Segregated witness - The solution to Scalability (short term)?

[QuestionAuthority]

However here in bitcoin world, there is no such kind of financial responsibility. If devs push in a change which resulted in customer loss, the devs are not responsible for the damage, or to say, they don't have enough money to compensate the loss from millions of users. The users are all on their own

if they mess up bitcoin, the dev's own income and savings is also lost..
thats why they dont want to mess up. and each new release is tested. and in the result of a bug in a new release. people downgrade to previous version and the bug is gone until its sorted out for an amended new release.

bitcoin is actually more secure then you think, you are not relying on 1 coders say so. there are usually 1000+ coders all using new releases before the general users even get the option to upgrade. so if there was any issue, the coders would be the first to get affected.

Right, so essentially we need to use at our own risk and trust that they will make the right choices and implement the correct improvements. It's a little more risky than trusting the current proven system with 22 billion transactions a year and millions of oversight workers but I so hate the current system that I'm willing to take the risk. I use the same method to determine when to jump out of Bitcoin that I use for investments or banks, I watch what's happening, ask questions, seek the council of trusted advisors and make my own decision. I've voted with my feet a few times now, only returning when I feel it's safe. Everyone can do the same. Honestly, none of us really have any say or influence over what happens with Bitcoin. All we can do is choose to use it or move on.

[franky1]

However here in bitcoin world, there is no such kind of financial responsibility. If devs push in a change which resulted in customer loss, the devs are not responsible for the damage, or to say, they don't have enough money to compensate the loss from millions of users. The users are all on their own

if they mess up bitcoin, the dev's own income and savings is also lost..
thats why they dont want to mess up. and each new release is tested. and in the result of a bug in a new release. people downgrade to previous version and the bug is gone until its sorted out for an amended new release.

bitcoin is actually more secure then you think, you are not relying on 1 coders say so. there are usually 1000+ coders all using new releases before the general users even get the option to upgrade. so if there was any issue, the coders would be the first to get affected.

Right, so essentially we need to use at our own risk and trust that they will make the right choices and implement the correct improvements. It's a little more risky than trusting the current proven system

banking is proven system??
2015 crash http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/epic/hsba/11830336/HSBC-hit-by-payments-crash-on-payday.html
2014 crash http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/bank-accounts/10667064/NatWest-suffers-payday-mobile-banking-crash.html
2013 crash http://www.theguardian.com/money/2013/mar/07/natwest-banking-crash-what-need-to-know
2012 crash http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-18561426

i picked 1 bank per year to make a point.. but there were alot more incidents.. need we forget the great crash of 2007-2008. or the goings on with banks in europe holding customers funds to ransom..

i much more trust bitcoin

[QuestionAuthority]

However here in bitcoin world, there is no such kind of financial responsibility. If devs push in a change which resulted in customer loss, the devs are not responsible for the damage, or to say, they don't have enough money to compensate the loss from millions of users. The users are all on their own

if they mess up bitcoin, the dev's own income and savings is also lost..
thats why they dont want to mess up. and each new release is tested. and in the result of a bug in a new release. people downgrade to previous version and the bug is gone until its sorted out for an amended new release.

bitcoin is actually more secure then you think, you are not relying on 1 coders say so. there are usually 1000+ coders all using new releases before the general users even get the option to upgrade. so if there was any issue, the coders would be the first to get affected.

Right, so essentially we need to use at our own risk and trust that they will make the right choices and implement the correct improvements. It's a little more risky than trusting the current proven system

banking is proven system??
2015 crash http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/epic/hsba/11830336/HSBC-hit-by-payments-crash-on-payday.html
2014 crash http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/bank-accounts/10667064/NatWest-suffers-payday-mobile-banking-crash.html
2013 crash http://www.theguardian.com/money/2013/mar/07/natwest-banking-crash-what-need-to-know
2012 crash http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-18561426

i picked 1 bank per year to make a point.. but there were alot more incidents..

Of course it's a proven system that has bailouts happen all the time. I've already said I'm willing to take the risk. Now, would you like me to start listing Bitcoin's failures starting with malleability and work backwards to be fair? Before you answer realize I'm going to fill a couple of pages of not only functional code problems but, because of the links you used, I'm going to list every theft that happened from human error or because Bitcoin made those thefts possible. BTW: no one bails out Bitcoin users and the FDIC doesn't reimburse them.

