Will BTC Ever Increase the Block Size Cap?

[Abiky]

With the adoption of SegWit, the concept of "block size" has been a thing of the past. Now, there's something called "Block Weight" where Bitcoin can currently handle up to 4mb blocks (please correct me if I'm wrong). The activation of SegWit back in 2017, has enabled Bitcoin to be compatible with layer-two scaling solutions like the Lightning Network. This second layer of the BTC blockchain enables instant, and cheap payments in an off-chain manner.

The capacity of the LN greatly depends on the number of nodes available, channel capacity, among several other factors. However, I believe that the LN is limited to Bitcoin's block size capacity in order to open/close channels on-chain more efficiently. A 4MB block weight may not seem enough for BTC to reach massive mainstream adoption if the Lightning Network becomes overloaded. That's why, it's best for BTC to increase the block size at a slow and steady rate every couple of years to maintain itself scalable for the foreseeable future. If devs are not willing to increase the block size, then Bitcoin will face the same scalability issues of today even with the Lightning Network in play.

What are your thoughts?

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[ðºÞæ]

Sig tells you all about scaling without LN altcoin.

[franky1]

(after reading other topic)

cant believe ETFbitcoin prefers that people give funds to custodians for 6 months and plays around with pegged tokens called milisats in that time.(3 oncahain a year: 1open, 1 close-aggregate-reopen, 1close)
he might aswell just stick to fiat and banks be his custodians of his value(hint: he lost memory of bitcoins true purpose if he really loves the idea of turning bitcoin into just a reserve store for custodians)

the 4mb WEIGHT is not actually a 4mb hard drive capacity. nor 4x transaction potential
its just a bad math equation while still keeping transactions reliant on the 1mb base block data limit.

even parts of segwit transactions need to sit in the 1mb baseblock limit thus limiting how many segwit transactions can be added
this is why after 2010 saying that bitcoin can do 7tx/s (600k a day) we have not still. even after segwit even surpassed 600k a day nor even attempted to get 2.4m that they 'imply' by suggesting the 4mb weight means the same thing as a 4mb block

anyway. in 2014-5 bitcoin could handle 1mb blocks. and yes there were many improvements too since then. meaning 4 years later 4mb of true legacy space is EASY

threats like linear sigops validation are a simple fix by just limiting sigops per tx
so bitcoins ability to scale onchain are there. but core just wont release the code and will strike off any other dev team that opposes cores standing

to all those folk prefering people lock funds up for 6 months at a time and use mobile apps that are server api'd to 'factories/watchtower' services.. is actually more of a 'server'/'client' scenario then the crap spouted about the btc network becoming a server farm of nodes.
yep LN will cause more users to end up using litewallets as thy would see less point in running a full node if they only touch the btc network once every 6 months.
think about it

i still cant believe people actually want to advice others that locking funds into hubs/factories/watchtowers(corporate banks 2.0) is the route they prefer
(facepalm)

the btc network can handle more transactions a day by raising the baseblock and getting rid of the fudgy math of the 4x weight. the issue is not technical. its not just political. and core the the ones preventing it

[R.I.U. iol]

yep LN will cause more users to end up using litewallets as thy would see less point in running a full node if they only touch the btc network once every 6 months.

Using the same logic, won't bigger blocks also reduce the incentive to run full nodes, since they would take up much more space on the HD and thus be more expensive for users.

[Wind_FURY]

OP, we don't know. Maybe? But look at Bitcoin Cash, or Litecoin, or Dogecoin. They're faster, and can do more transactions per second, but why are they less-used compared to Bitcoin?

Plus newbies, listen to franky1. Learn the hard way.

