Is the price stuck, because blocks are full ?

[GermanGiant]

Higher price will bring in more trade volume, which needs more space in blocks to get confirmed fast...

Increase in Tx in last 30 days...

https://blockchain.info/charts/n-transactions?timespan=30days&showDataPoints=false&daysAverageString=1&show_header=true&scale=0&address=

Increase in avaerage block size in last 30 days...

https://blockchain.info/charts/avg-block-size?timespan=30days&showDataPoints=false&daysAverageString=1&show_header=true&scale=0&address=

Current block size situation...



Will we be able to scale above 500 with the current cap ? I understand we scaled 1000+ with 1 MB cap. But, there were fewer exchange then. Bitcoin trading is much more decentralized now. Are we ready to handle a sudden rush ?

[1714822538]

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[1714822538]

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[CIYAM]

Most trading txs are not even on the blockchain at all (they are on SQL DB's that exchanges run).

[GermanGiant]

Most trading txs are not even on the blockchain at all (they are on SQL DB's that exchanges run).

That is for regular traders. Occassional traders and new traders who want to join the rush need to send their fund to exchanges for trading. Not many leave their fund on exchanges and this not a good practice either.

[shorena]

Most trading txs are not even on the blockchain at all (they are on SQL DB's that exchanges run).

#1 this ^

#2 its price changes(!) that cause higher amount of TX, not higher, but stable price. Durring big swings more people send their coins around in order to profit from the swings. When the price is stable only the regular deals appear on the chain.

What might be a problem though is that a higher price leads to smaller BTC amounts and the high number of transactions require many nodes to block small BTC amounts as dust from being relayed. If the price rises to high without a solution to the blocksize issue we might force small value transactions (think a couple of dollars) off the blockchain.

Whether or not this is something you care about is a different topic entirely, there are many that say the blockchain is too important for small payments for a coffee worth of coins.

[CIYAM]

That is for regular traders. Occassional traders and new traders who want to join the rush need to send their fund to exchanges for trading. Not many leave their fund on exchanges and this not a good practice either.

The majority of traders do not just jump in and out using regular BTC transfers as that is basically far too slow anyway (I guess you don't actually use any BTC exchanges).

[AtheistAKASaneBrain]

All of the trading that happens on exchanges never touch the blockchain, only the money that goes in and out of the exchange does and I doubt this has any relevant impact on the blocks being full or not. Only an idiot would send BTC without a recommended fee to an exchange and if you do that you will not have problems with your transaction taking too long to reach the exchange.

[Meuh6879]

No problem here ...

[crazyivan]

The price is stuck because traders decided to dump and take their profits unsure about Chinese BTC demand. Unless we see some positive press, I think we re going to go down.

[knight22]

The block size limit is basically a growth limit right now. I don't know if it directly affect the price but it sure doesn't help speculative investments.

[Meuh6879]

limit ?
http://statoshi.info/dashboard/db/blocks

average current block weight : 630 kB (over 7 days)

557 kB over 30 days.

[CIYAM]

The block size limit is basically a growth limit right now. I don't know if it directly affect the price but it sure doesn't help specative investments.

Why do you make such stupid statements (oh - yes - you are an XT shill - nearly forgot)?

As has been pointed out all of the speculative trading happens "off-chain" so please ignore this shill's stupid post (these shills have no shame and will try and state any reason to promote XT).

[Denker]

From reddit https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/3rwhh1/adam_back_asks_mike_hearn_in_ama_about_scaling/

This might be interesting for one or the other person here.
Imo Mike is acting like a kid and my feeling is that over the whole time his incentive is and was to get rid off Bitcoin core!


Adam Back:

    Hi Mike

    From the Bitcoin scaling workshop https://scalingbitcoin.org/hongkong2015/ in about 4 weeks, and review process following it, presuming a rough consensus on a scaling BIP including Wladimir, Greg, Pieter, Jeff & Gavin and many other experts and industry representatives etc with running code is standardised on will you collaborate with that? There were 40 industry sponsors and > 200 attenders from academia, individual developers, companies & core - the highest concentration of bitcoin expertise in one place ever! There are a number of BIPs already implemented and some more being implemented for presentation from various developers.

    I believe you are on record as saying you would support BIP100 also (unless I misremember and that was Gavin). Would you support a different BIP also?

