Should the bitcoin community ban the Satoshi Dice filter patch?

[fancy_pants]

Someone has offered up a patch to kill the satoshidice transactions (and by extention bitcoin itself.)

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150405.msg1598258#msg1598258

This poll is to determine whether or not the bitcoin community, specifically the bitcoin police in this forum, should enforce an outlaw of the patch.

There is still time to vote!!!

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[Rodyland]

Isn't it up to the  miners what tx they  do and don'tinclude? How would you enforce    a ban?

[gonzoflip]

How do you suggest they implement a ban of the patch exactly?


Edit:So you are suggesting they ban a ban... Yo Dog I heard you like bans...

[misterbigg]

This patch is just a quick stop-gap hack to address the transaction spam. More robust solutions which are vendor-agnostic (i.e. not specific to SatoshiDICE) are being evaluated and refined. Why is the transaction spam a problem?

SatoshiDICE is taking advantage of the early stage of Bitcoin, at a time when transaction volume is too low to fill the blocks and bring fees up to a level that would make up for the drop in subsidy. If Bitcoin was fully mature, it will not be vulnerable to this type of transaction spam and no one would be talking about it let alone suggest patches, because fees would make the dust spam economically unviable.

The problem is that we do not have a mature network, and we're in the bootstrapping phase. SatoshiDICE is consuming the "startup capital" (current state of low fees, high subsidy, and lots of free space in blocks) to profit without bringing a corresponding increase in growth of Bitcoin adoption. The simple fact is that a relatively small handful of gambling addicts and bots are flooding the block chain with 70%+ of its transactions.

This is not good.

[fancy_pants]

How do you suggest they implement a ban of the patch exactly?


Edit:So you are suggesting they ban a ban... Yo Dog I heard you like bans...

Look,  other than being a satoshidice shareholder,  I'm completely neutral here.  I can't tell the bitcoin police how to do their job any more than they can tell me to shut my mouth.  I'm a citizen, I pay my taxes, and I deserve a little bit more respect than you are giving me.  I voted to outlaw the ban on satoshi dice. What's the problem?

[John (John K.)]

It is impossible and silly to 'outlaw' such a patch. Everyone has their own rights to do whatever modifications they like on the software they run. A better way of handling this would be to implement a better pruning system.

[gonzoflip]

Look,  other than being a satoshidice shareholder,  I'm completely neutral here.  I can't tell the bitcoin police how to do their job any more than they can tell me to shut my mouth.  I'm a citizen, I pay my taxes, and I deserve a little bit more respect than you are giving me.  I voted to outlaw the ban on satoshi dice. What's the problem?

WTF?

[misterbigg]

A better way of handling this would be to implement a better pruning system.

It is precisely because no solution to the pruning problem exists for this form of transaction spam that we need a way to address it.

[casascius]

I have never played Satoshi Dice, and view their transactions as spam, but I also view them as doing an VALUABLE SERVICE for Bitcoin and don't think it should be disrupted.  I would be happy that a patch exists, but would also leave it disabled myself.

Without Satoshi Dice, we are left to guesstimate what will happen when we start reaching limits.

With Satoshi Dice, we reach those limits in a non-committal way.  We get to find out how Bitcoin reacts under load, using a load that is for all intents and purposes optional.

If at some point Bitcoin becomes disrupted by transaction load (something I pretty much expect will happen eventually), we always have the option of throwing out the Satoshi Dice noise long enough to re-engineer Bitcoin to handle more activity.  This is far better than reaching those limits with brick-and-mortar business activity that will turn off the business community if they end up being the guinea pigs for Bitcoin's scalability.

Because of Satoshi Dice, people are considering how to prune the blockchain and how to make a client function with a UTXO set rather than mandating everyone be a historian - something I'm afraid would be nowhere as progressed were it not for this game.

[fancy_pants]

...
This is not good.

Mr. Bigg:
holding a rabbit hostage is way worse than what you just described :  http://www.nbcnews.com/id/7406483/#.UTlyQBnXG2w

Has anyone here even played satoshidice?  ITS AWESOME!!!

[pyra-proxy]

What SD is doing and what this patch is doing and what the OP is doing is akin to the following analogy....

Bully is punching another student in the face, that student is trying to cover their face with their hands to dampen the blow, all while a third student is asking everyone to get mad at and hold the seconds students hands down because he is hurting the bullies choice to punch people in the face....  

[fancy_pants]

What SD is doing and what this patch is doing and what the OP is doing is akin to the following analogy....

Bully is punching another student in the face, that student is trying to cover their face with their hands to dampen the blow, all while a third student is asking everyone to get mad at and hold the seconds students hands down because he is hurting the bullies choice to punch people in the face....  

I'm not sure I agree with the path of escalation,  but I've added your choice to the poll.  Your vote counts too!

[misterbigg]

I also view them as doing an VALUABLE SERVICE for Bitcoin and don't think it should be disrupted.

There is definitely a valuable aspect to SatoshiDICE but it also comes with a cost. If they simply stop sending spam transactions to inform players of a loss, the problem would go away. From what I understand, the attitude from the principals was "if you can't deal with it then Bitcoin doesn't deserve to exist."

Without Satoshi Dice, we are left to guesstimate what will happen when we start reaching limits.

That's not true. First of all we have the soft limit, which we are consistently hitting. Second, we already have a pretty good understanding of what will happen when we reach limits. The fees will go up. Which is exactly what is happening now. Ordinary users have to pay higher fees just because SD is spewing 80% of all tx on the entire Bitcoin network. 10 years from now that's no big deal, since blocks will be full all the time.

But to have the higher fees now, much sooner than needed, can only choke adoption not spur it. And we need that adoption rate now a hell of a lot more than we need a gambling site that consumes many times more resources than normal.

With Satoshi Dice, we reach those limits in a non-committal way.

If by non-committal you mean "forced to store every losing transaction notification with unspendable and unprunable outputs from now until the end of time" then yeah I guess...I prefer the dictionary definition of non-committal.

We get to find out how Bitcoin reacts under load, using a load that is for all intents and purposes optional.

An artificial load of transactions with unspendable and unprunable outputs that compete with legitimate transactions and drive fees up without a corresponding increase in the size of the user base. Judging from the rate of some of the transactions and the wallet they came from, it is very likely that bots are doing much of the betting.

One could argue that implementing the patch lets us "get to find out how the development community reacts to economic attacks on Bitcoin's finite resources."

we always have the option of throwing out the Satoshi Dice noise long enough to re-engineer Bitcoin to handle more activity.

This is not an activity problem. Once Bitcoin reaches a critical mass (when the blocks are always full) this problem will solve itself and we wouldn't need the "ban" or any sort of client fix. It's only a problem NOW in the early adoption phase because it drives up fees for no good reason.

Eventually fees will go up no matter what, because blocks will be full and transaction space will always be a limited resource (even if we increase the limit). But having fees go up now only hurts the adoption rate, which we need more than we need to support the handling of every gambling addicts manual or automated pull of the slot machine arm or roulette wheel.

[gweedo]

I never played Satoshi Dice, don't care for it. I think of it as another bitcoin business, but the funny thing is if you ban Satoshi Dice, what stops other similar services from just doing the same thing. This is just the silliest thing, yet this what makes bitcoin great. You don't want Satoshi Dice transaction apply the patch, voting with your software. So I am kinda indifferent it shows the power of bitcoin but yet Satoshi Dice is another bitcoin business, who now have investors so this is really bad for them.

[misterbigg]

if you ban Satoshi Dice, what stops other similar services from just doing the same thing.

The solution is not to "ban SatoshiDICE" but rather, to implement technical measures to make the economical unviable transactions it produces more expensive. It's not just SatoshiDICE that creates unspendable outputs, other things produce them as well. We need to address all of it. It's just that SatoshiDICE is responsible for more than 80% of all traffic on the Bitcoin network.

Satoshi Dice is another bitcoin business, who now have investors so this is really bad for them.

It's not "really bad", they can easily fix the problem but just not sending single-satoshi transactions for every losing bet. The problem is that the people running SatoshiDICE are...let's use the phrase "not nice." When they were confronted about it the answer was along the lines of "so what? If Bitcoin can't handle it then it deserves to die."