[ðºÞæ]

Satoshi didn't have a 1MB limit in it.
The limit was originally Hal Finney's idea.  Both Satoshi and I objected that it wouldn't scale at 1MB.  Hal was concerned about a potential DoS attack though, and after discussion, Satoshi agreed.  The 1MB limit was there by the time Bitcoin launched.  But all 3 of us agreed that 1MB had to be temporary because it would never scale.  -Ray Dillinger

October 04, 2010
Satoshi explains how to remove the limit:

[franky1]

cant believe ETFbitcoin prefers that people give funds to custodians for 6 months and plays around with pegged tokens called milisats in that time.(3 oncahain a year: 1open, 1 close-aggregate-reopen, 1close)
he might aswell just stick to fiat and banks be his custodians of his value(hint: he lost memory of bitcoins true purpose if he really loves the idea of turning bitcoin into just a reserve store for custodians)

Using LN paper as example why block size need to be increased doesn't mean i support locking funds for 6 months (it's simply ridiculous).
I only support using LN for micro-transaction with far shorter timelock.

yet you advertise LN as a best case scenario usage of just 3 tx a year

While i strongly prefer combination of both off-chain and on-chain scaling (not block size increase), there's upper limit of those scaling solutions.
Even lightning network paper mention the need of block size increase on unrealistic best scenario (where everyone use LN and only make 3 transaction/year).

you actually done a strikethrough. to advocate you think its best and not unrealistic to expect 6month locks

And if people use custodial service to use LN, it's their problem. There's way not to use custodial service if you run your own full nodes client or use watchtower.

dang you really dont even know how LN works, yet advocate for it
for a watchtower to even have power to stop one of the parties from early broadcast. the watchtower has to have signing control level above the parties. meaning funds are not in your full control. thus they are your custodian

its the same as having a joint bank account with your wife.. but it aint money under a pillow that you both quibble over in private. but under the watch of a bank watching over it and ensuring your wife doesnt spend all your savings without your consent

yep LN will cause more users to end up using litewallets as thy would see less point in running a full node if they only touch the btc network once every 6 months.
think about it

As if people bother use full node wallet these days for on-chain transaction.

IMO people who bother run full node client today won't use light or custodial wallet if they want to use LN.

LN only function well if
A. people can plan spending habits.
      people cannot successfully plan a fortnight-month all the time.
      thus LN would require people closing and reopening channels fortnightly/monthly not 6monthly
B. to close and re-open without impacting the blockchain. they have to custodian up funds for 6 months and then let the custodian 'manage' and maintain offchain contracts of 2-4 weeks and re-aggregate funds offchain to avoid broadcasts

C. the promo of LN is fast transactions such as buying coffee or groceries without causing a queue.. people use mobile cell phones not desktop computers to buy quick fast stuff in retailers. meaning not a full node but a litewallet app

so again when using a lite wallet app daily and not needing to touch the blockchain for 6 months. people wont see the point in running a full node

the solution to make people want to be full nodes is actually make using onchain useful for everyday tasks, not 6monthly chores

LN does not have the same security as bitcoin
LN has many ways to lose funds. even LN devs have lost funds
LN has many flaws such as routing, regular funding, spending limits, trust of the other party

think about it all someone has to do is wait for you to go to bed and thy can broadcast their prefered tx, that stiff's you
LN is designed go falsely make people trust custodians and others having control over your spending decisions. all while saying and pretending its as secure as bitcoin by playing the bitcoin brand game of 'layers bitcoin' even though the reality is that its a separate network without all of bitcoins security measures

[hatshepsut93]

It only makes sense to seriously start considering another block size increase when:

1. The fees are high all the time over some long period of time.
2. It's clear that full nodes can meet the increased requirements

Since the last bubble popped, the fees were consistently low, so there's no urgent need for another blocksize increase right now. If we increased the blocksize just to better handle the sudden spikes of transactions, it would just create unnecessary permanent load on nodes that can't be reversed back.

[franky1]

2. It's clear that full nodes can meet the increased requirements

Since the last bubble popped, the fees were consistently low, so there's no urgent need for another blocksize increase right now. If we increased the blocksize just to better handle the sudden spikes of transactions, it would just create unnecessary permanent load on nodes that can't be reversed back.

