Time to roll-back Ordinals?

[avikz]

Currently as we speak, bitcoin's blockchain is clogged by transactions because ORDI a shitcoin related to so called "inscriptions" creating NFT like things on-chain for bitcoin.

Are we to forget how the blocksize wars took place circa 2015 because some developers thought everything above 1MB for blocks was too much decentralization? Bitcoin lost many developers and fans due to this debacle and was set back quite a bit. We now have 4MB blocks with SegWit and a literal shitcoin riding on-chain and clogging our blocks.

This trash being inscribed on chain is going to be worthless tokens in just a few months. I can't fathom that we're standing idly by watching this all unfold. Please let's all agree that it's time to end ordinals.

Any form of NFT is a nuisance! Ordinals are no exception. I personally feel NFTs should be banned from any mainstream cryptocurrency as it only clogs the network and pushes up the transaction fees. Miners won't do anything about it because it gives them extra income. But honestly I am not sure if it can be done technically.

If you are a normal bitcoin user, it's high time to completely move to LN. It's also hilarious to see some bitcoin puritans still think that Bitcoin will become "one world one currency".

[DooMAD]

The general tone of the thread, to my understanding, could be summarised as "Everyone else needs to take action because I'm personally not happy with something".

If that's what you're going with, I can tell you right now you're in for some disappointment.  You're up against people who went right ahead and just did what they wanted to do.  They didn't make requests for others to act.  They didn't ask permission.  They just did it.  That's how you get shit done in this environment. 

This isn't the customer service department for Bitcoin.  You don't get to come here and moan at everyone until your problem is fixed for you.  Find your own solution.

Bunch o' fuckin' Karens.

[darkangel11]

Any form of NFT is a nuisance! Ordinals are no exception. I personally feel NFTs should be banned from any mainstream cryptocurrency as it only clogs the network and pushes up the transaction fees. Miners won't do anything about it because it gives them extra income. But honestly I am not sure if it can be done technically.

If you are a normal bitcoin user, it's high time to completely move to LN. It's also hilarious to see some bitcoin puritans still think that Bitcoin will become "one world one currency".

Banned by whom? Who's wielding the ban hammer of bitcoin, please enlighten us, so that we can address this person and ask them to ban Craig Wright from using bitcoin. That would be something.
You're making fun of these bitcoin purists, but at the same time want bitcoin to remain pure, with no ordinals. So which one is it, because usually it's purists that want clean bitcoin and all the shitcoiners that want ordinals, NFTs, block size change and all the rest of it. 

[alani123]

The general tone of the thread, to my understanding, could be summarised as "Everyone else needs to take action because I'm personally not happy with something".

If that's what you're going with, I can tell you right now you're in for some disappointment.  You're up against people who went right ahead and just did what they wanted to do.  They didn't make requests for others to act.  They didn't ask permission.  They just did it.  That's how you get shit done in this environment. 

This isn't the customer service department for Bitcoin.  You don't get to come here and moan at everyone until your problem is fixed for you.  Find your own solution.

I guess I missed the memo that said discussion is bad now.

Honestly though, any meaningful change that's meant to last keeps the needs of the people in mind.
Were bitcoin users consulted about rising fees by those that inscribe Ordinals and BRC-20 tokens? Of course not, so there's the downside of "going ahead and fucking doing it".

However, there's still a slight chance that even though "inscriptions" do harm on bitcoin's basic functionality, maybe most bitcoin users aren't against them.
How else are we supposed to find out if not through discussion in the community?

[Artemis3]

Ah the dynamic duo of trolls is back, the only solution is add both to the ignore list. DooMAD and darkangel11 won't say anything useful or meaningful regarding this matter and just deny everything. They have to be paid (by you know who) to troll like this all this year...

[Z-tight]

Were bitcoin users consulted about rising fees by those that inscribe Ordinals and BRC-20 tokens? Of course not, so there's the downside of "going ahead and fucking doing it".