[fancy_pants]

I never played Satoshi Dice, don't care for it. I think of it as another bitcoin business, but the funny thing is if you ban Satoshi Dice, what stops other similar services from just doing the same thing. This is just the silliest thing, yet this what makes bitcoin great. You don't want Satoshi Dice transaction apply the patch, voting with your software. So I am kinda indifferent it shows the power of bitcoin but yet Satoshi Dice is another bitcoin business, who now have investors so this is really bad for them.

Hey whoa!,  nobody's talking about banning Satoshi Dice here.  That's the other thread.  This thread is about banning the ban.  In fact I think someone even suggested we ban all bans ( I dont know if the bitcoin police could handle the workload on that one.)  The reason is that most bans are harmful to what is being banned.  I'm sure Mr. Bigg scores chicks right and left with his huge paragraphs, but who ever reads to the end anyway?  Just vote then go kick some ass at satoshi dice.  I suggest you start out small with .003 bets at 75% then move up the foodchain if you get lucky.  Also, there's diceoncrack which is an epic martingale system automatic satoshi dice bet launcher.   Seriously, diceoncrack fires off about a thousand bets against the blockchain in seconds where it would take hours using the manual old school way on satoshi dice.  Both are great fun though!   diceoncrack makes bets so small and so fast it makes Satoshi Dice look like it just got punched in the face by that guy in the post above.

[Monster Tent]

5. Buy litecoin

[fancy_pants]

5. Buy litecoin

I just used the last spot to pump your dumbass litecoin.  Now, hows about a little something, you know, for the effort?  1co1eX56s2cGBSpL6EoymdYhqWLnCWFn1

[lassdas]

How about banning SatoshiDice from Bitcoin and let them move to litecoin?
I'd vote for that.

[fancy_pants]

How about banning SatoshiDice from Bitcoin and let them move to litecoin?
I'd vote for that.

amscray dude!  this thread is for pumping satoshidice, not some bullshit litecoin.  I only put option #5 up because I thought I could vote "no".  I only just now realized it doesnt work that way.

Oh, I almost forgot! The ticker for Satoshi Dice if you think it's a great investment is s.dice on the mpex exchange.

[lassdas]

this thread is for pumping satoshidice

Yeah, that's what I thought
"..completely neutral..", huh?  

IMO SD is just a spam-attack to the bitcoin-network, so I'll happily support every pool that applies this patch, good luck banning it.

[misterbigg]

"..completely neutral..", huh?  

It did give me a chuckle when I read that the first time.

[Melbustus]

...it is very likely that bots are doing much of the betting...

Now there's a problem that solves itself... Why would someone create a bot to place negative expectation bets? Unless there are progressives that get +EV sometimes. In which case, I'll be taking a break from this forum for a couple days to write a SatoshiDice bot. :-)

FWIW, I've never played SD, nor do I own any shares. But I agree with Casascius on this... The protocol allows this activity. Therefore, it's going to happen. Better to be forced to figure out how to properly handle it sooner rather than later.

I appreciate your point about this raising tx fees sooner than otherwise would've happened, and therefore negatively impacting the bitcoin adoption rate in general. But unless you think that the negative impact is of a sufficient magnitude to risk killing bitcoin completely, then it's a good thing to force the issue.

[J180]

Don't worry guys.

I spoke to the bitcoin police and they tell me they are keeping a close watch on the Satoshi Dice situation. They've interviewed three of the developers so far, and one of them remains in custody at my local bitcoin station.

[greyhawk]

Now there's a problem that solves itself... Why would someone create a bot to place negative expectation bets? Unless there are progressives that get +EV sometimes. In which case, I'll be taking a break from this forum for a couple days to write a SatoshiDice bot. :-)

They're trying to Martingale SatoshiDice. It's a common Bitcoiner problem: the inability to learn from past experience.

[nelisky]

this thread is for pumping satoshidice

Yeah, that's what I thought
"..completely neutral..", huh?  

IMO SD is just a spam-attack to the bitcoin-network, so I'll happily support every pool that applies this patch, good luck banning it.

I am "completely neutral" about DICEonCRACK and we are trying to prevent getting into the same spam issue as SD by grouping payouts as best as we can: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=120239.msg1598128#msg1598128 and by providing a wallet proxy (for now only on IRC) that does not signal losses with dust transactions https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=147722.0

I honestly believe that a proper solution needs to be found for the transaction spam issue for bitcoin as a whole, not targeting any specific service as this is severely needed to ensure bitcoin will survive globalization. Also, each miner has the freedom to choose which transactions to include in the found blocks, period. I wouldn't join a pool that filters anything because I believe the prioritization currently in existence is good enough. I'm invested in bitcoins for many reasons, not the least of which being the lack of central authority. We can boycott but we can't ban, simple as that, only a majority vote can steer the network one way or another, not an institution or a core group of developers.

This post started as a simple shameless plug "look at me, I'm trying neat solutions here" but ended up with my personal view of the problem... I need to learn to stay on topic!

[running]

it's funny how the same people talk about how bitcoin will take over the world and take over all transactions... and then they are angry at business that *uses it too much*... I mean come on. Free market and all that jazz!

SD is in my opinion not a spam. They are sending clearly distinguishable transactions, not trying to mask it or anything, and the miners can decide what to do with it.

[Gabi]

The ban will be enforced by the war spaceships of the Bitcoin Confederation or what?

[rini17]

Don't worry guys.

I spoke to the bitcoin police and they tell me they are keeping a close watch on the Satoshi Dice situation. They've interviewed three of the developers so far, and one of them remains in custody at my local bitcoin station.

I smell class lawsuit against s.dice. Or drones dispatchment.

[optimator]

Well I say let people do what they want....

But, I fear that the objections to SD cloaked in arguments about technical limitations of bitcoin are really a front for moral objections to gambling.

If SD is a problem FIX BITCOIN. SD is only the tip of the iceberg for transactions to come. Bitcoin must be ready or it will fail. Please don't set bitcoin up for failure because of moral objections to how it is used.

Cheers!

[misterbigg]

But, I fear that the objections to SD cloaked in arguments about technical limitations of bitcoin are really a front for moral objections to gambling.

Not really. You don't hear anyone complaining about http://satoshiroulette.com/ because they aren't creating economically unspendable outputs.

[optimator]

But, I fear that the objections to SD cloaked in arguments about technical limitations of bitcoin are really a front for moral objections to gambling.

Not really. You don't hear anyone complaining about http://satoshiroulette.com/ because they aren't creating economically unspendable outputs.

Fair enough. But then why not fix bitcoin? And if dust transactions are truly a problem then shouldn't the free market solve the problem with a solution?

[Raoul Duke]

What SD is doing and what this patch is doing and what the OP is doing is akin to the following analogy....

Bully is punching another student in the face, that student is trying to cover their face with their hands to dampen the blow, all while a third student is asking everyone to get mad at and hold the seconds students hands down because he is hurting the bullies choice to punch people in the face....  

Let'em come. We'll see who gets punched and who needs to cover their face.

Dogs who bark a lot rarely bit, haven't you heard? And this ones here aren't even dogs, just puppies.

[blockbet.net]

If SD is a problem FIX BITCOIN. SD is only the tip of the iceberg for transactions to come. Bitcoin must be ready or it will fail. Please don't set bitcoin up for failure because of moral objections to how it is used.

SD is not "the tip of the iceberg". Let's imagine a bitcoin-operated coffee shop and compare it to Satoshidice. Assume you have 1000 customers at your coffee shop every day, everybody makes one purchase. 1000 transactions spread over a day is not much.

With Satoshidice, a single user can generate 1000 transactions in an hour. He might even set up a martingale bot that was running 24 hours per day. Imagine a thousand customers doing the same, and you can start to see the problem.

In short: A couple of people using Satoshidice can generate more transactions than a ton of other businesses combined.

And I'm not even talking about the dust.

[Scrat Acorns]

Free market goes both ways and if the miners choose not to relay spam then SD will have to adapt. This is not about shutting them down, it is about them using proper netiquette. We're all in this together using a shared resource which we would like to see boom over the following years. Good manners would go a long way towards that outcome.

I consider 1 satoshi* transactions that are basically equal to "LOL YOU LOSE" as spam.

* Recently been changed to 5000, but it's the same thing.

