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

[VeritasSapere]

If most bitcoiners accept XT, then XT becomes Bitcoin main protocol, the old Core becomes altcoin.

Also covered in the wiki. Big IF that implies overwhelming economic consensus to break away from the dev consensus, as it has never happened before.

Currently the altcoin is XT, and it looks like it will stay an altcoin.

Incorrect since Bitcoin XT is compatible with the main Bitcoin blockchain today. After the fork Bitcoin XT will still be compatible with the Bitcoin protocol. If Bitcoin XT does not reach consensus for a fork it will also remain compatible with the main Bitcoin blockchain. Meaning that Bitcoin XT is not a altcoin but an alternative implementation of the Bitcoin protocol.

[Peter R]

The definition of an "alt coin" that I like is the one based off Satoshi's description on page 3 of the Bitcoin white paper:



I summarize this as: "Bitcoin is the longest chain composed (exclusively) of valid transactions."  

With that definition, a coin is "not Bitcoin" if:

(a) it's based on a blockchain that doesn't begin from the Satoshi genesis block,

(b) the blockchain does begin from the Satoshi genesis block but is not the longest chain composed of valid transactions.

With that definition, there have been times in the past when Bitcoin was "not Bitcoin".

How so?  Are you referring to times when a shorter chain eventually becomes longer than another chain?  Indeed, this happened with the LevelDB bug fork in 2013 (and sort of happens almost daily if you count orphans).  Perhaps it is better to say that the "longest persistent chain composed of valid transactions is Bitcoin."

How would you best define Bitcoin?  And how would you best define an alt-coin, Holliday?

[muyuu]

Incorrect since Bitcoin XT is compatible with the main Bitcoin blockchain today. After the fork Bitcoin XT will still be compatible with the Bitcoin protocol. If Bitcoin XT does not reach consensus for a fork it will also remain compatible with the main Bitcoin blockchain. Meaning that Bitcoin XT is not a altcoin but an alternative implementation of the Bitcoin protocol.

It's just you and the skeleton crew of XT loyalists making that distinction. The code to fork the chain is there, just like it was there in Feathercoin before it activated.

[brg444]

Looks like poor ol Mike didn't get his way in his attempt to stonewall CLTV 

[muyuu]

Looks like poor ol Mike didn't get his way in his attempt to stonewall CLTV  

If Mike was a man instead of a petulant little child, he'd just carry on with his fork and further break compatibility. He'd do as he said he would and do it with checkpoints and miner minority, or even changing the PoW. But then he'd have to do actual work in his fork and Gavin isn't doing much at all either. They'd fall so far behind it would be a lot of fun.

But he's all bluster, and his word is worth fuck-all.

There you have him being himself:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB9goUDBAR0

Blah blah blah. Coward.

[VeritasSapere]

Incorrect since Bitcoin XT is compatible with the main Bitcoin blockchain today. After the fork Bitcoin XT will still be compatible with the Bitcoin protocol. If Bitcoin XT does not reach consensus for a fork it will also remain compatible with the main Bitcoin blockchain. Meaning that Bitcoin XT is not a altcoin but an alternative implementation of the Bitcoin protocol.

It's just you and the skeleton crew of XT loyalists making that distinction. The code to fork the chain is there, just like it was there in Feathercoin before it activated.

Feathercoin is a clone of Litecoin, you are discrediting your self by making this comparison. Copying the code and cloning or "forking" in order to create a new cryptocurrency is not the same as a blockchain fork. After all the Feathercoin blockchain does not contain the original genesis block, neither does it maintain the original distribution of bitcoin and it certainly does not require a majority consensus from the Bitcoin protocol in order for it to be borne into existence. Bitcoin XT is a part of Bitcoin whether you like it or not, you might have even received data from Bitcoin XT nodes helping your own nodes to sync faster, which is ironic considering your position.

