So..What's Next For Bitcoin?

[titular]

I hate to be the guy that is already looking ahead, given that Taproot has not even been activated* yet.

Nonetheless, what is the next move for Bitcoin? Bigger Blocks? (Kidding) POS? (Kidding'er)

On a more serious note, I am curious as to what the focus will be for the next upgrade in a year or two. Will everything be more focused on L2? Security upgrades? Anonymity upgrades?

I have read many of the BIP's on GitHub, but I am unsure of what is likely to be accepted or not.

I'd rather ask you folks than the clowns on Reddit. What upgrades do you see coming next?

[1715054895]

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[1715054895]

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[kxwhalexk]

lol，yes it's kidding .
Bigger Blocks，Faster block update speed.These are simply changing some parameters based on the original.

But changing the parameters may not be so easy. This needs the support of miners.

Bigger Blocks，Faster block update speed all have their own problems, such as DDOS attacks, easier to fork, etc.

[pooya87]

I hate to be the guy that is already looking ahead, given that Taproot has not even been implemented yet.

I think you mean "activated" because Taproot was implemented a long time ago, was locked recently and will activate in a couple of months.

Nonetheless, what is the next move for Bitcoin? Bigger Blocks? (Kidding) POS? (Kidding'er)

We got bigger blocks back in 2017 with SegWit softfork and with Taproot we are going to get some additional "efficiency" increase that contributes to increasing capacity (smaller tx size => more tx in a block).
And PoS is a joke of course.

I am curious as to what the focus will be for the next upgrade in a year or two. Will everything be more focused on L2? Security upgrades? Anonymity upgrades?

You can subscribe to the mailing list and be informed of all the developments.
https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/bitcoin-dev

[titular]

I hate to be the guy that is already looking ahead, given that Taproot has not even been implemented yet.

I think you mean "activated" because Taproot was implemented a long time ago, was locked recently and will activate in a couple of months.

Nonetheless, what is the next move for Bitcoin? Bigger Blocks? (Kidding) POS? (Kidding'er)

We got bigger blocks back in 2017 with SegWit softfork and with Taproot we are going to get some additional "efficiency" increase that contributes to increasing capacity (smaller tx size => more tx in a block).
And PoS is a joke of course.

I am curious as to what the focus will be for the next upgrade in a year or two. Will everything be more focused on L2? Security upgrades? Anonymity upgrades?

You can subscribe to the mailing list and be informed of all the developments.
https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/bitcoin-dev

I was searching for the correct term and couldn't seem to find it. Thank you for finding it for me LOL

I figured implementation was analogous to activation.

[ndalliard]

BIP-118: SIGHASH_ANYPREVOUT - anyprevout.xyz

and

BIP-300/301: Drivechain - drivechain.xyz

are two proposals i am interested in, but i am only scratching the surface

[vjudeu]

Nonetheless, what is the next move for Bitcoin?

MimbleWimble, of course. If it will succeed in LTC, it will be also implemented in BTC, as it was with Segwit.

Bigger Blocks?

No chance for that, the only thing that can be done on-chain is compressing data more efficiently. And that is possible with Pedersen Commitments (range proof is another story and they are probably too heavy to be implemented).

POS?

There is no need for changing consensus from Proof of Work to something else. The only improvement I can see in this matter is mining decentralization, maybe with Stratum v2 or something else.

Will everything be more focused on L2?

Yes, things like SIGHASH_ANYPREVOUT are discussed, also full-RBF probably will be enabled.

[BlackHatCoiner]

Do we really need bitcoin that would  be delisted on exchanges?

We won't think what exchanges may try to do. We surely won't leave our chance to improve Bitcoin's privacy just because we'll be afraid of exchanges' actions. The situation with Monero is different; it's not same like adopted as Bitcoin and it has much less market cap. And still, I consider this temporary.

Imagine an exchange delisting Bitcoin, which is the first mover and the one that mainly moves the market of the other cryptocurrencies.  

[Wind_FURY]

Personally, I want to see people under Business Development work with Lightning builders and exchanges, and start implementing the infrastructure required for mass use and adoption. Some things can be learned from Jack Mallers’ “experiment” with El Salvador.

[titular]

Nonetheless, what is the next move for Bitcoin?

MimbleWimble, of course. If it will succeed in LTC, it will be also implemented in BTC, as it was with Segwit.