[justusranvier]

SD is not "the tip of the iceberg". Let's imagine a bitcoin-operated coffee shop and compare it to Satoshidice. Assume you have 1000 customers at your coffee shop every day, everybody makes one purchase. 1000 transactions spread over a day is not much.

One coffee shop is still part of the tip of the iceberg.

Bitcoin eventually needs to be able to handle multiple coffee chains, each with tens of thousands of stores, all serving 1000 customers per day.

[Raoul Duke]

SD is not "the tip of the iceberg". Let's imagine a bitcoin-operated coffee shop and compare it to Satoshidice. Assume you have 1000 customers at your coffee shop every day, everybody makes one purchase. 1000 transactions spread over a day is not much.

One coffee shop is still part of the tip of the iceberg.

Bitcoin eventually needs to be able to handle multiple coffee chains, each with tens of thousands of stores, all serving 1000 customers per day.

keyword: eventually

[bullioner]

Don't worry guys.

I spoke to the bitcoin police and they tell me they are keeping a close watch on the Satoshi Dice situation. They've interviewed three of the developers so far, and one of them remains in custody at my local bitcoin station.

Classic -- thanks for the laugh.

[justusranvier]

keyword: eventually

https://www.khanacademy.org/math/arithmetic/exponents-radicals/world-of-exponents/v/understanding-exponents

[MysteryMiner]

The people have right to choose what software modifications they run on computers. But I strongly oppose the patch. It is not going to solve the problem of transaction volume. And I don't see a problem in first place.

We cannot code patches for every pesky service out there. I don't care is it Satoshi Dice who are filling the blockchain or Silk Road weed sales. Valid transaction is valid transaction.

[optimator]

If SD is a problem FIX BITCOIN. SD is only the tip of the iceberg for transactions to come. Bitcoin must be ready or it will fail. Please don't set bitcoin up for failure because of moral objections to how it is used.

SD is not "the tip of the iceberg". Let's imagine a bitcoin-operated coffee shop and compare it to Satoshidice. Assume you have 1000 customers at your coffee shop every day, everybody makes one purchase. 1000 transactions spread over a day is not much.

With Satoshidice, a single user can generate 1000 transactions in an hour. He might even set up a martingale bot that was running 24 hours per day. Imagine a thousand customers doing the same, and you can start to see the problem.

In short: A couple of people using Satoshidice can generate more transactions than a ton of other businesses combined.

And I'm not even talking about the dust.

Here's the iceberg:

On December 23, 2011, VisaNet processed 11,000 / second - source http://blog.visa.com/2011/01/12/visa-transactions-hit-peak-on-dec-23/ - That's 950,400,000 transactions per day.

At 24,000 SD transactions per day is .002525% of that traffic. Said another way, Bitcoin is nowhere near ready for the global stage if 1,000 dust transactions per hour grinds the system to a halt.

If SD is a problem, fix bitcoin.

[paraipan]

Free market goes both ways and if the miners choose not to relay spam then SD will have to adapt. This is not about shutting them down, it is about them using proper netiquette. We're all in this together using a shared resource which we would like to see boom over the following years. Good manners would go a long way towards that outcome.

I consider 1 satoshi* transactions that are basically equal to "LOL YOU LOSE" as spam.

* Recently been changed to 5000, but it's the same thing.

^ 100% agreed, is about netiquette within a shared medium. Think at it like a crowded room where someone starts farting continuously and pollutes all the air  

Btw, someone knows C++ programming? I need to have some features done for my bitcoin wallet, even if Gavin would not see them as crucial. Please add to the reward if you would like to see it done too.

[Killdozer]

On December 23, 2011, VisaNet processed 11,000 / second - source http://blog.visa.com/2011/01/12/visa-transactions-hit-peak-on-dec-23/ - That's 950,400,000 transactions per day.

At 24,000 SD transactions per day is .002525% of that traffic. Said another way, Bitcoin is nowhere near ready for the global stage if 1,000 dust transactions per hour grinds the system to a halt.

If SD is a problem, fix bitcoin.

All trolling aside, this is the fucking truth.
We should be thankful to SatoshiDice for practically highlighting the scalability flaws of bitcoin (like hitting the soft block size limit). If the community starts shiting bricks when SatoshiDice sends a few transactions, what happens if someone starts sharing internet for microtransactions? Or when a real casino starts using bitcoin? Or whatever?

[Raoul Duke]

On December 23, 2011, VisaNet processed 11,000 / second - source http://blog.visa.com/2011/01/12/visa-transactions-hit-peak-on-dec-23/ - That's 950,400,000 transactions per day.

At 24,000 SD transactions per day is .002525% of that traffic. Said another way, Bitcoin is nowhere near ready for the global stage if 1,000 dust transactions per hour grinds the system to a halt.

If SD is a problem, fix bitcoin.

All trolling aside, this is the fucking truth.
We should be thankful to SatoshiDice for practically highlighting the scalability flaws of bitcoin (like hitting the soft block size limit). If the community starts shiting bricks when SatoshiDice sends a few transactions, what happens if someone starts sharing internet for microtransactions? Or when a real casino starts using bitcoin? Or whatever?

A real real casino? One with deposit and withdrawal pages and it's own accounting ledger?

[solex]

I have never played Satoshi Dice, and view their transactions as spam, but I also view them as doing an VALUABLE SERVICE for Bitcoin and don't think it should be disrupted.  I would be happy that a patch exists, but would also leave it disabled myself.

Without Satoshi Dice, we are left to guesstimate what will happen when we start reaching limits.

With Satoshi Dice, we reach those limits in a non-committal way.  We get to find out how Bitcoin reacts under load, using a load that is for all intents and purposes optional.

If at some point Bitcoin becomes disrupted by transaction load (something I pretty much expect will happen eventually), we always have the option of throwing out the Satoshi Dice noise long enough to re-engineer Bitcoin to handle more activity.  This is far better than reaching those limits with brick-and-mortar business activity that will turn off the business community if they end up being the guinea pigs for Bitcoin's scalability.

Because of Satoshi Dice, people are considering how to prune the blockchain and how to make a client function with a UTXO set rather than mandating everyone be a historian - something I'm afraid would be nowhere as progressed were it not for this game.

+1000

casascius. I think this description should on the newbie FAQ so that at least the discussion starts from a useful level, instead of the basement each time.

[blockbet.net]

Here's the iceberg:

On December 23, 2011, VisaNet processed 11,000 / second - source http://blog.visa.com/2011/01/12/visa-transactions-hit-peak-on-dec-23/ - That's 950,400,000 transactions per day.

At 24,000 SD transactions per day is .002525% of that traffic. Said another way, Bitcoin is nowhere near ready for the global stage if 1,000 dust transactions per hour grinds the system to a halt.

If SD is a problem, fix bitcoin.

I have no idea if a thousand transactions is anywhere near the truth, it's just a number that I threw up there. But if you want to compare it to Visa, then, imagine if out of those 950 million Visa transactions per day, 800 million were coming from your local burger shop, from a handful of people who do nothing but swipe their Visa cards again and again and again. Seems fair? Point is, a handful of people are hogging a gigantic piece of the network, and it's affecting all of us. It is not "bringing the system to a halt", but it's certainly not helping (well, stress test is useful but that's more of a by-product).

I'm glad to see SD has already taken some steps to fix the issue, even if you insist that there never was an issue. I do agree that we need to fix bitcoin itself, but in the meanwhile, there has to be communication within the community as well.

[Elwar]

I cannot wait to start banning more companies from using Bitcoin.

Should we -really- be accepting transactions from Silk Road? They are giving us a bad rep.

And what about a patch to stop BitPay from using Bitcoin. They are just exploiting the early weakness of Bitcoin being too difficult for merchants to implement as a payment service.

This is great.

[sinner]

Let me get this straight--are some of you saying I cant play Satoshi Dice?

[simonk83]

How about banning SatoshiDice from Bitcoin and let them move to litecoin?
I'd vote for that.

Oh, I almost forgot! The ticker for Satoshi Dice if you think it's a great investment is s.dice on the mpex exchange.

Yeah, you're super neutral in this whole argument aren't you.   

[Raoul Duke]

I cannot wait to start banning more companies from using Bitcoin.

Should we -really- be accepting transactions from Silk Road? They are giving us a bad rep.

And what about a patch to stop BitPay from using Bitcoin. They are just exploiting the early weakness of Bitcoin being too difficult for merchants to implement as a payment service.

