and that is sort of my point.  You can throw out PoW, relieving a lot of CPU/GPU/ASIC intensive work (without getting into security implications), and, like Bitcoin, the primary bottlenck is still networking.  

I am not referring to PoW in these examples, I was referring to full nodes which are dealing with the primary bottleneck of networking.

At the cost of decentralization.  This is just trying to find a happy place between Bitcoin and Visa.  Yet, it is clear that they acknowledge, that the primary issue is networking. 

We agree on the primary point.  So, let's apply that to the discussions on this thread. 

Does XT solve the primary scalability issue facing Bitcoin today... networking load and latency?

No because these issues did not arise yet so there is no incentive to solve them yet?

It is if you want to increase TPS while preserving decentralization.  I think most people support increasing the block size.  We just want to see a hard fork that addresses scalability holistically, not just one element of it, only to require yet another hard fork to finish the job. 

To be sure, there are some good proposals for improving network efficiency while preserving decentralization and security.  They just require a hard fork, as does increasing the block size.  Let's have ONE hard fork that truly paves the way for scalability.   

XT does not offer the holistic scalability solution we need, and definitely introduces too many risks we don't need.

[knight22]

I'm not so sure that altcoins have a lot more throughput than Bitcoin after reading this summary of testnet limitations of BitShare 2.0, which is claiming it an reach 100k TPS in the real-world:

Bitshares full nodes are very different to Bitcoin. Bitshares is delegated proof of stake, as far as I understand it there are only 100 full nodes which are incentivized and voted into position by the users based on the amount they hold. Other examples would be Dash which has fully incentivized full nodes implemented in a more decentralized fashion compared to Bitcoin. Ethereum also has some interesting solutions to scalability as well.

Yes, and that is sort of my point.  You can throw out PoW, relieving a lot of CPU/GPU/ASIC intensive work (without getting into security implications), and, like Bitcoin, the primary bottlenck is still networking.  

I am not referring to PoW in these examples, I was referring to full nodes which are dealing with the primary bottleneck of networking.

At the cost of decentralization.  This is just trying to find a happy place between Bitcoin and Visa.  Yet, it is clear that they acknowledge, that the primary issue is networking.  

We agree on the primary point.  So, let's apply that to the discussions on this thread.  

Does XT solve the primary scalability issue facing Bitcoin today... networking load and latency?

No because these issues did not arise yet so there is no incentive to solve them yet?

It is if you want to increase TPS while preserving decentralization.  I think most people support increasing the block size.  We just want to see a hard fork that addresses scalability holistically, not just one element of it, only to require yet another hard fork to finish the job.  

To be sure, there are some good proposals for improving network efficiency while preserving decentralization and security.  They just require a hard fork, as does increasing the block size.  Let's have ONE hard fork that truly paves the way for scalability.  

XT does not offer the holistic scalability solution we need, and definitely introduces too many risks we don't need.

Which are those proposal? Any doc?

[adamstgBit]

Bitcoin-NG debuts

Perhaps the most newsworthy event of the day came during the "Testing, Simulation and Modeling" section of the day's content when Cornell computer science post-grad Ittay Eyal presented Bitcoin-NG, a new proposed solution to scaling the bitcoin network.

Developed by Adem Efe Gencer, Emin Gün Sirer and Robbert Van Renesse, Bitcoin-NG seeks lower latency, higher throughput and better security on the bitcoin network by proposing changes to the bitcoin mining process.

The proposal recommends breaking up the process by which miners are provided both a reward for finding a "nonce", the arbitrary number that decides who wins the 25 BTC reward distributed every 10 minutes, and the process by which those winning miners determine the transactions added to the blockchain.

Bitcoin-NG would create two types of blocks: key blocks, which contain no content but elect a "leader"; and microblocks, which would contain only transaction content.

Bitcoin-NG

"Only the leader can generate the private blocks," Eyal explained. "The interval between the key blocks would be 10 minutes, while 'microblocks' come in every 10 seconds."

Under the system, keyblocks would be given the rewards from the mining block, while 40% of fees would go back to the leader and 60% to those who submit microblocks.

The proposal is still in its early stages and no white paper has yet been released.

that's what i'm talking about!
more crazy idea like this, that's the BIPs we need.