That's because they could do it without consensus, and they found a way to it do it through the Taproot upgrade, but you cannot just 'end' ordinals, doing so would amount to censorship because miners have to reject ordinals tx's for something like that to happen, and they would not even do it because they are making a lot of money from tx fees.

However, there's still a slight chance that even though "inscriptions" do harm on bitcoin's basic functionality, maybe most bitcoin users aren't against them.

Miners are surely in the group of those who aren't against this 'attack'. These inscriptions are clearly attacking BTC as a payment option because of the hike in tx fees it is causing, personally i don't like it and i want it to stop; but i would also not support any means of stopping it that would make the BTC network become pro censorship, like centralized institutions and their services.

[Kruw]

Were bitcoin users consulted about rising fees by those that inscribe Ordinals and BRC-20 tokens? Of course not

No, there wasn't any consultation required because Bitcoin is permissionless.  You don't need all the other Bitcoiners' permission before you can spend your coins, you can spend them single-handedly by yourself.

[franky1]

Were bitcoin users consulted about rising fees by those that inscribe Ordinals and BRC-20 tokens? Of course not, so there's the downside of "going ahead and fucking doing it".

That's because they could do it without consensus, and they found a way to it do it through the Taproot upgrade, but you cannot just 'end' ordinals, doing so would amount to censorship because miners have to reject ordinals tx's for something like that to happen, and they would not even do it because they are making a lot of money from tx fees.

rejecting transactions for using the "isvalid" validity bypass trick is not censorship. bitcoin is made with many rules. there is reasons why someone broadcasting a [insert shitcoin] tx on the bitcoin network wont see it in the block. because there are rules to reject transaction it does not understand.(well there used to be)

bitcoin WAS suppose to be a secure network with rules to keep it clean. the abuse of the opcodes treated as "isvalid" validity bypass, that have been activated but nodes have not been given subsequent rules to follow for those opcodes is the issue

the opcodes that allow the 4mb memejunk has not been available since 2009. so look at when it became available and which team created those opcodes which dont come with a byte or content rule

we have moved away from developing efficiencies and counting bytes properly where each byte should serve a useful purpose. we need to re proposition the core devs(the reference client central point) to put some validation rules of certain opcodes that cause nodes to seek out actual valid information used in conjunction with the opcodes, such as meaningful bitcoin signatures and scripts to validate that the transaction is actually transacting meaningful bitcoin functionality, with byte limit requirement too

opcodes left open with no rules should be disabled and only enabled when the network consensus of node majority is ready to validate a new opcode, where said opcode includes new rules..
there are ways to enforce it without breaking bitcoin. but certain trolls dont even want people discussing it as it destroys their promotions of certain services, scams, schemes and groups they affiliate with

i know some trolls pretend there is no core reference client everyone relies on..but then different times idolises cores role.
i know some trolls pretend anyone can change things at consensus/protocol level. but then opens up REKT campaign against individuals that are not their core gods

so yes CORE have to fix their mistake when they created new opcodes that nodes dont do checks on the contents

[coolcoinz]

rejecting transactions for using the "isvalid" validity bypass trick is not censorship. bitcoin is made with many rules. there is reasons why someone broadcasting a [insert shitcoin] tx on the bitcoin network wont see it in the block. because there are rules to reject transaction it does not understand.(well there used to be)

And who is going to do it? One pool rejects it and another confirms it.
If you run a node, or you mine, you can reject what you want, but if someone else wants it to go through, he can.
You don't like LN, so you don't use it and don't run LN node. Someone else wants to use it, he runs LN node.

Freedom?

we have moved away from developing efficiencies and counting bytes properly where each byte should serve a useful purpose.

I bet people who pay money to send additional stuff through the blockchain think it's a good use of their resources.
Miners who are getting paid more by people who do these things don't complain either.

You're preaching to the choir here. I don't use ordinals, I don't need it, but get here a guy who does and a miner who benefits and persuade them both to stop, because you want it gone.