This is great.

Except Silk Road or Bitpay don't use always the same n addresses to receive their transactions and leave recognizable "footprints" everywhere...

[asdf]

Miners will ultimately have to deal with the resources consumed by tx spam. All they have to do is raise the fee for spamy transactions, if they are making a loss on them.

[BootyCall]

Lets say two of my mates and I decide to go for a drive one lovely day.  We each drive our own autos side by side across all three lanes of the highway at the minimum speed allowed by law forcing all others behind us to travel at the same low speed.  Assuming we do not block emergency workers we are not violating any laws (at least not where I live) but this does not justify our actions.  We are indeed injuring others.  (Using the word "injuring" here in the libertarian sense, very intentionally. <looks at Erik>)  For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.  SD is free to do as they please and the community is free to react as they see fit.

[pyra-proxy]

Let me get this straight--are some of you saying I cant play Satoshi Dice?

No they are saying they don't want to use their cpu/storage space processing the wasteful transactions that Satoshi Dice is making unnecessarily.

[pyra-proxy]

They are just exploiting the early weakness of Bitcoin being too difficult for merchants to implement as a payment service.

You know as well as any you can't compare Bitpay in this manner... bitpay makes necessary transactions to conduct business and is NOT exploiting bitcoin, heck if it weren't for bitpay I suspect the value of Bitcoin right now would be an order of magnitude lower.  They offer a well implemented, very valuable service... you know a payment service for merchants...  i.e. giving merchants an alternative or complementary service to Visa/Mastercard/Discover payment gateways which gets them involved in the Bitcoin world....

Can you explain how this relates to Satoshi Dice's wasteful usage of transaction "messages" on the block chain consuming near ?80%? of the entire space allocated for transactions for everyone?

[Elwar]

I cannot wait to start banning more companies from using Bitcoin.

Should we -really- be accepting transactions from Silk Road? They are giving us a bad rep.

And what about a patch to stop BitPay from using Bitcoin. They are just exploiting the early weakness of Bitcoin being too difficult for merchants to implement as a payment service.

This is great.

Except Silk Road or Bitpay don't use always the same n addresses to receive their transactions and leave recognizable "footprints" everywhere...

Ahh, gotcha.

So, try to use many addresses so that the community will not come after you.

I wonder how long it will take before we just split all of the large bitcoin wallets amongst ourselves. It will solve the hoarding thing. And those rich bastards do not really deserve it anyway.

This is great fun. We are like the government of Bitcoin, passing down regulations when we do not like the way someone uses our system.

Who should we go after next?

[Raoul Duke]

This is great fun. We are like the government of Bitcoin, passing down regulations when we do not like the way someone uses our system.

Regulations? You trippin', chap? You should stop with that Silk Road acid, it's damaging your last neuron.

[solex]

This is great fun. We are like the government of Bitcoin, passing down regulations when we do not like the way someone uses our system.

Regulations? You trippin', chap? You should stop with that Silk Road acid, it's damaging your last neuron.

LOL. Just brilliant.

[marhjan]

Look,  other than being a satoshidice shareholder,  I'm completely neutral here.  I can't tell the bitcoin police how to do their job any more than they can tell me to shut my mouth.  I'm a citizen, I pay my taxes, and I deserve a little bit more respect than you are giving me.  I voted to outlaw the ban on satoshi dice. What's the problem?

"Other than being..."  this made me LOL.   There are NO bitcoin police - talking about bans here is just absurd.  Some miners may choose not to relay SD transactions - if enough of them do so SD will likely have to transform their business practices.  This is a free market = good.  "Banning the ban" makes me wonder if you understand the bitcoin protocol at all honestly - and this 'little bit more respect you deserve'  meh - prove it.

[Raoul Duke]

Look,  other than being a satoshidice shareholder,  I'm completely neutral here.  I can't tell the bitcoin police how to do their job any more than they can tell me to shut my mouth.  I'm a citizen, I pay my taxes, and I deserve a little bit more respect than you are giving me.  I voted to outlaw the ban on satoshi dice. What's the problem?

"Other than being..."  this made me LOL.   There are NO bitcoin police - talking about bans here is just absurd.  Some miners may choose not to relay SD transactions - if enough of them do so SD will likely have to transform their business practices.  This is a free market = good.  "Banning the ban" makes me wonder if you understand the bitcoin protocol at all honestly - and this 'little bit more respect you deserve'  meh - prove it.

I think he meant "some fucking respect", à lá Patrick Stratteman.

[DoomDumas]

a patch ?

This is non-sense.. Bitcoin will evolve, dont bug that much on this issue.  Evolution to cope with a larger tx volume is necessary.. Now or later.  A patch ?  WTF !
Bitcoin network will be modified, this will make Bitcoin more ready for the futur usage by more and more user.

SDice just bring the issue up front sooner...

Normal evolution.. Please stop whining and developing patches, those are no good for the community, and the evolution of the network.

Do you notice that MrBigg got more and more Ignored !  He's also the one who compain the most about the scaling issue !

Please do not dramatise, bring constructive solutions, not a patch to segragate the network.. this is toxic.

This was my "punch in the face" vote !

[Rothgar]

This is a strange question.  It's not possible to ban such a patch. 

[fancy_pants]

This is a strange question.  It's not possible to ban such a patch.  

Well it looks like they just banned it now didn't they?  (I actually don't know what they banned, but there's some talk in the internet rooms about patched code)

[BadBear]

People can do what they want, their reasons are their own.

[whitenight639]

A better way of handling this would be to implement a better pruning system.

It is precisely because no solution to the pruning problem exists for this form of transaction spam that we need a way to address it.

Is this because of the small amounts? or some other technical reason?


Can we not find a way to make there trasactions prunable?

To be honest SD using 70% of the blockchain is ridiculous, im all libertarian and freemarket n shit but if a service is using 70% of the blcokchain slowing everyone elses shit down AND they are making transactions that will never be prunable its got to change, espeicially if the majority of bitcoiners feel the same way.   

[justusranvier]

Mining pool operators could make it economical to collect those unprunable outputs tomorrow if they wanted to, with no changes needed to the protocol.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150726.0

[solex]

Mining pool operators could make it economical to collect those unprunable outputs tomorrow if they wanted to, with no changes needed to the protocol.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150726.0

I am coming to the conclusion that this business is like herding cats

[Raoul Duke]

Isn't it good when people rush to "fix" things and fork the chain because of it?

Bitcoin doesnt need fixing. Satoshidice on the other hand...
They are now also responsible for a fork on the chain, like the spam wasn't enough.

[BitcoinAshley]

I missed the part where it is actually possible to enforce a ban on transaction spam filters.

The best you can do about it is whine and whine on the forums and hopefully some miners agree with you and don't use it.

I agree that it doesn't have to be SD specific; it could simply filter out spammy dustcoins with no tx fee.

[nelisky]

They are now also responsible for a fork on the chain, like the spam wasn't enough.

I usually steer clear of these particular trains of thought, but you do understand SD wasn't responsible, right? A bug in the BDB code caused this, and yes, SD did trigger the bug but while it was a nuisance to be very mild (I lost almost 4 hours of what was otherwise already too little sleep for this), it does mean some big enterprise (read government) that happens to find this bug can't create havoc and properly abuse this situation with properly prepared double spends and the like.

Honestly, I strongly believe everyone is entitled to their own opinion, mine isn't better than yours outside my own system of values but this community should keep together a little better and your constant calling wolf isn't helping, in my opinion... it is just my opinion! I don't really care too much what other people think anyway, unless I perceive a chance of learning from them.

[nelisky]

I agree that it doesn't have to be SD specific; it could simply filter out spammy dustcoins with no tx fee.

I believe SD sends dustcoins WITH proper tx fees. SD is paying the vast majority of fees now included in blocks, and has been for a while.

[Raoul Duke]

They are now also responsible for a fork on the chain, like the spam wasn't enough.

I usually steer clear of these particular trains of thought, but you do understand SD wasn't responsible, right? A bug in the BDB code caused this, and yes, SD did trigger the bug but while it was a nuisance to be very mild (I lost almost 4 hours of what was otherwise already too little sleep for this), it does mean some big enterprise (read government) that happens to find this bug can't create havoc and properly abuse this situation with properly prepared double spends and the like.