[muyuu]

Feathercoin is a clone of Litecoin, you are discrediting your self by making this comparison. Copying the code and cloning or "forking" in order to create a new cryptocurrency is not the same as a blockchain fork. After all the Feathercoin blockchain does not contain the original genesis block, neither does it maintain the original distribution of bitcoin and it certainly does not require a majority consensus from the Bitcoin protocol in order for it to be borne into existence. Bitcoin XT is a part of Bitcoin whether you like it or not, you might have even received data from Bitcoin XT nodes helping your own nodes to sync faster, which is ironic considering your position.

Feathercoin forked the Litecoin code AND blockchain without consensus and tried taking over the brand and the economic majority.

Read up on it.

[Holliday]

The definition of an "alt coin" that I like is the one based off Satoshi's description on page 3 of the Bitcoin white paper:



I summarize this as: "Bitcoin is the longest chain composed (exclusively) of valid transactions."  

With that definition, a coin is "not Bitcoin" if:

(a) it's based on a blockchain that doesn't begin from the Satoshi genesis block,

(b) the blockchain does begin from the Satoshi genesis block but is not the longest chain composed of valid transactions.

With that definition, there have been times in the past when Bitcoin was "not Bitcoin".

How so?  Are you referring to times when a shorter chain eventually becomes longer than another chain?  Indeed, this happened with the LevelDB bug fork in 2013 (and sort of happens almost daily if you count orphans).  Perhaps it is better to say that the "longest persistent chain composed of valid transactions is Bitcoin."

How would you best define Bitcoin?  And how would you best define an alt-coin, Holliday?

You answered your own question. Perhaps it is better to add "persistent", although that means we get to argue the length of persistent.

I would argue the "valid transactions" part, because valid transactions are determined by the software itself. It's almost like using a word in it's own definition. I guess it's in there to throw node operators a bone, since without it, miners themselves would decide what is "Bitcoin"!

I don't have a suitable definition for Bitcoin or alt-coin, although I'm happy to make observations on what other people think.

[VeritasSapere]

Looks like poor ol Mike didn't get his way in his attempt to stonewall CLTV  

If Mike was a man instead of a petulant little child, he'd just carry on with his fork and further break compatibility. He'd do as he said he would and do it with checkpoints and miner minority, or even changing the PoW. But then he'd have to do actual work in his fork and Gavin isn't doing much at all either. They'd fall so far behind it would be a lot of fun.

But he's all bluster, and his word is worth fuck-all.

There you have him being himself:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB9goUDBAR0

Blah blah blah. Coward.

More ad hominem from the usual suspects.

Watch the entire interview and you will see clearly what he is saying in context, he was discussing a worse case scenario where there is a split between east and west. His actions speak louder then his words, just look at the code. Bitcoin XT will only fork if a seventy five percent consensus is reached, saying anything contrary to this and talking about checkpoints and ignoring the longest chain in regards to Bitcoin XT is really just pure FUD.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8JmvkyQyD8w

[muyuu]

I don't have a suitable definition for Bitcoin or alt-coin, although I'm happy to make observations on what other people think.

IMO it would be useful to distinguish blockchain forks that happen intentionally to make an alternative system, and maybe that's deserving of a new word other than altcoin, particularly when it's an attempt at an usurpation as it happened with Feathercoin or what BitcoinXT would aim to achieve.

Maybe altfork? However nobody says that.

Frankly I think altcoin is a neutral term and sometimes, albeit not often, they are perfectly legitimate and worthy of praise (as opposed to the XT hackjob).

The other question is whether something can be simultaneously "Bitcoin" and "an altcoin" given this definition of altcoin in the wiki, and whether XT is that.

Watch the entire interview and you will see clearly what he is saying in context, he was discussing a worse case scenario where there is a split between east and west. His actions speak louder then his words, just look at the code. Bitcoin XT will only fork if a seventy five percent consensus is reached, saying anything contrary to this and talking about checkpoints and ignoring the longest chain in regards to Bitcoin XT is really just pure FUD.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8JmvkyQyD8w

Learn English.

