Significant Decimal Precision

[LoyceV]

What about coloured coins ?

You need to colour some BTC, and you need lots of decimal places, to have lots of decimal places on your token.

I don't think the Bitcoin protocol should be changed for external needs that can be used on a side chain.

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[DooMAD]

I hear this mythical date in 2140 when we find the last scrap.. but does it have to be.. if only we could keep halving.. for-EVER!

You'll be adding an ever smaller number of Bitcoins per block. There's no point increasing the total Bitcoin supply by - say - 0.00000000000001% per block. The limited supply is by design, and it's one of the things that makes Bitcoin better than fiat.

It would still take some time to exceed the 21 million cap, though.  My understanding was that currently there will never be more than 20999999.9769 BTC in circulation (or technically 20999949.9769 BTC due to the unspendable genesis block).  Adding more decimal places and dealing with sub-satoshi units would not create enough extra BTC to make up for the 2310000 satoshi shortfall for many years, if ever.

//EDIT:  Unless my math is wrong, which I'm starting to think it is.

//DOUBLE_EDIT:  Nope, seems okay:

20999999.97690000
+
(210000 blocks x .5 satoshi) 0.00105000
=
20999999.97795000
+
(210000 blocks x .25 satoshi) 0.00052500   
=
20999999.97847500
+
(210000 blocks x .125 satoshi) 0.00026250
=
20999999.97873750
+
(210000 blocks x .0625 satoshi) .00013125
=
20999999.97886875
+
(210000 blocks x .03125 satoshi) .000065625  (nine decimal places)
=
20999999.978934375  (nine decimal places)

So yeah, that's another ~20 years without crossing 21 million BTC and I'm sure if I kept going, it's okay for some time, or possibly forever.

[ABCbits]

--snip--

So yeah, that's another ~20 years without crossing 21 million BTC and I'm sure if I kept going, it's okay for some time, or possibly forever.

Actually, it will never cross 21 million BTC as long as the only thing changed is halving every 210.000 blocks happen forever rather than until the mining reward is 1 satoshi.

It's just like math problem/logic where if you sum 1/2, 1/4, 1/8, 1/16, ..., 1/2ⁿ is less than 1

[o_e_l_e_o]

You can read more about it here: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Controlled_supply#Projected_Bitcoins_Long_Term

The total number of bitcoins in existence asymptotically approaches 21 million. After the penultimate halving, the block reward will only be 1 satoshi per block, and so after the final halving, there will be no block reward, and we will have mined 20,999,999.9769 BTC. It does not matter how many additional decimal positions you added, or how much you further subdivide a satoshi, you would never cross the 21 million asymptote. As ETF says, it is essentially an infinite series, becoming infinitely close to 21 million with infinite more decimal places, but never crossing.

[DooMAD]

So, if the base protocol may, given consensus, be upgraded at some point take on the additional decimal places to accommodate settling LN millisats to the blockchain, we'd have the option at that point of extending the halvings as well.  Worth considering, I guess.  I'm sure miners won't have any complaints, heh.

[o_e_l_e_o]

So, if the base protocol may, given consensus, be upgraded at some point take on the additional decimal places to accommodate settling LN millisats to the blockchain, we'd have the option at that point of extending the halvings as well.

True. It also depends on when the additional decimal places are added. After the 10th halving, the block reward will reduce from 0.09765625 BTC to 0.04882812 BTC, with a rounding error of 0.5 satoshi being lost. This error is compounded in all future halvings, and added to with further rounding errors in subsequent halvings.

If we added an additional 3 decimal places before then, then we would end up going to 43 halvings instead of 33, and the total mined BTC would be 20,999,999.99997060000, for an increase in 0.0230706 BTC.

If we waited until just before the final currently planned halving, when the block reward was 1 satoshi, to add another 3 decimal places, then we would add 9 instead of 10 additional halvings, and the final mined bitcoin would be 20,999,999.97898740000, for a difference of 0.0020874 BTC more than planned, but 0.0209832 BTC less than the former scenario detailed above.

If we added 3 more decimal places somewhere between these two extremes, then obviously the final amount of added bitcoin would lie somewhere in between ~0.002 and ~0.02 BTC.