[brg444]

 

you two make a nice couple.

of course let's not sure make sure that Bitcoin is resilient to attacks from totalitarian governments and handicapped internet grids in war-torn countries and other areas of geo-political instabilities. because fuck these people right, they can't have Bitcoin, just too bad they weren't born in cozy north america  

much rather design it to work only in the la-la land of infinite growth where progress never stops and government are perfectly fine with Bitcoin challenging their monetary sovereignty

have you guys ever opened an history book? do you not see the debacle unfolding before your very eyes on the international scene? do you really imagine that the next decade is going to be some kind of rosy economic prosperity where citizens of the world and their government hold hands and sing kumbaya!?

do you still believe in the tooth fairy?

[UfoRia]

Read this post here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1162684.msg12506336#msg12506336 let it sink in and until you can present a cogent reply to it then I am not wasting my time with you anymore.

Your comment that you referenced while poignant, was likely the best thing I read today. Specifically, concerning the importance of a globally decentralized monetary system to subvert oppressive environments. +1

[adamstgBit]

I, want bigger blooooooks!

[VeritasSapere]

It seems strange to me that some people do not think that Bitcoin needs to compete with other cryptocurrencies. That Bitcoin somehow exists in a vacuum and does not need to compete in the free market, that somehow Bitcoins success is guaranteed even if we all just sit on our holdings while having no regard to its utility. This in my opinion is not correct, people do care about the cost of the transaction and the present holders of Bitcoin is not all that matters. For Bitcoin to grow and survive it needs to attract more users, when better and cheaper alternatives exists people will choose those instead of Bitcoin. Bitcoin should be able to compete with other cryptocurrencies and I believe that it can as long as we do not allow the Bitcoin network to become overloaded which would lead to transactions becoming unreliable and over the long term prohibitively expensive.

One that you propose here is that without large transaction throughput and high velocity Bitcoin has no utility.

I never said this.

Well "this in my opinion is not correct".

I guess then I agree with this.

While regular retail consumers may care about the cost of transactions, Bitcoin offers little to no advantage in that regard compared to traditional payment and monetary systems.

I disagree, I even personally have ideological reasons for why I prefer using cryptocurrency over traditional payment and monetary systems. If I can no longer do this on the Bitcoin blockchain I will simply move to another blockchain that does allow me to do this. Which relates to my point about competition as well. 

Aside from certain niche use cases (remittances or conventional international money transfer) most people are perfectly fine using credit cards and fiat for their daily purchases. These systems provide consumer protection and security that is hardly possible using Bitcoin.

I disagree, I prefer Bitcoin. If I could use it for everything I would.

While these might be costly and put enormous weight on the financial system as well as shift enormous responsibility & trust toward the institutions running these networks most people could not care less.

I do care.

So essentially what you are doing is pushing for dangerous changes to Bitcoin so that it attempts to compete with systems that are inherently more efficient and scalable given their centralized arrangements. This, to me, is asinine and totally misses the point of what Bitcoin's true value proposition is.

I am not advocating for pushing dangerous changes to Bitcoin, I actually think that we should not increase the blocksize beyond conservative projected estimates of the technical limitations for running a full node, mainly bandwidth actually. A guideline could be that most people should be able to run a full node from their homes if they live in the developed world. So please do not mischaracterize my views as dangerous unless you do think that what I have just described is actually dangerous.

Bitcoin has grown from nothing to a 3.5B$ market cap largely without notable "transactional" utility except for some special uses cases. The reasons for this are obvious to anyone who has been paying attention: its sound monetary theory & its decentralized, censorship-resistant property.

It is not a case of either or, Bitcoin can have notable transactional utility and have a sound monetary theory while remaining decentralized and censorship resistant. These properties are not mutually exclusive, they are actually synergistic. It is a false dichotomy to think that we must choose. Increasing the utility of Bitcoin allows it to be a better store of value. Being a better store of value in turn also allows Bitcoin to function more effectively as payment system. Bitcoin can be many things simultaneously and be different things to different people at the same time, we should not try and restrict Bitcoin.