Honestly, I strongly believe everyone is entitled to their own opinion, mine isn't better than yours outside my own system of values but this community should keep together a little better and your constant calling wolf isn't helping, in my opinion... it is just my opinion! I don't really care too much what other people think anyway, unless I perceive a chance of learning from them.

In fact SD didn't trigger the bug.
The devs rushing to "fix" things which could be "fixed" by SD changing it's ways instead of "fixed" on the network level was the trigger.

[jgarzik]

I agree that it doesn't have to be SD specific; it could simply filter out spammy dustcoins with no tx fee.

I believe SD sends dustcoins WITH proper tx fees. SD is paying the vast majority of fees now included in blocks, and has been for a while.

This is entirely irrelevant when the fees are miniscule, compared to the block reward subsidy.

The cost of all those unspent outputs created by SD, for lost bets, impacts all bitcoin users.

[nelisky]

I agree that it doesn't have to be SD specific; it could simply filter out spammy dustcoins with no tx fee.

I believe SD sends dustcoins WITH proper tx fees. SD is paying the vast majority of fees now included in blocks, and has been for a while.

This is entirely irrelevant when the fees are miniscule, compared to the block reward subsidy.

The cost of all those unspent outputs created by SD, for lost bets, impacts all bitcoin users.

I am not defending nor attacking SD, and as I'm running a competitor (which is obviously a drop of water in the ocean, or a 1 satoshi tx in a large block compared to SD).

And the point that SD's stressing of the network is a great future proofing test has been made as many times as the SD is evil one. I don't understand why SD hasn't change its behaviour towards the problem but then again that hasn't reduced the amount of users they get, and thus the market has spoken. I would most certainly like to see a better fee equalization algorithm implemented, and would be glad to help achieve it, but it feels to me that most everyone chooses a side and points the finger, spending way too much time repeating "'coz I said so".

[solex]

They are now also responsible for a fork on the chain, like the spam wasn't enough.

I usually steer clear of these particular trains of thought, but you do understand SD wasn't responsible, right? A bug in the BDB code caused this, and yes, SD did trigger the bug but while it was a nuisance to be very mild (I lost almost 4 hours of what was otherwise already too little sleep for this), it does mean some big enterprise (read government) that happens to find this bug can't create havoc and properly abuse this situation with properly prepared double spends and the like.

Honestly, I strongly believe everyone is entitled to their own opinion, mine isn't better than yours outside my own system of values but this community should keep together a little better and your constant calling wolf isn't helping, in my opinion... it is just my opinion! I don't really care too much what other people think anyway, unless I perceive a chance of learning from them.

In fact SD didn't trigger the bug.
The devs rushing to "fix" things which could be "fixed" by SD changing it's ways instead of "fixed" on the network level was the trigger.

+1

[Raoul Duke]

They are now also responsible for a fork on the chain, like the spam wasn't enough.

I usually steer clear of these particular trains of thought, but you do understand SD wasn't responsible, right? A bug in the BDB code caused this, and yes, SD did trigger the bug but while it was a nuisance to be very mild (I lost almost 4 hours of what was otherwise already too little sleep for this), it does mean some big enterprise (read government) that happens to find this bug can't create havoc and properly abuse this situation with properly prepared double spends and the like.

Honestly, I strongly believe everyone is entitled to their own opinion, mine isn't better than yours outside my own system of values but this community should keep together a little better and your constant calling wolf isn't helping, in my opinion... it is just my opinion! I don't really care too much what other people think anyway, unless I perceive a chance of learning from them.

In fact SD didn't trigger the bug.
The devs rushing to "fix" things which could be "fixed" by SD changing it's ways instead of "fixed" on the network level was the trigger.

+1

Stop +1'ing my posts.
Don't you know there's possibly nothing you can learn from them?

[nelisky]

Stop +1'ing my posts.
Don't you know there's possibly nothing you can learn from them?

Touché... nothing like having good arguments to assert a point.

[Raoul Duke]

Stop +1'ing my posts.
Don't you know there's possibly nothing you can learn from them?

Touché... nothing like having good arguments to assert a point.

kabong...

[Luke-Jr]

If anything, we should be banning miners who refuse to do reasonable filtering like this.

[nelisky]

If anything, we should be banning miners who refuse to do reasonable filtering like this.

Banning is such a strong word, though. If a majority of miners would in fact refuse such transactions other smaller miners would start getting a lot of orphans and would be forced to either reduce their blocksize drastically or starts filtering out what goes in to their mined blocks. But that's only if the majority of miners sees that as a good thing for the network and their bottom line, no?

I mean, one of the most beautiful things about bitcoins, and one of the most criticized features of it at the same time is the lack of an appointed central authority, but majority still rules the chain.

[Luke-Jr]

If anything, we should be banning miners who refuse to do reasonable filtering like this.

Banning is such a strong word, though. If a majority of miners would in fact refuse such transactions other smaller miners would start getting a lot of orphans and would be forced to either reduce their blocksize drastically or starts filtering out what goes in to their mined blocks. But that's only if the majority of miners sees that as a good thing for the network and their bottom line, no?

If miners refuse to do their job in filtering, there's no reason to leave it up to miners.
Regular participating nodes can refuse to relay blocks with (eg) more than 50% Dice spam.

[justusranvier]

If miners refuse to do their job in filtering, there's no reason to leave it up to miners.
Regular participating nodes can refuse to relay blocks with (eg) more than 50% Dice spam.

Let me get this straight: a blockchain fork caused by the fixing of an unknown bug should be fixed ASAP. On the other hand the blockchain should be deliberately forked because not all miners agree with you?

[nelisky]

If anything, we should be banning miners who refuse to do reasonable filtering like this.

Banning is such a strong word, though. If a majority of miners would in fact refuse such transactions other smaller miners would start getting a lot of orphans and would be forced to either reduce their blocksize drastically or starts filtering out what goes in to their mined blocks. But that's only if the majority of miners sees that as a good thing for the network and their bottom line, no?

If miners refuse to do their job in filtering, there's no reason to leave it up to miners.
Regular participating nodes can refuse to relay blocks with (eg) more than 50% Dice spam.

Even better! So the people that in theory are the ones losing out from all this have the power to do something about it!

A new kind of poll is born, a client that does filtered relaying where the user can opt as to what kind of filtering to apply gives that user a vote. Then it is not just he said, she said, it's actually measuring user opinion.

But having clients decide on their own relay rules opens a whole new can of worms, of course, and will ultimately open a new angle of attack against bitcoin stability. It does present an interesting case, perhaps worth discussing further.

[BitcoinAshley]

So wait, the Psy theory is the following:
Major bug in network. Don't actually fix it, simply expect the company taking advantage of it to stop taking advantage of it out of the kindness of their hearts. Then, proceed to exercise monumental amounts of naivety by assuming that no other website will come along and start to do the same exact thing. When they do, instead of fixing the bug, simply come on bitcointalk.org and whine and whine about it instead of fixing the bug. The (by then 100+) websites doing the exact same thing should simply stop doing it out of the kindness of their hearts. Rinse repeat. Never actually solve problem, just expect that it will solve itself if I whine about it enough. Don't fix flaws, just expect people not to aBTCuse them.

Psy, ...wtf? I can't even begin to wrap my mind around that.

That's like the Canadian people expecting the operators of the Exxon-Valdez vessel to pay for the environmental damage of the spill out of the kindness of their hearts, after passing a law specifically limiting the company's financial liability in case of a spill. It's nice, if you're in kindergarten, to expect the world to be all fluffy and happy and companies will simply not profit from loopholes and exemptions and little flaws that allow them to make more money.
This is not kindergarten. Expect that any flaw will be fully taken advantage of and abused, and must be taken care of like the SRS BSNS that it is.

[Luke-Jr]

If miners refuse to do their job in filtering, there's no reason to leave it up to miners.
Regular participating nodes can refuse to relay blocks with (eg) more than 50% Dice spam.

Let me get this straight: a blockchain fork caused by the fixing of an unknown bug should be fixed ASAP. On the other hand the blockchain should be deliberately forked because not all miners agree with you?

This topic has nothing to do with blockchain forking, period.