what TECHNICAL problems are there that current computers cannot meet
though segwit does not ustilise the '4mb'... by devs saying '4mb' they seem fine with system requirements of 4mb
also hard drives are not 1990's floppy disks but 1tb ssd the size of a international postage stamp

also unlike blocks of 2014 block headers are broadcast and verified in seconds and the transaction data (the main bloat of a block) would be majority verified long before the header even gets mined. thus much faster

also the fudgey math of the 4x isnt producing a 4x transaction potential so if devs are ok with 4mb of data.. then just do the logical thing and open up the base block to such that the 4mb allowance is actually 4mb allowance without the bait and switch hidden data and unaccounted data

oh and if you say tx fee's are low. great. keep them low but let pools earn more by having more transactions.
EG 8000tx a block at 1 sat/tx is 4x more than 2000tx at 1sat/tx. trying to constrain the baseblock at 1mb just to say pools ned 'demand' to stop people just playing 1sat is foolish. pools can earn more without the constraint

imagine it like a lottery. where the prize has to be $10. would u prefer 1 person paying $10 a ticket. or 10 people paying $1 a ticket
by making it cheaper, more people remain interested and keep doing it.
making it expensive to use deters people from using it

and dont bother turning it into a debate about full nodes will cost thousands of dollars for servers.
sorry but we are not in the floppy disk era where 1 floppy is $1 and how 250,000mb would be $250k
we are in the world of cheap hard drives where by default computers have 1tb hard drives
we are in a world of fibre and 5g.. we are not stuck at dialup speed

i never hear netflix customers complain that netflix decidd to only stream in 480 res.. netflix streams at HD and the internet hasnt blown up in an apocalypse

[muslol67]

With the adoption of SegWit, the concept of "block size" has been a thing of the past. Now, there's something called "Block Weight" where Bitcoin can currently handle up to 4mb blocks (please correct me if I'm wrong). The activation of SegWit back in 2017, has enabled Bitcoin to be compatible with layer-two scaling solutions like the Lightning Network. This second layer of the BTC blockchain enables instant, and cheap payments in an off-chain manner.

The capacity of the LN greatly depends on the number of nodes available, channel capacity, among several other factors. However, I believe that the LN is limited to Bitcoin's block size capacity in order to open/close channels on-chain more efficiently. A 4MB block weight may not seem enough for BTC to reach massive mainstream adoption if the Lightning Network becomes overloaded. That's why, it's best for BTC to increase the block size at a slow and steady rate every couple of years to maintain itself scalable for the foreseeable future. If devs are not willing to increase the block size, then Bitcoin will face the same scalability issues of today even with the Lightning Network in play.

What are your thoughts?

We have always argued that Block size is not something that can be constantly increased. For this reason, different solutions such as LN and segwit had started to be proposed. I think the issue is more than block size, because mining equipment is not developing rapidly enough. In other words, mining equipment should have increased hash power and / or better performance with less energy. It'il make things a little better.

[mikeywith]

by making it cheaper, more people remain interested and keep doing it.
making it expensive to use deters people from using it

If the above theory is correct then BTC would have been the least used/adpoted coin by now, assuming it has the highest fees among it's competitors, the fact that people still pay a "fortune" to use bitcoin proves that "cheap" does not always attract more people, this is not the 18th century anymore, people do question things around them, anyone with 2 brain sells will wonder, why the heck do people pay so much to use bitcoin when they can use BSV and get close to zero fees ? people will eventually know that security and stability come with cost, and then they will have to make a choice between using a semi-decentralized block chain that has a ton of hash power securing it , or use a semi-centralized shitcoin like BSV.

to put this in a simple way for the average person to understand, if your theory is valid then nobody would buy a German car , they can get a faster and a better looking Korean car for half the price , those cheap Korean cars never made it to the top as far as sales/profit is concerned.

I am not against blocksize increase per se ,but it must be only done when no other options are left , and when actually people start using bitcoin, as far as the whole world is concerned nobody actually uses crypto, all crypto users combined can probably fit in a medium size building somewhere in Thailand , and please don't tell me people aren't using crypto because fees are "high" because if that's true then coins that have pretty low fees would have been already adopted.

The main issue with big blockers is underestimating technology limitations, do you know that a person in my country needs to spend at least a full month salary to actually run a bitcoin node with the current blocksize ? let alone a 16mb or more,  I pay a fortune for 2mb connection with a very limited quota, it's pretty damn expensive for me to maintain a node so that I can solo mine on it and verify transactions, how do you expect me to propagate a 500mb block like the one BSV had the other day ? you need to understand that the world does not revolve around 1st class rich and well developed countries like yours, in fact when you think about it, a 500mb block is insane ,and only a handful of people can actually keep up with such blocks.