    A number of people have said heated things on the internet about how to scale Bitcoin, myself included, and scaling is a complex topic with a number of tradeoffs, so I dont think we should prematurely assume bad-faith, but rather try to evaluate the tradeoffs. Maybe you should come to the workshop and participate along with others. I know that a number of other people felt much better about a spirit of collaboration after coming to the first scaling workshop in Montreal a few months ago and talking politely face to face with people they had exchanged sharp views with online and finding out that the difference of views was far smaller than they assumed. You can also participate via video link. I believe travel bursaries are available also.

    Some of the proposals are quite interesting and seem better able to support bursting and scaling than the initial simpler proposals. You may like to review them.

    I think it's time for the community to pull together, what do you say?

    Adam

Answer by Mike Hearn:

OK, a whole bunch of things here.

If everyone except me ends up agreeing on a way to increase the block size, then I wouldn't have to collaborate on that, would I? It'd go ahead and happen anyway. Still, I think there's a risk is that Jeff and Gavin end up "agreeing" to a proposal that doesn't really make sense and they think is bad, just to try ensure something happens ..... but currently so little has happened that even this seems unlikely.

I don't recall saying I support BIP 100. I may have said if it happens anyway then XT would go along with it, obviously it'd have to, otherwise it wouldn't work properly anymore.

Workshop: right now neither me nor Gavin plan to attend Hong Kong.

Pulling together. I think the community has to get out of this notion that a vaguely defined community of experts hands decisions down from on high after a bunch of conferences or an IRC meeting or whatever. I realise why a lot of people like this idea but it's unhealthy. I wrote above about what can go wrong when groupthink takes hold. It's a very scary social failure mode, and yet isn't uncommon. Frankly right now I see a lot of the symptoms: the desire for social harmony through unanimous consensus, the attempts to minimise conflict at any cost, the 'illusion of invulnerability' etc.

Ironically, central banking has a lot of the same issues.

How can the dangers of groupthink be avoided? The wiki page has a few suggestions, but here are mine:

    For Core: replacing decision making through unanimity with a formal process for expressing and resolving disagreement, in a company this is usually a CEO, in a committee it can be a vote.
    Ensuring that for any decision that is made, the wider world has a clear and simple process for rejecting it. Any group must be able to be given "no" for an answer. In a country this is usually an election or a market. Gavin, myself and many others think a market for nodes which may cast different votes on changes to the block chain is the right way to do this.
    De-emphasising the role of (often self-proclaimed) intellectuals and experts, thus emphasising the judgement of work by results rather than the reputation of who was involved. Deference to expertise is a means to an end with the end being correct results, but in the Bitcoin community it's too often become the end itself.


Whilst I understand the rationale that went into proposing two separate conferences to discuss scalability, and the idea that everyone always gets along with each other is lovely, I don't think endless talk in the pursuit of 100% agreement is healthy or productive. The first conference didn't produce any concrete deliverable e.g. a requirements document, so I am skeptical the second will be more effective. And I've made these views clear many times before.

[maokoto]

The price is stuck because traders decided to dump and take their profits unsure about Chinese BTC demand. Unless we see some positive press, I think we re going to go down.

Likely this. People get nervous when they see profits and sell. Me included.

[knight22]

The block size limit is basically a growth limit right now. I don't know if it directly affect the price but it sure doesn't help specative investments.

Why do you make such stupid statements (oh - yes - you are an XT shill - nearly forgot)?

As has been pointed out all of the speculative trading happens "off-chain" so please ignore this shill's stupid post (these shills have no shame and will try and state any reason to promote XT).

This has nothing to do with speculative investments. Investors that does not foresee any growth in the system won't invest in bitcoin, plain and simple. Why would they anyway? Uncertainties are way too high ATM.

BTW I am sorry to criticize your religion, which is why it makes you mad.

[Mickeyb]

The price is stuck because traders decided to dump and take their profits unsure about Chinese BTC demand. Unless we see some positive press, I think we re going to go down.

Likely this. People get nervous when they see profits and sell. Me included.

Well we couldn't have more positive press and articles in the last few weeks than what we had. I don't know what would you guys want more.

And no OP, blocks are only half full at the moment and I am positive that block size limit will be raised very soon.

[Luqman]

I'll say bitcoin price should stable at 400$

[Fraxinus]

At 360-380 $ Bitcoin is at a good rate,we'll see what can happen from there.

[Blue_Tiger73]

First of all, the price isn't really stuck, it is just jumping up and down. I guess the demand for Bitcoin is rising, hence there are more transactions. And there are not enough miners to compensate this.