Worst case as in it didn't happen the way he wanted, so why not going ahead? because he's a coward and he knows he would absolutely fail to get all that support he was so sure to get.

I watched the whole thing long ago. He turns my stomach, the little cunt. Even more now after seeing he doesn't even keep his word.

[VeritasSapere]

I don't have a suitable definition for Bitcoin or alt-coin, although I'm happy to make observations on what other people think.

IMO it would be useful to distinguish blockchain forks that happen intentionally to make an alternative system, and maybe that's deserving of a new word other than altcoin, particularly when it's an attempt at an usurpation as it happened with Feathercoin or what BitcoinXT would aim to achieve.

Maybe altfork? However nobody says that.

Frankly I think altcoin is a neutral term and sometimes, albeit not often, they are perfectly legitimate and worthy of praise (as opposed to the XT hackjob).

The other question is whether something can be simultaneously "Bitcoin" and "an altcoin" given this definition of altcoin in the wiki, and whether XT is that.

I can agree with defining Bitcoin XT as an "altfork", this does sufficient justice to separate altcoins from chain forks which I do think are separate phenomena.

Chain forks or "altforks" are indeed sometimes justified in order to avoid the danger of centralization of power that can develop within a Core development team. However if Bitcoin Core forks for any reason at all then I suppose Bitcoin Core should also be considered as being an "altfork", which you might even already be able to argue, based on previous forks in Bitcoins history. I have already written extensively on why I think such "altforks" are justified. Read the article that I wrote on the subject if you are more interested in my reasoning.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1164464.0

[tl121]

As the "official wiki" says, it's technically an altcoin.  

https://archive.is/rjhmO

Since it is incompatible with the Bitcoin protocol, it is technically an altcoin, but due to an unusually large economic acceptance it may potentially become a "new Bitcoin" some day.

If insufficient mining hash power runs XT to reach supermajority then nothing will happen. If enough does, XT users will follow a new blockchain and cease to be using and trading bitcoins.

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Bitcoin_XT

Warning: you will be banned if you try to vandalise the wiki.

How is one to decide what constitutes bitcoin and what constitutes an alt-coin? How is one to decide what constitutes the bitcoin protocol?  Invoking wikis, developers, forum posts, amounts to using the argument from authority and this will only be effective if there is agreement on who or what the authority is.  It is quite obvious there is no such agreement.

I trust the authority of the chain with maximum proof of work that started with the bitcoin genesis block.  I do not trust any other authority as to what is bitcoin.  To do so would require trusting in some group of individuals that I do not personally know and so have no reason to trust. I do not trust the authority of any wiki or collection of developers, unless I personally know all of the individuals involved.

Along this line, I am not fearful of being banned by any wiki or forum.  Indeed, any wiki or forum that were to ban me would automatically disqualify itself as an authority that I would care about.  Were the situation sufficiently egregious I would feel obliged to make efforts to subvert the wiki or forum, attempting to place it and its operators in disrepute.

[muyuu]

Indeed, any wiki or forum that were to ban me would automatically disqualify itself as an authority that I would care about.  Were the situation sufficiently egregious I would feel obliged to make efforts to subvert the wiki or forum, attempting to place it and its operators in disrepute.

Any respectable wiki will ban you for vandalism if you alter their established definitions.

[tl121]

Indeed, any wiki or forum that were to ban me would automatically disqualify itself as an authority that I would care about.  Were the situation sufficiently egregious I would feel obliged to make efforts to subvert the wiki or forum, attempting to place it and its operators in disrepute.

Any respectable wiki will ban you for vandalism if you alter their established definitions.

Perhaps it's time for someone who enjoys tilting at windmills to challenge these wikis.

[muyuu]

Perhaps it's time for someone who enjoys tilting at windmills to challenge these wikis.

Be my guest. Ask Mikey to do so, at best he'll further ostracise himself and lose even more influence. At worst he'll continue showing himself for the little coward he is.

It is quite obvious there is no such agreement.