Rushing to increase blocksize the way BSV did for example will very shortly lead to 10-20 large companies running every single node, technically back to square 1 where a "bunch of rich white men sit together in a closed room and decide for everybody else".

[yoseph]

With the adoption of SegWit, the concept of "block size" has been a thing of the past. Now, there's something called "Block Weight" where Bitcoin can currently handle up to 4mb blocks (please correct me if I'm wrong). The activation of SegWit back in 2017, has enabled Bitcoin to be compatible with layer-two scaling solutions like the Lightning Network. This second layer of the BTC blockchain enables instant, and cheap payments in an off-chain manner.

The capacity of the LN greatly depends on the number of nodes available, channel capacity, among several other factors. However, I believe that the LN is limited to Bitcoin's block size capacity in order to open/close channels on-chain more efficiently. A 4MB block weight may not seem enough for BTC to reach massive mainstream adoption if the Lightning Network becomes overloaded. That's why, it's best for BTC to increase the block size at a slow and steady rate every couple of years to maintain itself scalable for the foreseeable future. If devs are not willing to increase the block size, then Bitcoin will face the same scalability issues of today even with the Lightning Network in play.

What are your thoughts?

We have always argued that Block size is not something that can be constantly increased. For this reason, different solutions such as LN and segwit had started to be proposed. I think the issue is more than block size, because mining equipment is not developing rapidly enough. In other words, mining equipment should have increased hash power and / or better performance with less energy. It'il make things a little better.

We used to talk about the concept of increasing the block size when we were paying high transactions fees but now that we are currently paying low transaction fees, nobody seems to care about that anymore. I believe the blocksize is going to be maintained for the foreseeable future. Unless that something dire comes up so that they change it.

[Carlton Banks]

The capacity of the LN greatly depends on the number of nodes available, channel capacity, among several other factors. However, I believe that the LN is limited to Bitcoin's block size capacity in order to open/close channels on-chain more efficiently. A 4MB block weight may not seem enough for BTC to reach massive mainstream adoption if the Lightning Network becomes overloaded.

not really how it works

the more Lightning software improves, the easier it will be to keep channels open permanently (Lightning devs have been improving the standards for 2 years now). And then once there's enough money in Lightning channels to maintain demand for transactions, the need for closing or opening channels is pretty minimal.

and besides we're nowhere near that situation yet. Lightning use can't be that high, it's running on 850 BTC at the moment. And blocks aren't full. And fees aren't high.

[DooMAD]

I'm just going to cross-paste my reply from the other topic, because I get the impression it's not an easy point to counter:

The only sensible answer is "wait and see".  If users begin running code that would permit blocks which are larger than currently allowed, something might change.  If users continue to run code that would reject larger blocks, it won't.  

But what you should always try to remember is this:  All these people out there running code are doing so to enforce their preferences, not yours.  I can't speak for everyone out there, but I have a sneaking suspicion they don't feel any pressure to increase their burden simply in order to reduce yours.  And this is absolutely what you are asking of them when you insist they should store and circulate these larger blocks for you.

No ifs, buts or maybes.  It'll only happen if or when users want it.

[franky1]

by making it cheaper, more people remain interested and keep doing it.
making it expensive to use deters people from using it

If the above theory is correct then BTC would have been the least used/adpoted coin now by now,

what you actually find is that in 2014-2015 bitcoin had massive merchant adoption. but due to no significant scaling proposals and how fee's started to become more than pennies. merchants started to drop off in 2016-2019
yep less real merchants
(and no dont talk about the crappy 'virtual avatars' and digital kittens people can buy. i mean real world merchants)

The main issue with big blockers is underestimating technology limitations, do you know that a person in my country needs to spend at least a full month salary to actually run a bitcoin node with the current blocksize ? let alone a 16mb or more,

and here we go.. another 'leaper' script instead of a 'scaling' script.. come on no one is talking about 16mb or gigabytes by midnight. calm down

I pay a fortune for 2mb connection with a very limited quota, it's pretty damn expensive for me to maintain a node so that I can solo mine on it and verify transactions, how do you expect me to propagate a 500mb block

you need to understand that the world does not revolve around 1st class rich and well developed countries like yours, in fact when you think about it, a 500mb block is insane ,and only a handful of people can actually keep up with such blocks.