[franky1]

Of course it's a proven system that has bailouts happen all the time. I've already said I'm willing to take the risk. Now, would you like me to start listing Bitcoin's failures starting with malleability and work backwards to be fair? Before you answer realize I'm going to fill a couple of pages of not only functional code problems but, because of the links you used, I'm going to list every theft that happened from human error or because Bitcoin made those thefts possible. BTW: no one bails out Bitcoin users and the FDIC doesn't reimburse them.

and i will write every single card cloning, every single pick pocket. every single bank note loss..
yes thats right bank notes are not insured.. if its stolen by some cunning theif its gone..
i bet the number of victims of bank notes. including total value lost will exceed bitcoin losses.

lehman brothers lost $600 billion+.. bitcoin is only $5 billion cap and losses far far far below that

if bitcoin v0.12 broke. we can just import our private keys into v0.11..
if our bank broke. we have to wait for a bank bailout.. which millions of people are still waiting for even today 7 years later..
so bitcoin fix=10 minutes.. banking mega crash.. 1day-7years

[QuestionAuthority]

Of course it's a proven system that has bailouts happen all the time. I've already said I'm willing to take the risk. Now, would you like me to start listing Bitcoin's failures starting with malleability and work backwards to be fair? Before you answer realize I'm going to fill a couple of pages of not only functional code problems but, because of the links you used, I'm going to list every theft that happened from human error or because Bitcoin made those thefts possible. BTW: no one bails out Bitcoin users and the FDIC doesn't reimburse them.

and i will write every single card cloning, every single pick pocket. every single bank note loss..
yes thats right bank notes are not insured.. if its stolen by some cunning theif its gone..
i bet the number of victims of bank notes. including total value lost will exceed bitcoin losses.

lehman brothers lost $600 billion+.. bitcoin is only $5 billion cap and losses far far far below that

if bitcoin v0.12 broke. we can just import our private keys into v0.11..
if our bank broke. we have to wait for a bank bailout.. which millions of people are still waiting for even today 7 years later..
so bitcoin fix=10 minutes.. banking mega crash.. 1day-7years

There can't be a mega crash in Bitcoin compared to a world wide economy because Bitcoin is a flea compared to an elephant. There can't be a housing market crash in Bitcoin because there are no home loans denominated in Bitcoin. Bla bla bla....  I've used fiat banks for 50 years and never lost a dime. But I've lost thousands of dollars with Bitcoin.

You so desperately want to be right and defend your beloved Bitcoin that you're missing my point completely. I use Bitcoin. I'm willing to take the risk because I don't like the current system either. Bitcoin use is a personal choice. Use your own best judgement and trust it or not. But please don't pretend to have any influence on what's happening. If you want to influence what's happening start posting your own changes on Git and join the debate there. Be prepared though, they know what they're talking about. This is mostly a users forum. You can't help here.

[johnyj]

However here in bitcoin world, there is no such kind of financial responsibility. If devs push in a change which resulted in customer loss, the devs are not responsible for the damage, or to say, they don't have enough money to compensate the loss from millions of users. The users are all on their own

if they mess up bitcoin, the dev's own income and savings is also lost..
thats why they dont want to mess up. and each new release is tested. and in the result of a bug in a new release. people downgrade to previous version and the bug is gone until its sorted out for an amended new release.

bitcoin is actually more secure then you think, you are not relying on 1 coders say so. there are usually 1000+ coders all using new releases before the general users even get the option to upgrade. so if there was any issue, the coders would be the first to get affected.

Yes, being the stake holder in the system will prevent devs from intentionally harm the system. But still they can make mistake, and a mistake in bitcoin network will bring real financial impact, like reversed transactions, lost mining income etc...  I still remember that during 2013 fork, those miners lost hundreds of coins due to they were on the wrong chain by running Gavin's new version, eventually their loss was compensated by the mining pools, so it was mining pools took the responsibility, not core devs. And that directly resulted in that almost none of the mining pools favor Gavin's code this time

[johnyj]

All we can do is choose to use it or move on.

Or by ignore new updates and let others become lab rats

[Blawpaw]

Why can´t the Bitcoin Lightning network, sidechains or colored coins be the answer to this problem? al least it would avoid tempering with the code

[QuestionAuthority]

All we can do is choose to use it or move on.

Or by ignore new updates and let others become lab rats

Well, that is one way, I suppose. As long as you don't end up on the losing side of a fork.  

[onemorexmr]

Why can´t the Bitcoin Lightning network, sidechains or colored coins be the answer to this problem? al least it would avoid tempering with the code

LN needs two things to work properly:
 - free blockspace
 - fixed transaction malleability

the first one is not really solved (in my opinion at least) but the second one is.

[Lauda]

LN needs two things to work properly:
 - free blockspace
 - fixed transaction malleability

the first one is not really solved (in my opinion at least) but the second one is.