Since then, a trove of entrepreneurs and venture capitalist have tried to shape Bitcoin into the second coming of Paypal, riding the coattails of its novelty features and permissionless aspects. Remember when 2014 was supposed to be the "year of the merchant"? Expedia, Microsoft, Dell, Overstock, Newegg, etc. Somehow you would think all this "utility" would lead to more adoption right? After all people cant wait to spend their bitcoins and use them to shop online....right..right? Well it turns out that no, they don't. It simply doesn't make sense, other than maybe temporarily as a novelty, to purchase bitcoins to make purchases. It is not convenient or economically desirable. Imagine the amount of money that was wasted trying to sell this "utility" to mainstream customers. Just thinking of the giant fail that was the "Bitpay Bitcoin Bowl" says all that needs to be said. The "customer" is simply not buying it. Bitcoin is still looked at as a freak show by most of the general public, they simply don't care for it.

It will take more time for Bitcoin to be more commonly be accepted as a means of exchange, for some people there are certain psychological barriers to overcome considering some of the anarchistic aspects of Bitcoin, currency without centralized authority. For me Bitcoin is much more then currency, it is trust without centralized authority which can be applied to many applications, including currency. For me the political benefits of using Bitcoin as a currency, as well as a store of value, would have profound effects on global economics and political power. Money is power, Bitcoin changes the fundamental nature of power. The benifits of this are not as easily measured because the true cost of the current financial system is borne through externalities like quantitative easing, regulatory capture, inefficiencies, corruption ect.

As we consider the different avenues we could take it is seemingly clear to me that we always end up at the same point: monetary freedom.

Monetary freedom implies the protection of one's wealth from government inflation, taxes, confiscation or general destructive economic policies. Trace speaks of economic interests in Venezuela and Switzerland using Bitcoin to the tune of millions of dollars to circumvent some of their countries restrictive economic policies. By all account this is what Bitcoin excels at: being a safe haven for one's wealth, an accessible and comparatively cheap way to escape capital controls

It seems like you are implying that a conservative blocksize increase would compromise monetary freedom when that is not the case. Again you are setting up a false dichotomy, a false choice. Increasing the block size does not compromise monetary freedom.

The generalization that you make of what a user is, as if it only relates to transactional interest, is misguided and to some extent downright disingenuous. On the other hand the users I refer to are not some imaginary "mass adoption" fantasy. They are real and are using Bitcoin as we speak. They are not deterred by high transaction fees because they literally have no other options or if they have, they involve costs that are on a whole different level than what you would refer to as "prohibitive" (bankers, lawyers, accountants, government officials).

I am not making the generalization of what a user is, I think that we should account for many different users of Bitcoin not just the "bankers, lawyers, accountants, government officials" whom you however are saying who the users should be which is a much worse generalization to make, furthermore I would consider that "prohibitive" for most people, myself included. If the fee market determines that this the price for transacting on the Bitcoin network based on the technical limitations of the time then it would be justified and I would use an altcoin instead. However that would not be the case if we left the limit at one megabyte since that does not presently represent the median of our current technical limitations, since it is just an arbitrary limit after all. That is why the blocksize should be increased within the extend that it does not compromise decentralization as a whole. Since leaving this restriction in place would lead to more centralization as whole in the form of an increased reliance on off chain transactions and other types of third parties in comparison to the alternative in the case of increased adoption.

No one's disregarding Bitcoin's competition. If someone is it is you as you conveniently ignore readily available and very dominant fiat alternatives for the purpose of "transactional utility".

Again you are saying we should use fiat instead, I am sure that many more people will want to use Bitcoin instead of fiat even if just because of "ideological" reasons. If the majority do not choose financial freedom then that is alright since at least we do still have the choice.

As far as cryptocurrency is concerned there are a multitude of reasons why Bitcoin has little to no competition. If you wish to understand why I suggest this excellent article from Mencius Moldbug about monetary history. While it may not be factually accurate on all points, it certainly is in regard to inherent network effects and how powerful they are in the context of money:

Once Nitropia is on rhodium, anyone who buys palladium is no different from anyone who is trying to manipulate any commodities market. In a free market, if you want to buy up a bunch of palladium - or wheat or oil or FCOJ - and by so doing raise the price, you may do so. But if you want to actually realize your profits, you have to sell at some point, and there is no reason to think you'll have any luck getting out at a higher price than you got in at. This is called the "burying the corpse" problem, and a thing of beauty it is.

In other words, money is the bubble that doesn't pop. Once rhodium feels the Quickening, any other potential monetary standard is at an incurable disadvantage, because its adherents are mere manipulators. Sooner or later they will get tired and let their guard down, and rhodium will take their heads. But rhodium itself cannot pop - there can be only one, but there has to be at least one. And that's money.