500mb block.. again calm down with the apocalypse leaping to high blocksize immediately.
i could kind of tell you are just repeating nonsense cases as soon as you used the word 'bigblockers' which just shows everyone which scripts you ben reading

Rushing to increase blocksize the way BSV did for example will very shortly lead to 10-20 large companies running every single node, technically back to square 1 where a "bunch of rich white men sit together in a closed room and decide for everybody else".

again think SCALING not LEAPING. really. chill on the 500mb scripts your thinking of

[hotmom]

I somehow doubt this, it is unlikely that bitcoin will change somehow in the coming years.

[franky1]

I'm just going to cross-paste my reply from the other topic, because I get the impression it's not an easy point to counter:

The only sensible answer is "wait and see".  If users begin running code that would permit blocks which are larger than currently allowed, something might change.  If users continue to run code that would reject larger blocks, it won't.  

But what you should always try to remember is this:  All these people out there running code are doing so to enforce their preferences, not yours.  I can't speak for everyone out there, but I have a sneaking suspicion they don't feel any pressure to increase their burden simply in order to reduce yours.  And this is absolutely what you are asking of them when you insist they should store and circulate these larger blocks for you.

No ifs, buts or maybes.  It'll only happen if or when users want it.

rebuttal
this topic shows people want it.
why are they not getting it
because CORE are not writing the code to even give users to even let the users choose
why not.. well thats been discussed. they prefer offchains and alt networks to push people over to
thus refuse to release code for an upscale of the base block

and if non-core devs dared write code and released something that people would want. guess what. core would just mandate they 'f**k off' as they did in 2017

so yea tell people to just wait like sheep for core to release code because we both know everyone on the btc network has to do that now. wait and see what core spoons out.

people have no choice for what the btc network changed into.. core now bypass consensus
that was your whole flip flop. you kept saying there was no democracy you kept saying there is no consensus

the only thing you couldnt accept was there used to be, before core made it their sole network where they became the central decision maker of coded rules to implement on the network.

but have a good day mr flippity flop

[lighpulsar07]

I don't think core devs have plans to increase the blocksize since bitcoin is still fine at the moment the users and merchants that use bitcoin is significantly reduced since the bubble popped in early 2018 but honestly though lightning network hasn't gained an attraction since it's launch in last year.

[Abiky]

Same topic recently discussed at https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5202006.0

Everyone have different opinion/thought, but it's safe to assume it won't happen anytime soon as long as there are other off-chain and on-chain scaling solution.

Thanks for letting me know. I might continue the discussion from there. Just became concerned about Bitcoin's block size capacity, since devs have been focusing more on the LN instead of the core Blockchain protocol. This could turn out to be bad for Bitcoin in the long run, since even the LN will become overloaded by too many operations on the main chain involving opening/closing channels. With the current block weight of 4MB, we shouldn't worry much about this issue during the meantime. But eventually, Bitcoin will need to increase the size of blocks a little, just to remain relevant as "digital cash" for the world.

not really how it works

the more Lightning software improves, the easier it will be to keep channels open permanently (Lightning devs have been improving the standards for 2 years now). And then once there's enough money in Lightning channels to maintain demand for transactions, the need for closing or opening channels is pretty minimal.

and besides we're nowhere near that situation yet. Lightning use can't be that high, it's running on 850 BTC at the moment. And blocks aren't full. And fees aren't high.

Well, if channels remain permanently opened, then the block size wouldn't be much of an issue within the BTC blockchain. As long as blocks aren't filled in their entirety, there's no need to worry about increasing the block size at all. We got the Lightning Network already, and it's still not heavily used by people in the mainstream world. It's only a matter of time, to determine which method of scaling would be the most suitable in terms of decentralization and security. Bitcoin via the Lightning Network will compete with other alternatives that use "big blocks" (like Bitcoin Cash and Bitcoin SV) across the crypto market. The coin that remains decentralized and scalable enough for the world, will most likely succeed for the foreseeable future. So far, Bitcoin seems to be a winner in this regard as both BCH and BSV will become heavily centralized because of their enourmous block size capacity.