But there is. There will always be a few deranged individuals.

0 out of 1000 blocks say the consensus is overwhelming. 

[figmentofmyass]

Watch the entire interview and you will see clearly what he is saying in context, he was discussing a worse case scenario where there is a split between east and west. His actions speak louder then his words, just look at the code. Bitcoin XT will only fork if a seventy five percent consensus is reached, saying anything contrary to this and talking about checkpoints and ignoring the longest chain in regards to Bitcoin XT is really just pure FUD.

i'm a bit confused as to why any "worst case scenario" justifies ignoring the longest valid chain and intentionally breaking bitcoin into multiple blockchains. these are basic, basic defining principles and completely betrays the consensus mechanism outlined in the whitepaper.

the very reason this is a topic of discussion is because everyone possessing basic intelligence knows that 75% (less, including lucky runs) is not sufficient to achieve consensus. basic game theory. consider a 70-30 mining split---the 30% minority that remains on the pre-fork chain have strong incentives to remain there. the biggest incentive is that with 70% of the hashing power mining a different chain, relative hashing power on the pre-fork chain rises by 333%. especially if you are ideologically opposed to the forked chain or believe it is doomed to technical failure. a 75% threshold is so low that by the time the fork happens, we could see miner splits much closer to 70-30, 60-40, 50-50. without a very clear supermajority, this would inevitably break bitcoin in multiple chains forever.

if you're so intent on breaking consensus, just join frapdoc et al and start pushing for a hard fork with only a minority of hashing power. the result is more or less the same. you'd probably just look even more irrelevant than you already do.

[muyuu]

if you're so intent on breaking consensus, just join frapdoc et al and start pushing for a hard fork with only a minority of hashing power. the result is more or less the same. you'd probably just look even more irrelevant than you already do.

They're too cowardly to do that. They will stay panhandling at the entrance because they know they cannot replicate what Core devs are doing nor the support from the rest of us.

[figmentofmyass]

Chain forks or "altforks" are indeed sometimes justified in order to avoid the danger of centralization of power that can develop within a Core development team.

you repeating these misnomers just makes you look foolish. Core developers don't have any power; that's the beauty of the open source decentralized protocol that they are developing. at any time, miners and nodes can throw their weight behind a different version, developed by anyone. they have zero power to control anyone's actions. you and other XT fanboys are just upset that miners and nodes do not support other versions. i suspect the reason that only a tiny minority of loud developers shares your view that "Core is centralized" is that developers by and large have a much more sophisticated understanding of the technical issues, and therefore don't see a "civil war" of sorts as necessary. they'd prefer to continue to collaborate effectively on the bitcoin project; it was clear for many, many months that Hearn became disinterested in collaboration since no one was receptive to his ideas. since bitcoin is open source and development is indeed decentralized, he took the liberty (as anyone can) to fork the code.

and you know what? miners and nodes didn't support his fork. boo hoo. he proved just how decentralized bitcoin development is -- no one controls the code -- and even temporarily garnered some limited support for his fork. but it failed. and the idea that it could achieve 75% hashing power at this point is laughable. if nodes and miners do not support alternative versions, that is not evidence to say that "centralization of development" exists. it only says that unpopular versions are unpopular.

if you believe that a significant portion of miners and nodes will support an alternative version, go develop it. not a developer? well, too bad. because crying about "centralization" when you've no idea what it means won't make the alternative versions you think are so important magically appear. and it certainly doesn't provide any evidence that there is "centralization of power within the Core development team."