So wait, the Psy theory is the following:
Major bug in network. Don't actually fix it, simply expect the company taking advantage of it to stop taking advantage of it out of the kindness of their hearts. Then, proceed to exercise monumental amounts of naivety by assuming that no other website will come along and start to do the same exact thing. When they do, instead of fixing the bug, simply come on bitcointalk.org and whine and whine about it instead of fixing the bug. The (by then 100+) websites doing the exact same thing should simply stop doing it out of the kindness of their hearts. Rinse repeat. Never actually solve problem, just expect that it will solve itself if I whine about it enough. Don't fix flaws, just expect people not to aBTCuse them.

Psy, ...wtf? I can't even begin to wrap my mind around that.

That's like the Canadian people expecting the operators of the Exxon-Valdez vessel to pay for the environmental damage of the spill out of the kindness of their hearts, after passing a law specifically limiting the company's financial liability in case of a spill. It's nice, if you're in kindergarten, to expect the world to be all fluffy and happy and companies will simply not profit from loopholes and exemptions and little flaws that allow them to make more money.
This is not kindergarten. Expect that any flaw will be fully taken advantage of and abused, and must be taken care of like the SRS BSNS that it is.

The flaw is that miners aren't doing their job filtering spam. That's how the Bitcoin protocol deals with it.

[Raoul Duke]

So wait, the Psy theory is the following:
Major bug in network. Don't actually fix it, simply expect the company taking advantage of it to stop taking advantage of it out of the kindness of their hearts. Then, proceed to exercise monumental amounts of naivety by assuming that no other website will come along and start to do the same exact thing. When they do, instead of fixing the bug, simply come on bitcointalk.org and whine and whine about it instead of fixing the bug. The (by then 100+) websites doing the exact same thing should simply stop doing it out of the kindness of their hearts. Rinse repeat. Never actually solve problem, just expect that it will solve itself if I whine about it enough. Don't fix flaws, just expect people not to aBTCuse them.

Psy, ...wtf? I can't even begin to wrap my mind around that.

That's like the Canadian people expecting the operators of the Exxon-Valdez vessel to pay for the environmental damage of the spill out of the kindness of their hearts, after passing a law specifically limiting the company's financial liability in case of a spill. It's nice, if you're in kindergarten, to expect the world to be all fluffy and happy and companies will simply not profit from loopholes and exemptions and little flaws that allow them to make more money.
This is not kindergarten. Expect that any flaw will be fully taken advantage of and abused, and must be taken care of like the SRS BSNS that it is.

You put in my mouth a lot of words I didn't say...
That's to be expected.

[justusranvier]

If miners refuse to do their job in filtering, there's no reason to leave it up to miners.
Regular participating nodes can refuse to relay blocks with (eg) more than 50% Dice spam.

Let me get this straight: a blockchain fork caused by the fixing of an unknown bug should be fixed ASAP. On the other hand the blockchain should be deliberately forked because not all miners agree with you?

This topic has nothing to do with blockchain forking, period.

One faction in the network refusing to relay valid blocks has no potential to cause a fork?

[Luke-Jr]

If miners refuse to do their job in filtering, there's no reason to leave it up to miners.
Regular participating nodes can refuse to relay blocks with (eg) more than 50% Dice spam.

Let me get this straight: a blockchain fork caused by the fixing of an unknown bug should be fixed ASAP. On the other hand the blockchain should be deliberately forked because not all miners agree with you?

This topic has nothing to do with blockchain forking, period.

One faction in the network refusing to relay valid blocks has no potential to cause a fork?

If it gets big enough, it could cause a soft-fork. But that's a much different/smaller problem than a hardfork, and unlikely to occur (since miners would presumably get their act together before it got to this point).

Edit: The real problem with this idea, is how to coordinate undoing it when/if SD cleans up their service so that it stops flooding.

[justusranvier]

If it gets big enough, it could cause a soft-fork. But that's a much different/smaller problem than a hardfork, and unlikely to occur (since miners would presumably get their act together before it got to this point).

If half the network decides that blocks containing SD transactions are valid, and the other half decide they are invalid it would indeed be a hard fork.

There's no guarantee that it would go your way either.  The majority of the network might just continue processing those transactions and ignore your blocks until you get your act together.

[Luke-Jr]

If it gets big enough, it could cause a soft-fork. But that's a much different/smaller problem than a hardfork, and unlikely to occur (since miners would presumably get their act together before it got to this point).

If half the network decides that blocks containing SD transactions are valid, and the other half decide they are invalid it would indeed be a hard fork.

Notice I never suggested to consider them invalid. Just not relay them.

There's no guarantee that it would go your way either.  The majority of the network might just continue processing those transactions and ignore your blocks until you get your act together.

You mean Bitcoin's way. My miners are just doing their job filtering out spam, like they're supposed to as part of the Bitcoin system.
And if you start trying to force miners to accept transactions, you're breaking Bitcoin.
In this particular case, you'd in effect be creating a SD tax on miners.

[maximian]

My miners are just doing their job filtering out spam, like they're supposed to as part of the Bitcoin system.

My understanding is that SD no longer creates 1 satoshi transactions. The minimum it now sends is 5000 satoshis, which should help with the unspendable bit dust problem. Does that change your position on SD transactions?

[Luke-Jr]

My miners are just doing their job filtering out spam, like they're supposed to as part of the Bitcoin system.

My understanding is that SD no longer creates 1 satoshi transactions. The minimum it now sends is 5000 satoshis, which should help with the unspendable bit dust problem. Does that change your position on SD transactions?

Not at all. Those are still dust spam, and even if they never sent anything on losses, their "bet" and "win" transactions are still spam.

[justusranvier]

[Soros Shorts]

I used to be able to run a full node on a cheap $30/month VPS. When SD came along, I got banned for generating too much I/O.

Now I am paying a lot more to host my full node (almost 10x more). The cost includes an SSD partition for the blockchain database.

At some point I won't be willing to pay the minimum cost to operate a full node. Being able to filter out less important transactions might allow me to operate my node longer with my given budget. The alternative would be to take it completely offline.

Would it be better to go offline and relay nothing, or remain online and relay a subset of transactions?

[ShireSilver]

You mean Bitcoin's way. My miners are just doing their job filtering out spam, like they're supposed to as part of the Bitcoin system.

You don't seem to understand what bitcoin is. Satoshi Dice is the one actually using bitcoin correctly, unlike the other sites that require you to create an account and log in. Your Orwellian insistence on calling it spam doesn't put you in a good light. Please understand that bitcoin is making the old centralized ways of doing things obsolete, and we need to learn how to build new ways of doing things.

Centralization, which is required in systems that make you create accounts, leads inevitably to corruption. Satoshi Dice has found a way to work in the bitcoin system and not require centralization, which is a huge benefit to us all - regardless of some small inconveniences that you appear to want to whine about even though it isn't really a problem.

And as has been pointed out, your quest for vengeance against an upstanding citizen of the bitcoin economy has apparently killed an innocent victim. It is looking like the colored coin distributed asset management system is no longer viable. This would have been a huge boon to small businesses and individuals who might have used it to raise needed capital. Instead they will have to continue to rely on old outdated systems that are less efficient and can expose them to JBTs unnecessarily.

[justusranvier]

This would have been a huge boon to small businesses and individuals who might have used it to raise needed capital. Instead they will have to continue to rely on old outdated systems that are less efficient and can expose them to JBTs unnecessarily.

Apparently some key people involved with Bitcoin see this as a desirable outcome.

[pyra-proxy]

You mean Bitcoin's way. My miners are just doing their job filtering out spam, like they're supposed to as part of the Bitcoin system.

You don't seem to understand what bitcoin is. Satoshi Dice is the one actually using bitcoin correctly, unlike the other sites that require you to create an account and log in. Your Orwellian insistence on calling it spam doesn't put you in a good light. Please understand that bitcoin is making the old centralized ways of doing things obsolete, and we need to learn how to build new ways of doing things.

Centralization, which is required in systems that make you create accounts, leads inevitably to corruption. Satoshi Dice has found a way to work in the bitcoin system and not require centralization, which is a huge benefit to us all - regardless of some small inconveniences that you appear to want to whine about even though it isn't really a problem.

And as has been pointed out, your quest for vengeance against an upstanding citizen of the bitcoin economy has apparently killed an innocent victim. It is looking like the colored coin distributed asset management system is no longer viable. This would have been a huge boon to small businesses and individuals who might have used it to raise needed capital. Instead they will have to continue to rely on old outdated systems that are less efficient and can expose them to JBTs unnecessarily.