You mean, the second one will be after segwit gets implemented? Otherwise the statement is incorrect because right now malleability is still a problem. The other complex solutions need time to develop.

[onemorexmr]

LN needs two things to work properly:
 - free blockspace
 - fixed transaction malleability

the first one is not really solved (in my opinion at least) but the second one is.

You mean, the second one will be after segwit gets implemented? Otherwise the statement is incorrect because right now malleability is still a problem. The other complex solutions need time to develop.

yes, sorry. after segwit is implemented the second one is fixed (malleability) but the first one is not solved (the blocksize problem has just been moved to the future)

[franky1]

There can't be a mega crash in Bitcoin compared to a world wide economy because Bitcoin is a flea compared to an elephant. There can't be a housing market crash in Bitcoin because there are no home loans denominated in Bitcoin. Bla bla bla....  I've used fiat banks for 50 years and never lost a dime. But I've lost thousands of dollars with Bitcoin.

You so desperately want to be right and defend your beloved Bitcoin that you're missing my point completely. I use Bitcoin. I'm willing to take the risk because I don't like the current system either. Bitcoin use is a personal choice. Use your own best judgement and trust it or not. But please don't pretend to have any influence on what's happening. If you want to influence what's happening start posting your own changes on Git and join the debate there. Be prepared though, they know what they're talking about. This is mostly a users forum. You can't help here.

im not saying it is fool proof.. im just saying its not as bad a risk as you think..
and how have you lost thousands of bitcoins.. if there on your keys there on your keys.. it wont matter if they are on keys from 2009 or 2015, they are stil on the keys..
lets say you are a business and you were delivering products in exchange for bitcoins.. you havnt lost bitcoins.. you just never got paid because of a scammer handing you a counterfeit.. which is the same as the real world..

lets say you put funds into dodgy exchanges.. well i can tell you millions of dodgy fiat boiler room scammers. how many "nigerian prince" scams cost people..

scams are not bitcoin protocols problem.. they are problems of human judgement. which no code can sort out.. if your going to throw funds at a nigerian prince, it doesnt matter if its bitcoin or fiat.. your going to lose..

but if you have and keep the coins on your private keys.. there is no way for a nigerian prince to run off.. there is no way a bank can go bankrupt and take your money..

im sorry but i do realise that bitcoin is not perfect. but nigerian princes setting up dodgy boiler room bitcoin exchanges has nothing o do with the bitcoin protocol

[franky1]

LN needs two things to work properly:
 - free blockspace
 - fixed transaction malleability

the first one is not really solved (in my opinion at least) but the second one is.

You mean, the second one will be after segwit gets implemented? Otherwise the statement is incorrect because right now malleability is still a problem. The other complex solutions need time to develop.

lauda, you keep emphasising the malle proof..
but have you actually read HOW

come on paste in the exert that explains it. and tell me how it cannot be done without splitting the blockchain.. and how only wuille can do this,

[johnyj]

Why can´t the Bitcoin Lightning network, sidechains or colored coins be the answer to this problem? al least it would avoid tempering with the code

As you can see, unless you heavily tamper the code, none of these solutions is going to work

Still I prefer the simplest solution of direct clearing and settlement between service providers, two major benefit:
1. you don't need to change the bitcoin code, thus maximum code stability
2. clearing based solutions is a mature solution in financial industry, maybe more risky at each service provider level but no risk for bitcoin network, it can give you 0 transaction fee and instant payment, which bitcoin network can never achieve no matter what kind of scaling solution

[onemorexmr]

LN needs two things to work properly:
 - free blockspace
 - fixed transaction malleability

the first one is not really solved (in my opinion at least) but the second one is.

You mean, the second one will be after segwit gets implemented? Otherwise the statement is incorrect because right now malleability is still a problem. The other complex solutions need time to develop.

lauda, you keep emphasising the malle proof..
but have you actually read HOW

come on paste in the exert that explains it. and tell me how it cannot be done without splitting the blockchain.. and how only wuille can do this,

tx malle can be fixed easily with a softfork without segwit.
just let all miners and nodes reject one kind of tx (be it the positive or the negative one - doesnt matter)
if you have the biggest miners on board it wont take long and its done ;-) to help with the transition miners may help users by "mallating" the tx themselves to the new correct format (some people [forgot the name..sorry] already do that).

[franky1]

LN needs two things to work properly:
 - free blockspace
 - fixed transaction malleability

the first one is not really solved (in my opinion at least) but the second one is.