[franky1]

rejecting transactions for using the "isvalid" validity bypass trick is not censorship. bitcoin is made with many rules. there is reasons why someone broadcasting a [insert shitcoin] tx on the bitcoin network wont see it in the block. because there are rules to reject transaction it does not understand.(well there used to be)

And who is going to do it? One pool rejects it and another confirms it.
If you run a node, or you mine, you can reject what you want, but if someone else wants it to go through, he can.

learn consensus. (where nodes upgrade to mass consent (literal meaning of consensus) on a rule, causing the network to comply to that rule). then realise bitcoin is code and codes create rules. learn if core(node majority reference client of devs coding the bitcoin protocol) decides to code a rule that is enforced via consensus, everyone then follows.. especially when those sponsoring core then do a NYA mandatory upgrade to force compliance by economic nodes and pools to speed up the consensus activation(as they have done before)

yes it can be done. but requires CORE to fix their mistakes, individuals editing their node get treated as opposition/threat to the core roadmap.

some will say the "isvalid" utility is necessary.. however it doesnt need to be open to abuse

take this idea(simplified*)

op0 - isvalid(no checks) IF block version >0 else reject
op1 - requires X data format and limited to # bytes
op2 - requires y data format and limited to # bytes

(below enabled when block version changes to 1)
op0-0 - isvalid IF block version >1 else reject
op0-1 - requires X data format and limited to # bytes
op0-2 - requires y data format and limited to # bytes

(below enabled when block version changes to 1)
op0-0-0 - isvalid IF block version >2 else reject
op0-0-1 - requires X data format and limited to # bytes
op0-0-2 - requires y data format and limited to # bytes

this way the "isvalid" trick only activates for old nodes if the entire network has upgraded. where the new upgraded nodes cant use the next gen "isvalid" trick but can use a new set of opcodes that have structure, format and data requirements in their rules

*no i am not saying go back in time to change old node treatment of opcodes, its a simplified visualisation.. practically when core decide they want to upgrade to offer a new subdivison of new opcodes they can add in a IF statement on the next gen opcodes that only get activated if block version is 3 where the 'isvalid" unchecked bypass of the next gen opcode only activates if block version is 4+

[coolcoinz]

learn consensus. (where nodes upgrade to mass consent (literal meaning of consensus) on a rule, causing the network to comply to that rule). then realise bitcoin is code and codes create rules.

Great idea. Let's fork bitcoin again so that we may have a network with people who don't like the last upgrade and another with those who like it and then every time we don't like the way the network works we'll play Roger Ver and divide the community.  
You do realize that for consensus to work there has to be said consensus, right? By the looks of this thread there's none.

[franky1]

learn consensus. (where nodes upgrade to mass consent (literal meaning of consensus) on a rule, causing the network to comply to that rule). then realise bitcoin is code and codes create rules.

Great idea. Let's fork bitcoin again so that we may have a network with people who don't like the last upgrade and another with those who like it and then every time we don't like the way the network works we'll play Roger Ver and divide the community.  
You do realize that for consensus to work there has to be said consensus, right? By the looks of this thread there's none.

thats why CORE need to code something thats worthy of the network to get around.. (im ashamed core have reached this authority level, but they have so we have to play their game now)
individual X would get destroyed and treated as roger.ver2.0 if they tried.

but if CORE fixed their error and shown it to be of benefit to the community the trolls would ally behind it and support it* and the community will see the benefit and support it

independent brand releasing upgrade proposal will just be treated as the enemy (as history has shown)

*much like trolls were against more then 1mb blocks until core decided 4mb was ok(trolls follow core like cats in heat)

so to get the trolls that dont want to stop ordinals onboard, is via core(their gods) doing the fix

[panganib999]

I don't think such a move is possible in my opinion. Rolling back updates, especially for something as massive as bitcoin would just be even more detrimental to its growth compared to keeping the updates that we're so angry about anyway. Don't get me wrong, I hate ordinals as much as the next guy but at the end of the day, it was a testament that proves whatever other chains could do, bitcoin could probably do as well with enough dedication and manpower. Granted it wasn't the best representation of bitcoin NFTs as we wanted, it's the first and would probably be the last since the hype surrounding NFTs is pretty much dead at this point. Regardless, just keep it for keeping's sake, the blockchain's pretty much recovered at this point anyway, so everything should be good to go.

