WARNING! Bitcoin will soon block small transaction outputs

[lophie]

You have a point, but Bitcoin started with an understanding that 1 satoshi was the minimum.  Now, we're being told that the limit is 5340 satoshis, with no free-market input on the matter.  It's rather disappointing.  Individuals should be able to decide what size of transaction is too small - we shouldn't all be forced to suddenly abide by the same arbitrary rule.

Last time I checked Bitcoin was opensource, The client and the protocol. Did Gavin changed that as well?  

Look IMO your problem is that you still confuse Bitcoin with other alternatives having a central authority. Bitcoin transactions don't magically happen, All nodes participate, Those nodes have challenges to overcome and some of them are common ones. This is a "suggestion" on how to overcome a certain one of them.

Look at the recent unfortunate fork event. Wasn't the devs utterly helpless at "applying" the solution? It most be adopted/executed by the network in order to work. So they "suggested" the solution. They provided rationale for it, People liked it, People saved the day.

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[solex]

Now, we will be regulated to only sending transactions of a certain size.  No free market choice here...

Shame of them limiting the amount to one satoshi! it should be 1/100000 of a satoshi.....

What kind of argument is that?  

You have a point, but Bitcoin started with an understanding that 1 satoshi was the minimum.  Now, we're being told that the limit is 5340 satoshis, with no free-market input on the matter.  It's rather disappointing.  Individuals should be able to decide what size of transaction is too small - we shouldn't all be forced to suddenly abide by the same arbitrary rule.

5340 satoshis is negligible, less than a US or Euro cent, and a very sensible minimum. This cutoff is a needed arbitrary rule which mirrors the real-world where fiat sub-cent transactions are also unwelcome.  The 5340 will be reduced as BTC value increases.

This whole thread is a fuss about a benefit interpreted wrongly.

The Achilles Heel of Bitcoin is being swamped by transactions worth less than a cent because, unlike fiat coinage transactions, Bitcoin transactions are stored on thousands of servers for years or forever.

[muyuu]

You have a point, but Bitcoin started with an understanding that 1 satoshi was the minimum.  Now, we're being told that the limit is 5340 satoshis, with no free-market input on the matter.  It's rather disappointing.  Individuals should be able to decide what size of transaction is too small - we shouldn't all be forced to suddenly abide by the same arbitrary rule.

This change is temporary, and at current valuations it's not an issue.

I'd be more interested in finding out what the permanent solution will be. But there must be something because block size is a finite resource.

The alternative right now is to leave it with MIN_RELAY_TX_FEE=0.0005 BTC.

[Bakemono]

I think that this change is a positive one in every way especially with the current state of things.

Still many people have concerns because this change looks like a regulation from a central authority or something
and there is a red line there that i dont know how thin it is.

[gmaxwell]

You have a point, but Bitcoin started with an understanding that 1 satoshi was the minimum.

0.01 was actually the minimum available in software at the start.

Now, we're being told that the limit is 5340 satoshis, with no free-market input on the matter.

And Satoshi also added mandatory fees for transactions producing outputs under 0.01.

It's rather disappointing.  Individuals should be able to decide what size of transaction is too small - we shouldn't all be forced to suddenly abide by the same arbitrary rule.

They do.

This is a terrible idea, IMO.  Miners and full nodes should be able to decide which transactions to relay and include in blocks, and which transactions to not.  An option to set a minimum amount per output or transaction should be built in to the client.  So miners, if they believe transactions below a certain size to be dust, should set the option to not propagate transactions below that certain size.

Uh. You realize your "should" are describing the change here, right?

Yes, but there is no choice in the matter (as far as I am aware).  Will there be an option where I can set what transaction amounts I wish to propogate and what transaction amounts I wish to block?

There is. It's just set off the configuration option that sets the amount of fee treated as zero. As I've been saying over and over and over again.

True, but then those miners will receive no future updates.  If 0.8.2 and onward include this patch, then those who disagree with the patch will be forever left on 0.8.1.

No, it's a freeking commandline setting.

[gmaxwell]

The Achilles Heel of Bitcoin is being swamped by transactions worth less than a cent because, unlike fiat coinage, Bitcoin transactions are stored on thousands of servers for years or forever.

Just so.  If there are no limitations at all a griefer (or other malicious force, like an antiquated payment system that feels threatened by Bitcoin) could just flood bitcoin with inconsequential "non-transactions" producing hundreds of gigabytes of bloat and making bitcoin unusuable and non-decenteralized (because if Bitcoin required 200GB of storage right now in its infancy, who would run it??).  So there must be something to rate limit attacks.