When you research the history of currency, they most certainly can pop. There have been many currencies in history that seemed to have had this "network effect" however they have still failed time and time again. To suggest that Bitcoin has no competition is not accurate, I agree that the network effect in cryptocurrency is strong but it is not invincible. Especially now that true volunteerism and choice exists for currency which previously did not exist. Currency and aspects of macro economic policy can be truly separated from the state in a similiar way that the seperation of church and state has. These are compelling reasons to use Bitcoin as a store of value and as a currency, while maintaining financial freedom and decentralization. Since that would better then using the fiat it seems you think we should use instead, the definition being.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiat_money

"Fiat money is currency which derives its value from government regulation or law. The term derives from the Latin fiat ("let it be done", "it shall be").[1] It differs from commodity money and representative money. Commodity money is created from a good, often a precious metal such as gold or silver, which has uses other than as a medium of exchange (such a good is called a commodity), while representative money simply represents a claim on such a good."

Gold was used as a currency for millennia and it has been a good store of value for most of its history simultaneously, these concepts are not incompatible and historically has been how human society has operated for the vast majority of recorded history.

[tvbcof]

By the way, I am still taking 1 BTC bets (subject to deposit in a 2-of-3 escrowed wallet) that the longest proof-of-work chain will contain a block larger than 1 MB by this time next year.  

And still with a high degree of vaugeness about what is meant by 'the longest proof-of-work chain' I see.

I will say that in my mind, a change in protocol which is not agreed to by ALL of the currently active core contributors is not valid and it does not matter if it is long enough to reach from Earth to the edge of the solar system.

Btw if peter would be more serious about this, i'd take the bet.

I am quite serious.  If the longest chain contains a block greater than 1 MB by this time next year I win, otherwise you win.  The longest chain is defined as the chain built on top of the Satoshi genesis block with the greatest cumulative difficulty.  If Bitcoin forks, then I only win if the "large block" fork has a greater cumulative difficulty than the "small block" fork.

As for escrow, I am open to suggestions.  Danny Hamilton and Jonald Fyookball come to mind.  We would each deposit 1 BTC into a 2-of-3 multisig address and the escrow would hold the third key.  

I'd do it.  I'm widely known as someone who is up-front and more than willing to admit my mistakes if evidence proves I've err'd.  One might call me [in Latin] 'arbiter elegantiarum'.

I won't take the bet because as I've mentioned, I, as a staunch 1MB'r, would be delighted to see larger blocks as long as they are safe and necessary.  This would indicate that it has exceeded the realistic capacity to support logical scaling mechanism such as sidechains and actually needs to scale internally.  To wit, I will as mentioned consider the 1MB protocol to be obsolete if I sense that van der Laan, Maxwell, Wuille, Garzik, and Andresen all agree with an update to it.

Like many other clued in analysts and hodlers, it is obvious to me that mining consolidation is the Achille's heal of Bitcoin, and very well may be limiting it's growth at this time.  Simply put, miners operate at the pleasure of the governments under who's jurisdiction they fall.  Were it not for the fact that a reasonable parity of hashing power operates in two competing political and economic jurisdictions (The U.S. + EU-land minions, and China) Bitcoin might already be toast.  As it is, the argument for strength is fairly tenuous and rests on the conjecture that the blockchain holds enduring value which could be realized on re-start after an attack.  I can easily imagine the power structures in China, who probably doesn't care much about Bitcoin one way or another, horse-trading miner attacks for some other geo-political and/or economic goodies in a variety of situations.  Or that it simply may threaten their own internal economic system in ways that are intolerable.

The above mentioned mining consolidation weakness is why I would not take the bet an the 'longest chain' wording.  It is a word-trick and heavily pumped by the likes of Peter R. probably as the next-best hope for destroying Bitcoin after the implosion of the XT/BIP101 attack.  Aside from that the words have no meaning without the all-important 'valid'.  There are work-around to subjugation by political and legal pressure on the consolidated hashing power, but it is unclear how well they would work in practice.

Besides all of the above, I find it more likely than not that Peter R. is not betting with his own money.  It seems highly possible that he is in fact betting with my tax dollars.

edits: slight