Your body and mind is centralized so therefore corrupted... please go and decentralize yourself to purge the corruption.  Have a nice day!

[HorseRider]

SD is a bitcoin business which is using the bitcoin network to wire money with real business intention (gambling). I do not see any problem with SD. Bitcoin should handle this problem, but not ban SD. If we need ban SD, I don't think bitcoin has the scalable future that most people once imaged.

[Gabi]

SD is a bitcoin business which is using the bitcoin network to wiring money with real business intention (gambling). I do not see any problem with SD. Bitcoin should handle this problem, but not ban SD. If we need ban SD, I don't think bitcoin has the scalable future that most people once imaged.

+1

[robocoin]

I just imagined a guy with enough money to drive a big PR campain against some sort of political enemy, that includes convincing miners to ignore all TXs relatated to the enemys BTC address. But that wouldn't really work? No?

For now it seams reasonable to filter out SDice. More complications to come.

[jgarzik]

SD is a bitcoin business which is using the bitcoin network to wire money with real business intention (gambling). I do not see any problem with SD. Bitcoin should handle this problem, but not ban SD. If we need ban SD, I don't think bitcoin has the scalable future that most people once imaged.

That is 3/4 of what SD does.

1/4 of what SD does is send worthless 0.00000001 bitcoins -- essentially instant messages / emails -- through the blockchain, saying "You lose"

That latter is informational, bloats our "unspent transaction" ledger with unspendable bitcoins, and should not be in the blockchain at all.

People on IRC also claim that SD gambles against themselves to build their Most Popular Bitcoin Gambling Website brand, which would also bloat the blockchain, but there is no way of proving or disproving that rumor.

[Luke-Jr]

People on IRC also claim that SD gambles against themselves to build their Most Popular Bitcoin Gambling Website brand, which would also bloat the blockchain, but there is no way of proving or disproving that rumor.

Well, if you ask around, there is surprisingly few people who actually play SD...

[HighInBC]

Are we really going to go down the road of deciding who can and cannot use bitcoin?

Any solution should be agnostic of specific vendors. The problem is not SD, how the hell is bitcoin going to scale to meet massive use if we can't handle a single company?

[Luke-Jr]

Are we really going to go down the road of deciding who can and cannot use bitcoin?

Any solution should be agnostic of specific vendors. The problem is not SD, how the hell is bitcoin going to scale to meet massive use if we can't handle a single company?

A vendor-specific solution is better than no solution at all. It buys us time to figure out a better solution.
And worst case scenario, this problem is short-term anyway - the risk goes away when bitcoin adoption is sufficient to handle it.

[HorseRider]

People on IRC also claim that SD gambles against themselves to build their Most Popular Bitcoin Gambling Website brand, which would also bloat the blockchain, but there is no way of proving or disproving that rumor.

Well, if you ask around, there is surprisingly few people who actually play SD...

I know a local gambler who has write his own script to gamble on SD at thousands of bets per day, as he believes that his script can win money. He once tried to raise a venture capital fund to gamble with SD.....(Of course, a single example cannot disprove that rumor. )

[HighInBC]

I know a local gambler who has write his own script to gamble on SD at thousands of bets per day, as he believes that his script can win money. He once tried to raise a venture capital fund to gamble with SD.....(Of course, a single example cannot disprove that rumor. )

Does this person not understand the concept of the odd being stacked towards the house?

[phatsphere]

i haven't read everything, but for now there are a few things granted: miners can do what they want, and they cannot be banned. it's decentralized - period.
second, i think we should start thinking more about how to structure the fees. fee must be smaller than the transacted amount, and be at least of 0.1%? additionally, add a certain penalty amount, if you send it to a new address… also, the fee should weight in how old are the past tx out and the general size of the TX. there is a lot to experiment!
S.D. is just enabling this discussion. I hope something useful will come out of this and the fee has the right incentives to secure bitcoins scalability.

[Luke-Jr]

fee must be smaller than the transacted amount, and be at least of 0.1%?

You can't know how much was transacted unless you're the sender.

additionally, add a certain penalty amount, if you send it to a new address…

All transactions should be going to new addresses! If anything, we should penalize address reuse.

also, the fee should weight in how old are the past tx out and the general size of the TX.

Already does.

[HighInBC]

...
All transactions should be going to new addresses! If anything, we should penalize address reuse.
...

Nonsense. Address reuse is perfectly valid. When I spend from a paper wallet I send the change back to the same place. I sign the transaction on an offline computer using electrum, then publish it on another. I would have to constantly be printing out change wallets if I did not send the change back.

How exactly is address reuse an issue to anyone?

[knightmb]

Are we really going to go down the road of deciding who can and cannot use bitcoin?

Any solution should be agnostic of specific vendors. The problem is not SD, how the hell is bitcoin going to scale to meet massive use if we can't handle a single company?

+1,
Bitcoin is a set of rules and as long as your follow the rules, no one should be allowed to pass judgement on how others use it. Unless the rules are changed to combat perceived problems, such as the micro-transactions that SD brings up, everyone is complaining about the problem and not offering up any solutions and thus will never solve the perceived problem.

There is no such thing as a technical solution to a social problem. 

[Luke-Jr]

...
All transactions should be going to new addresses! If anything, we should penalize address reuse.
...

Nonsense. Address reuse is perfectly valid. When I spend from a paper wallet I send the change back to the same place. I sign the transaction on an offline computer using electrum, then publish it on another. I would have to constantly be printing out change wallets if I did not send the change back.

How exactly is address reuse an issue to anyone?

It compromises the network's privacy (not just your own!). Basic privacy is pretty important when it comes to finances.

Additionally, when we upgrade to post-quantum cryptography, reusing an address will likely allow people to compromise your wallet - possibly even other addresses in it (though I'm not so sure on this last bit).

Bitcoin is a set of rules and as long as your follow the rules, no one should be allowed to pass judgement on how others use it. Unless the rules are changed to combat perceived problems, such as the micro-transactions that SD brings up, everyone is complaining about the problem and not offering up any solutions and thus will never solve the perceived problem.

There is no such thing as a technical solution to a social problem. 

Flooding is a social problem, and that is why Bitcoin uses a social solution (miners who are supposed to filter it).
Nobody is "passing judgement" on SD (or maybe someone is, but it's unrelated to this) for being gambling or anything like that.
Enabling flooding is simply not possible.

[solex]

Nobody is "passing judgement" on SD (or maybe someone is, but it's unrelated to this) for being gambling or anything like that.
Enabling flooding is simply not possible.

I agree. SD's business model best runs without internalizing transactions, unlike Coinbase or Mt. Gox, who do internalize. The problem is that SD's model is scalable much faster than the Bitcoin network's capability. SD usage could scale 10x while the network capability might only double in that time.

SD brings in a lot of fees, and is "stress-testing" Bitcoin, and highlights the risk of a flooding attack. All these are beneficial to have or know. I did suggest blocking SD yesterday and got criticism for it. I accept that and withdraw that idea. My earlier suggestion stands: which is for fees to somehow rise exponentially for flooding sources on a per block basis. It seems possible to do this, but perhaps it isn't.

[justusranvier]

The problem is that SD's model is scalable much faster than the Bitcoin network's capability. SD usage could scale 10x while the network capability might only double in that time.

This is an artifact of the extremely low transaction volume that makes fees negligible compared to the block subsidy. The network will be more sustainable when the volume is high enough that transaction fees match the block reward because from that point on increase volume will directly translate in the increased revenue for the miners to pay for the necessary capacity.

[solex]

The problem is that SD's model is scalable much faster than the Bitcoin network's capability. SD usage could scale 10x while the network capability might only double in that time.

This is an artifact of the extremely low transaction volume that makes fees negligible compared to the block subsidy. The network will be more sustainable when the volume is high enough that transaction fees match the block reward because from that point on increase volume will directly translate in the increased revenue for the miners to pay for the necessary capacity.

Fair enough. Then, what is the path to get smoothly to that future?