Fees have generally served this purpose— but they are a blind mechinsm that doesn't really distinguish abusive use from good use, they just hope abusers use the network a lot more. But as there is more legitimate economic use and value people want the base fees to go down and not up.  Fortunately, some of the more obnoxious abuse these days looks categorically different from ordinary transactions: They create tons of 1e-8 value outputs (not 0 value, because the node software already blocks zero value outputs) which encode data.  By having a minimum output value it increases the cost of that bloat by a factor of over 5000 without impeding pretty much any normal transactions.  It also reduces the incidence of people getting irritated because they've received payments which cost them more in fees to spend then they're worth.

[ewitte]

I'm ok if its temporary but if 1BTC is say $1000 or $2000 it needs to be adjusted.  I tried "free" dust and its a waste of time a CPU can mine more in a single block.

[fellowtraveler]

I'm hoping this change won't impact colored coins -- because colored coins are important.

Can anyone comment on this?

[muyuu]

I'm ok if its temporary but if 1BTC is say $1000 or $2000 it needs to be adjusted.  I tried "free" dust and its a waste of time a CPU can mine more in a single block.

It is temporary.

That said, we still don't know what the definitive fix will be. Or at least I haven't found it sketched anywhere.

[jubalix]

Bitcoin is not suitable for micro transactions. This is all. Nothing new  here, it was pretty obvious from the very beginning that all those dusters are allowed to shit into blockchain only until there are not enough more serious transactions to fill the blocks.

If you want to spam blockchain, patch the client or use another one and hope that miners will be amenable to serve you for free.

As value goes up, the the micro's are not micro's any more, but perhaps the Bitcoin protocol canot handle mass adoption then? is this an admission?

[gmaxwell]

I'm hoping this change won't impact colored coins -- because colored coins are important.
Can anyone comment on this?

I did above, it's also covered on the pull request above—  it means that absent some agreement a miner you'll have to use quanta for your colored coins large enough to pass the rule.  This works out sensibly in any case, because it means that even if your colored coins lose their colored value there will still be some economic incentive for people to sweep up the set of unspent transaction outputs.

[mrkent]

Why do we even need satoshis then? Let's just taken a digit off the currency then?

[bitcoin_bob]

Gavin Andresen has changed the Bitcoin code to block any output with a value of less than 54uBTC:
...

So, what happens when Bitcoin takes over the world economy, and 54 uBTC is worth a lot of money ($54 say)?  Then Bitcoin will only be usable for large-value transactions...  It will be more like the existing inter-bank wire-transfer system at that point...

Yes, the price on money transfers will be determined by free markets. It is not impossible that bitcoin will mostly be used for debt settlement and large transfers like real estate transactions and inter bank ops.

Well I'm auctioning off a house in Bitcoin at the moment because I agree wholeheartedly that this kind of transaction is what BTC is useful for. However, when I go to spend my BTC on goodies, I don't want to HAVE to buy another house with them

[lophie]

..............It also reduces the incidence of people getting irritated because they've received payments which cost them more in fees to spend then they're worth.

I certainly can understand this.....

[evoorhees]

You can all thank Erik "Tony Hayward" Voorhees for polluting the blockchain so badly that this has come to pass.

Thanks for "stress testing" us to a hard-fork, Erik (again). You're such a champ - at taking people's money. I'd also like to thank all the mouth-breathing fools that thought Satoshi Dice was a good idea. You're also at fault too.

Great job, Erik - you profit-first douchebag.

Lots of good arguments in there, Timm.

SatoshiDice has paid more to miners than all the rest of everyone, combined. It pays for its usage of the blockchain, according to the rules of the game. If you have ever sent a transaction without a fee attached, you are spamming the blockchain more than SD.

[notme]

Bitcoin needs distributed block chain storage. This will fix everything.

This.  There is no reason why every node needs to store every block.  Luckily, the solution is obvious: blockchain pruning.  As long as there are 100 or so copies and the people who care about the transaction store it, the blockchain can be completely reconstructed.  Some will still archive the whole thing, but it doesn't have to be necessary.

[jgarzik]

I personally think that it would be much better if those "policy settings" in the client were tunable via config file and cli params and Gavin simply suggested the best ones via defaults.

This change does exactly that:  takes previously compiled-in "minimum relay" defaults, and make them configurable.

[solex]

Bitcoin needs distributed block chain storage. This will fix everything.

This.  There is no reason why every node needs to store every block.  Luckily, the solution is obvious: blockchain pruning.

I'm all for it. So, when this is implemented, then perhaps the coin dust minimum can be reduced from 5430 to 1 satoshi at a faster rate than the BTC fx rate is climbing.

[jgarzik]

the satoshi spam is not a threat, it is a view of the future payment value and volume once bitcoin exceeds $£1000 each. Gavin should be looking for ways to make the block chain cope, not ignore!

Part of the issue is that people were starting to use the blockchain for data storage, not currency transfer.

Below a certain economic value, it becomes trivial to use ultra-low-value transactions as data transmission.

[boonies4u]

If you have ever sent a transaction without a fee attached, you are spamming the blockchain more than SD.

What is everyone's take on this? (will edit in my take on it)