You mean, the second one will be after segwit gets implemented? Otherwise the statement is incorrect because right now malleability is still a problem. The other complex solutions need time to develop.

lauda, you keep emphasising the malle proof..
but have you actually read HOW

come on paste in the exert that explains it. and tell me how it cannot be done without splitting the blockchain.. and how only wuille can do this,

tx malle can be fixed easily with a softfork without segwit.
just let all miners and nodes reject one kind of tx (be it the positive or the negative one - doesnt matter)
if you have the biggest miners on board it wont take long and its done ;-) to help with the transition miners may help users by "mallating" the tx themselves to the new correct format (some people [forgot the name..sorry] already do that).

i know.. im just poking at Lauda because he seems to really want to push segwit, as if its the ultimate solution.. and the only solution..
yet many other people know there are better solutions that dont mess up the main bitcoin chain..

[QuestionAuthority]

There can't be a mega crash in Bitcoin compared to a world wide economy because Bitcoin is a flea compared to an elephant. There can't be a housing market crash in Bitcoin because there are no home loans denominated in Bitcoin. Bla bla bla....  I've used fiat banks for 50 years and never lost a dime. But I've lost thousands of dollars with Bitcoin.

You so desperately want to be right and defend your beloved Bitcoin that you're missing my point completely. I use Bitcoin. I'm willing to take the risk because I don't like the current system either. Bitcoin use is a personal choice. Use your own best judgement and trust it or not. But please don't pretend to have any influence on what's happening. If you want to influence what's happening start posting your own changes on Git and join the debate there. Be prepared though, they know what they're talking about. This is mostly a users forum. You can't help here.

im not saying it is fool proof.. im just saying its not as bad a risk as you think..
and how have you lost thousands of bitcoins.. if there on your keys there on your keys.. it wont matter if they are on keys from 2009 or 2015, they are stil on the keys..
lets say you are a business and you were delivering products in exchange for bitcoins.. you havnt lost bitcoins.. you just never got paid because of a scammer handing you a counterfeit.. which is the same as the real world..

lets say you put funds into dodgy exchanges.. well i can tell you millions of dodgy fiat boiler room scammers. how many "nigerian prince" scams cost people..

scams are not bitcoin protocols problem.. they are problems of human judgement. which no code can sort out.. if your going to throw funds at a nigerian prince, it doesnt matter if its bitcoin or fiat.. your going to lose..

but if you have and keep the coins on your private keys.. there is no way for a nigerian prince to run off.. there is no way a bank can go bankrupt and take your money..

im sorry but i do realise that bitcoin is not perfect. but nigerian princes setting up dodgy boiler room bitcoin exchanges has nothing o do with the bitcoin protocol

Transaction malleability aside (because I'm not sure I believe the millions of dollars were actually lost from this), I still know that Bitcoin isn't secure enough for anyone to "go all in" as they say. Not only because the protocol isn't well refined yet but because there aren't systems in place to secure users from the inevitable teenaged hacker. I have had fraudulent transactions on one of my bank accounts. You know how much I lost? Nothing! You need to make your own choice how much you are willing to use and possibly lose. Your right, of course, if you're willing to have all your keys unusable on a paper wallet then Bitcoin is a fortress. The rest of us have our money constantly in play.

This Segwit solution is a change that can help, at least in the short run. I'm really unclear why you are so opposed to it. It seems like a solution that will give the developers a little breathing room to come up with a permanent solution to blocksize while solving the malleability problem without even the need for a hard fork. What's wrong with that?

Edit: If you have real concerns and are trying to save us all then please go here and make them known. https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/bitcoin-dev

[Lauda]

i know.. im just poking at Lauda because he seems to really want to push segwit, as if its the ultimate solution.. and the only solution..
yet many other people know there are better solutions that dont mess up the main bitcoin chain..

This is incorrect. Did you notice the question mark in the thread title? There is no "ultimate solution" and there never will be.

[onemorexmr]

i know.. im just poking at Lauda because he seems to really want to push segwit, as if its the ultimate solution.. and the only solution..
yet many other people know there are better solutions that dont mess up the main bitcoin chain..

This is incorrect. Did you notice the question mark in the thread title? There is no "ultimate solution" and there never will be.

i am still undecided on segwit.
i just know that added complexity always leads to more problems. bitcoin is simple atm. i'd prefer to keep it that way (if possible)

so we have to look at the benefits to make an educated decision.

the only valid benefit i see is reduced storage - which is not bad but is it important? i dont think so. AFAIK nodes running on home-intrnet-lines are adding a burden on the network anyway.

so...still undecided ;-) but i like to learn more...