I'm not sure if MimbleWimble is a real need in the case of  Bitcoin. By and large, exchanges are very suspicious to all coins that have sophisticated privacy features and either don't list them or delist them if they are already there. Consider Monero for example. It was listed on Bitttrex for long time but was removed from exchange in January this year. Do we really need bitcoin that would  be delisted on exchanges?  I don't think so.

You dont think XMR's issues stem from the negative press? Do you think Bitcoin would get this bad press if they targeted anon features like Monero?

[BrewMaster]

You dont think XMR's issues stem from the negative press? Do you think Bitcoin would get this bad press if they targeted anon features like Monero?

nothing in history of cryptocurrencies have received more bad press than bitcoin, most people don't even know what XMR is. so no i don't think the FUD about bitcoin can get any worse than this.
but if we can add more privacy features to bitcoin as the adoption already growing it will be helpful to increase that adoption. but if bitcoin didn't have its adoption like XMR then adding more FUD could prevent its further growth.

[vjudeu]

By and large, exchanges are very suspicious to all coins that have sophisticated privacy features and either don't list them or delist them if they are already there.

But Bitcoin is not going to activate such changes in a hard fork way. Any such exchange will just reject MimbleWimble addresses in the same way as some exchanges don't accept Segwit addresses. The same with mining pools, there are some of them mining only non-Segwit transactions or censoring Bitcoin transactions. Also, many exchanges freeze funds above some limit anyway, forcing you to do KYC/AML stuff, for that reason we should focus more on decentralized exchanges or maybe even having some LN-based exchange attached to each LN node by default (or maybe some L3 node).

Consider Monero for example.

Monero has privacy enabled by default and forced on all users, which is good for privacy and bad for exchange listing. But Bitcoin is going to activate new features by creating new address types, that of course makes privacy worse, but nobody can be forced to use new features. You cannot force anyone to use Segwit, the same will be with MimbleWimble, if implemented. Of course, as with Segwit, there will be incentives to use such addresses, because joining transactions make it possible to decrease transaction size, so it is cheaper.

Do we really need bitcoin that would  be delisted on exchanges?  I don't think so.

If trading by LN will work, then why not. LN swaps between LN-BTC and LN-LTC are technically possible right now, for other networks it is also technically possible to activate it, as long as some features like multisig or locktime works. I don't think Bitcoin should rely on centralized exchanges if better options will be available. Exchange centralization is one of the things that should be addressed in the future, as well as mining centralization.

[Wind_FURY]

I believe the support for Bitcoin privacy features by some users haven’t truly considered the consequences.

If there is a flaw in the privacy implementation, then some entities would have the advantage to exploit the flaw over the users who don’t know how to exploit the flaw.

Bitcoin might also be “more feared”, and it might not enjoy the government’s tolerance for it anymore once privacy features are implemented.

It will increase the size of the blocks, and centralize the network.

Auditability of the ledger through transparency, to assure everything is balanced, is good.

[BlackHatCoiner]

I believe the support for Bitcoin privacy features by some users haven’t truly considered the consequences.

I think I'm going to agree with this. I've said it on another thread too; you can't make everyone agree upon such upgrade even if it's better for the sake of your privacy. Bitcoin was designed to be transparent and I'd continue running a node that supports transparency. If you don't like the way Bitcoin works, there are plenty of other altcoins built with a different purpose.

It will increase the size of the blocks, and centralize the network.

How would that increase the block size?

The role of exchanges in Bitcoin ecosystem is hard to overestimate.

The role of exchanges is to allow their users exchange. If a Bitcoin upgrade would mean delisting from some exchanges, then the minority of the exchanges left would find their chance to appear.

[Wind_FURY]

I believe the support for Bitcoin privacy features by some users haven’t truly considered the consequences.

I think I'm going to agree with this. I've said it on another thread too; you can't make everyone agree upon such upgrade even if it's better for the sake of your privacy. Bitcoin was designed to be transparent and I'd continue running a node that supports transparency. If you don't like the way Bitcoin works, there are plenty of other altcoins built with a different purpose.

Nitpicking here, but I don’t think it was deliberately “designed to be transparent”. If Satoshi had the technical knowledge, I believe he would have implemented privacy features early in Bitcoin.