There is no proper fees market for block access at present because fees average <5% of the block reward. A 1MB block accommodates about 2400 transactions (ignoring many inputs/outputs possible). With the block reward about $1150 it means an average fee of $0.48 is required to match the reward in value. Is there a consensus on a "reasonable" fee for a vanilla Bitcoin transaction? Is it closer to 5c than 0.5c or 50c? Probably. So the fees market for block space becomes viable when 10MB blocks are common. This is a while off. Until that time SD (and anything with a similar business model) can flood the network, unless these apps are throttled at the discretion of their owners.

[justusranvier]

Fair enough. Then, what is the path to get smoothly to that future?

There is no proper fees market for block access at present because fees average <5% of the block reward. A 1Mb block accommodates about 2400 transactions (ignoring many inputs/outputs possible). With the block reward about $1150 it means an average fee of $0.48 is required to match the reward in value. Is there a consensus on a "reasonable" fee for a vanilla Bitcoin transaction? Is it closer to 5c than 0.5c or 50c? Probably. So the fees market for block space becomes viable when 10Mb blocks are common.

Ideally replace the hard block limit with an algorithm like time-to-verify, but at least get it 10 MiB so that it's possible to reach the transaction rates that create a fees market.

Rely on the block reward, aided by increases in the exchange rate, to subsidize miners while they gradually start mining larger blocks and fund development of protocol optimizations that reduce the resources needed to run at high transaction rates to reduce the burden on full non-mining nodes.

This is a while off.

It can happen faster than you think. I don't think BitPay, Coinbase, and BIPS are going to slow down the rate they try to sign up new businesses, nor do I expect the growth in new users to slow down. Repeated success causes a snowball effect, and humans are notoriously bad an intuitively estimating exponential growth.

Also keep in mind there are plenty of countries where Bitcoin is still completely unknown. The Chinese and Indians are going to want to be able to make transactions on the blockchain too.

[astutiumRob]

Are we really going to go down the road of deciding who can and cannot use bitcoin?

I recently moved to a new laptop following a fatal hardware issue.
Install bitcoin, started d/loading the block chain over 2 _days_ later I was sync'd again.

Knowing in excess of 80% of that is SD when it's not a service I use or care about is annoying.

Now scale that up to more common acceptance of bitcoin - and people wont bother

There are only 2 solutions to ease adoption
# initial blockchain d/load has to be better handled, like a set of "hubs" with everything to X date in a single downloadable file - with the appropraite hashing/cross-checks to other "hubs"
# limitation of the blockchain to what needs to be in it - servcies like SD woudl work perfectly as well with an "account" based system like every other gambling site
- this benefits them - people leave their money in the gambling site(s) rather than constantly withdrawing it - means more of it to gamble
- this benefits everyone else - as it will limit the number of "public" broadcast transactions

Win-Win as they say.

The problem is not SD, how the hell is bitcoin going to scale to meet massive use if we can't handle a single company?

Coins change hands many many times before loss/destruction/sitting in a jar forever.
This _should_ be no different for bitcoin

Sadly the current system is equivalent to everyone having to carry about a photograph of every coin ever exchanged - there are of course benefits - but it's also a problem.

[ShireSilver]

I recently moved to a new laptop following a fatal hardware issue.
Install bitcoin, started d/loading the block chain over 2 _days_ later I was sync'd again.

Well, there's your problem. Install Electrum instead. Problem solved.

Knowing in excess of 80% of that is SD when it's not a service I use or care about is annoying.

Most of the bitcoin uses out there that other people are using aren't ones that I use or care about. Should I be whining about them?

There are only 2 solutions to ease adoption
# initial blockchain d/load has to be better handled, like a set of "hubs" with everything to X date in a single downloadable file - with the appropraite hashing/cross-checks to other "hubs"
# limitation of the blockchain to what needs to be in it - servcies like SD woudl work perfectly as well with an "account" based system like every other gambling site
- this benefits them - people leave their money in the gambling site(s) rather than constantly withdrawing it - means more of it to gamble
- this benefits everyone else - as it will limit the number of "public" broadcast transactions

Saying "there are only two solutions" is usually done when there *are* more than 2 solutions but the speaker doesn't want any other solutions to be considered. In other words it is a con job. But I would point out that your proposed solution 1 already exists - see Electrum.

Satoshi Dice would not work if you had to have an account. That's its whole point, that you don't need an account. You're asking for a system where it works like

1) insert coin in machine
2) pull lever
3) get results, win or lose
4) repeat 1-3 at will

to change to one where it works like

1 ) go to a cashier
2 ) exchange some coins of one type for coins of another type
3 ) go to machine
4 ) insert coin into machine
5 ) pull lever
6 ) get results, win or lose
7 ) repeat 4-6 at will until coins are gone or done
8 ) if wanting to continue play, go to 1
9 ) go to cashier
10) exchange coins of one type for coins of another type

and that is clearly retarded.

[misterbigg]

The problem is that SD's model is scalable much faster than the Bitcoin network's capability. SD usage could scale 10x while the network capability might only double in that time.

This is an artifact of the extremely low transaction volume that makes fees negligible compared to the block subsidy. The network will be more sustainable when the volume is high enough that transaction fees match the block reward because from that point on increase volume will directly translate in the increased revenue for the miners to pay for the necessary capacity.

An obvious solution presents itself:

Lower the hard limit on maximum block size to 200KB, and put it on a slowly increasing schedule back to 1 megabyte over the next two years!


      

[TraderTimm]

A fun infographic for new and old users of bitcoin alike:

"The blockchain is a shared resource... Won't you help to prevent abuse?"

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0BzdbolIn7zf1dEhJNmZYX0VpVTQ/edit?usp=sharing ~1.04 MB - 1024 x 2048

Larger sizes available upon request, share with whoever you like.

(The preview on Google Drive makes it look pixelated, but I assure you the original is razor-sharp vector graphics.)

[hardcore-fs]

A far easier way would be to introduce a 'mix' filter, so that  'low value' transactions can take up no more than '%' of a block, backlog them, they will soon reduce them down.
Or 'boundary' them, I.E  bitcoins between a certain value get delayed a given number of days, before there is an attempt to stuff them in the block.

[Smoovious]

A far easier way would be to introduce a 'mix' filter, so that  'low value' transactions can take up no more than '%' of a block, backlog them, they will soon reduce them down.
Or 'boundary' them, I.E  bitcoins between a certain value get delayed a given number of days, before there is an attempt to stuff them in the block.

:facepalm:

Ya know... it is these stupid artificial games played by people who want to control the money supply which sparked the existence of Bitcoin in the first place!

Leave it alone. The transaction fee/priority system works. Stop trying to fiddle with it and LET IT WORK.

We've become too complacent with the change to reduce transaction fees in the first place, which never should have been done. Now people will have to include reasonable fees again.

GOOD!

-- Smoov

[Technomage]

I have never played Satoshi Dice, and view their transactions as spam, but I also view them as doing an VALUABLE SERVICE for Bitcoin and don't think it should be disrupted.  I would be happy that a patch exists, but would also leave it disabled myself.

Without Satoshi Dice, we are left to guesstimate what will happen when we start reaching limits.

With Satoshi Dice, we reach those limits in a non-committal way.  We get to find out how Bitcoin reacts under load, using a load that is for all intents and purposes optional.

If at some point Bitcoin becomes disrupted by transaction load (something I pretty much expect will happen eventually), we always have the option of throwing out the Satoshi Dice noise long enough to re-engineer Bitcoin to handle more activity.  This is far better than reaching those limits with brick-and-mortar business activity that will turn off the business community if they end up being the guinea pigs for Bitcoin's scalability.

Because of Satoshi Dice, people are considering how to prune the blockchain and how to make a client function with a UTXO set rather than mandating everyone be a historian - something I'm afraid would be nowhere as progressed were it not for this game.

+100

[Technomage]

That is 3/4 of what SD does.

1/4 of what SD does is send worthless 0.00000001 bitcoins -- essentially instant messages / emails -- through the blockchain, saying "You lose"

That latter is informational, bloats our "unspent transaction" ledger with unspendable bitcoins, and should not be in the blockchain at all.

This is a very important point. Banning SD in general makes no sense whatsoever, but figuring out a mechanism to stop the 1 satoshi dust spam, is definitely needed.

[justusranvier]

This is a very important point. Banning SD in general makes no sense whatsoever, but figuring out a mechanism to stop the 1 satoshi dust spam, is definitely needed.

1 satoshi won't be dust forever.