[VeritasSapere]

Chain forks or "altforks" are indeed sometimes justified in order to avoid the danger of centralization of power that can develop within a Core development team.

you repeating these misnomers just makes you look foolish. Core developers don't have any power; that's the beauty of the open source decentralized protocol that they are developing. at any time, miners and nodes can throw their weight behind a different version, developed by anyone. they have zero power to control anyone's actions. you and other XT fanboys are just upset that miners and nodes do not support other versions. i suspect the reason that only a tiny minority of loud developers shares your view that "Core is centralized" is that developers by and large have a much more sophisticated understanding of the technical issues, and therefore don't see a "civil war" of sorts as necessary. they'd prefer to continue to collaborate effectively on the bitcoin project; it was clear for many, many months that Hearn became disinterested in collaboration since no one was receptive to his ideas. since bitcoin is open source and development is indeed decentralized, he took the liberty (as anyone can) to fork the code.

and you know what? miners and nodes didn't support his fork. boo hoo. he proved just how decentralized bitcoin development is -- no one controls the code -- and even temporarily garnered some limited support for his fork. but it failed. and the idea that it could achieve 75% hashing power at this point is laughable. if nodes and miners do not support alternative versions, that is not evidence to say that "centralization of development" exists. it only says that unpopular versions are unpopular.

if you believe that a significant portion of miners and nodes will support an alternative version, go develop it. not a developer? well, too bad. because crying about "centralization" when you've no idea what it means won't make the alternative versions you think are so important magically appear. and it certainly doesn't provide any evidence that there is "centralization of power within the Core development team."

I argued that centralization of power can develop within the Core development team, I have not argued that this is presently the case. I do argue however that having the ability to hard fork away from a core development team if we need to is an important mechanism of Bitcoin that allows Bitcoin to remain decentralized and truly free. Based upon what you have said here I would think that you would at least agree with this conception.

[figmentofmyass]

Chain forks or "altforks" are indeed sometimes justified in order to avoid the danger of centralization of power that can develop within a Core development team.

you repeating these misnomers just makes you look foolish. Core developers don't have any power; that's the beauty of the open source decentralized protocol that they are developing. at any time, miners and nodes can throw their weight behind a different version, developed by anyone. they have zero power to control anyone's actions. you and other XT fanboys are just upset that miners and nodes do not support other versions. i suspect the reason that only a tiny minority of loud developers shares your view that "Core is centralized" is that developers by and large have a much more sophisticated understanding of the technical issues, and therefore don't see a "civil war" of sorts as necessary. they'd prefer to continue to collaborate effectively on the bitcoin project; it was clear for many, many months that Hearn became disinterested in collaboration since no one was receptive to his ideas. since bitcoin is open source and development is indeed decentralized, he took the liberty (as anyone can) to fork the code.

and you know what? miners and nodes didn't support his fork. boo hoo. he proved just how decentralized bitcoin development is -- no one controls the code -- and even temporarily garnered some limited support for his fork. but it failed. and the idea that it could achieve 75% hashing power at this point is laughable. if nodes and miners do not support alternative versions, that is not evidence to say that "centralization of development" exists. it only says that unpopular versions are unpopular.

if you believe that a significant portion of miners and nodes will support an alternative version, go develop it. not a developer? well, too bad. because crying about "centralization" when you've no idea what it means won't make the alternative versions you think are so important magically appear. and it certainly doesn't provide any evidence that there is "centralization of power within the Core development team."

I argued that centralization of power can develop within the Core development team, I have not argued that this is presently the case. I do argue however that having the ability to hard fork away from a core development team if we need to is an important mechanism of Bitcoin that allows Bitcoin to remain decentralized and truly free. Based upon what you have said here I would think that you would at least agree with this conception.

how can centralization of power develop, in this context? i argue that it cannot. there is no power. this greatly differs from the protocol-level discussion where the various parties hold some level of power to hold the others accountable (e.g. nodes have the power to enforce the protocol and render a miner's fork invalid). these incentive-induced checks and balances have absolutely fuck-all to do with developers. development is completely external to the protocol, and developers have zero power to enforce code on anyone. all this "centralization" talk in the context of development is a silly red herring to confuse simple-minded people who take the word at face-value without thinking about it.

bitcoin is not closed source. that's the only instance in which developers can hold any power over users, nodes and miners. otherwise the latter parties can simply audit the code and opt to run another version.