It will increase the size of the blocks, and centralize the network.

How would that increase the block size?

What kind of privacy implementations are available? Ring Signatures? Confidential Transactions? Both of them will increase the block size, or am I wrong in this?

[BlackHatCoiner]

Nitpicking here, but I don’t think it was deliberately “designed to be transparent”. If Satoshi had the technical knowledge, I believe he would have implemented privacy features early in Bitcoin.

It may wasn't his intention, but I'm focusing that Bitcoin started as a transparent currency. Indeed, he was having a discussing with a forum member about fungibility.

To accomplish this without a trusted party, transactions must be publicly announced [1], and we need a system for participants to agree on a single history of the order in which they were received.

What kind of privacy implementations are available? Ring Signatures? Confidential Transactions? Both of them will increase the block size, or am I wrong in this?

Oh, that's what you meant. Yes, we'll probably need higher size.

[BrewMaster]

Nitpicking here, but I don’t think it was deliberately “designed to be transparent”. If Satoshi had the technical knowledge, I believe he would have implemented privacy features early in Bitcoin.

i don't think it is just about availability of the technology or having the knowledge of it but possibly it was mostly about that creating a truly anonymous transactions for bitcoin was not easy at all and there was a high possibility that it would have failed as being "anonymous" due to some issues. the history have shown some of these issues that were overlooked by some of the coins claiming to be anoncoins which shows it is not an easy task. now imagine you want to both invent bitcoin and make it anon at the same time.

[vjudeu]

It will increase the size of the blocks, and centralize the network.

Pedersen Commitments is one thing, range proofs is another thing. They can be separated, because if you have hundreds of inputs and outputs, then amounts don't have to be hidden, as in CoinJoin. And as far as I know, calculating transaction hashes in another way (to allow joining them) is not going to increase block size.

Ring Signatures? Confidential Transactions? Both of them will increase the block size, or am I wrong in this?

None of them are needed for joining transactions. With taproot, we could join signatures, so being able to join transactions is just another step forward in this scaling path.

[Welsh]

i don't think it is just about availability of the technology or having the knowledge of it but possibly it was mostly about that creating a truly anonymous transactions for bitcoin was not easy at all and there was a high possibility that it would have failed as being "anonymous" due to some issues. the history have shown some of these issues that were overlooked by some of the coins claiming to be anoncoins which shows it is not an easy task. now imagine you want to both invent bitcoin and make it anon at the same time.

Even with somewhat successful privacy coins there are certain pitfalls that can indicate an address belongs to x. When you combine the Blockchain, which is transparent in Bitcoin's implementation, and include a way of keeping it anonymous, of course that's going to be difficult. Plus, the current implementation we have is good enough in my opinion, we don't need too much anonymization, and the fact that Bitcoin is only pseudonymous might actually help with adoption, since there was definitely some issues with privacy coins being rejected from exchanges if I recall, probably for not being able to comply with Know Your Customer?  

I'm not sure if MimbleWimble is a real need in the case of  Bitcoin. By and large, exchanges are very suspicious to all coins that have sophisticated privacy features and either don't list them or delist them if they are already there. Consider Monero for example. It was listed on Bitttrex for long time but was removed from exchange in January this year. Do we really need bitcoin that would  be delisted on exchanges?  I don't think so.

MimbleWimble is probably the best idea that I've seen when it comes to privacy, but as above there might be issues with governments actually allowing Bitcoin with something like MimbleWimble attached to it. Of course, we shouldn't be relying on the government to approve it, but that's the reality if we want adoption.

I think there might need to be adjustments made to MimbleWimble for it to be acceptable in terms of adoption, but I definitely do see it becoming a part of Bitcoin in the future.

[titular]

BIP-118: SIGHASH_ANYPREVOUT - anyprevout.xyz

and

BIP-300/301: Drivechain - drivechain.xyz

are two proposals i am interested in, but i am only scratching the surface

I just got around to reading both of these proposals.

As I was reading the BIP 300 proposal, I felt it sounded insanely familiar. I realized Paul Sctorc did a presentation on this improvement proposal at the Miami Bitcoin Conference and I was already quite familiar with it.

This upgrade could bring a lot of creativity to the space. I'm hoping that it pans out the way he hopes.

There was a great thread on this forum talking about the proposal. It was met with some contention.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5344091.0