[BitDane]

There is no need to roll-back ordinals, what is needed is to prevent odinals from spamming the Bitcoin network.  I also think that the developer should act about this matter.  It is not funny  to see the transaction fee get higher without a valid reason.  Ordinals is not a part of Bitcoin so it should not meddle with Bitcoin system.  If this kind of tx fee increase exploit keeps on happening, no matter how happy the miner is, users will start looking for alternative because it is not fun to pay a huge amount of fee to transfer a small amount.

As a small time Bitcoin user and is using BTC to pay purchases online, it is not funny to wait for hours before the transaction is confirmed, it may give users a trauma of using Bitcoin since some Bitcoin payment processor only have 30 min. window for transaction confirmation.  It will be a problem for user if they paid the amount but the sudden spam of Ordinals on the Bitcoin network delays its confirmation and made the transaction be rejected while the payment is still waiting to be confirmed.

This case scenario might make users to look for alternative, with ordinals spamming the network, miners maybe happy while the Bitcoin influence is slowly dying because users are looking for alternatives just to avoid the problem done by these Ordinals.

[DooMAD]

I guess I missed the memo that said discussion is bad now.

All I'm saying is, if you're asking someone, or a group of someones, to step in and wave a magic wand to make the bad things go away, that's not a particularly fruitful avenue of discussion.


Aside from that hurdle, if I were given the choice between:

a) a blockchain where it's cheaper to transact, but all the users on that network believed themselves to be in a position where they could tell me what I could or couldn't do,   

or

b) a blockchain where it's a little more expensive, but all the users on that network had total respect for permissionless freedom,

Then sign me up for b)

I'm personally never going to see it any other way.  If people did theoretically fork off to some totalitarian chain where they did somehow miraculously manage to prevent any form of non-transactional data being stored in a block, I'd want no part of it.  When you start looking for ways to prevent others from transacting in the way they want to, it's only a matter of time before someone does the same to you.  Those aren't the kind of ideals I came here for.  I feel sorry for anyone who did.

DooMAD and darkangel11 won't say anything useful or meaningful regarding this matter and just deny everything.

Shoot the messenger if you like, doesn't change the reality of the situation. 

Anyone who has looked at this issue in detail can usually spot the inevitable game of cat and mouse that would surely commence if you look to start closing off certain methods of appending non-transactional data to the blockchain.  Not to mention the can of worms it opens when someone wants to propose a new scaling solution later down the line, but immediately runs into a brick wall when there's no way to implement it because you've shut off any possible extensibility in the protocol by trying to lock out the stuff you don't approve of.

So, the problem ultimately boils down to the fact that these people are determined and they're willing to pay above average fees to embed their crap in the chain.  I don't see how you're meant to prevent those traits in others whilst simultaneously not crippling the protocol and annihilating censorship resistance in the process.  And, if you're being honest with yourself, you don't have any answers to that either. 

But sure, I'm the bad guy here.  Cool.

[d5000]

Just to prevent the ability for them to be created from now on.[/b]

There are a couple of options, but none of them would be effective:

1) Hard-coded blocking of Ordinal-style Taproot scripts. That's what some (Luke-Jr et al.) have already "implemented" with a "patch", but it is absolutely uneffective, because the Ordinal guys simply could change the protocol in a way it's not detected by the patch. There should be lots of options to do that. So there would be a permanent "arms race" between the pro-Ordinals and anti-Ordinals fraction, the Bitcoin code would become complex, and less maintainable. Maybe the "Ordinals dynamic" could be slowed down a bit but not stopped if there is enough FOMO potential.

2) Limit the size of some Taproot scripts. That's what a small altcoin, Peercoin, did with a RFC implemented in version 0.12.3. I have favoured that method in some earlier posts when big NFTs were the main problem. But this would only stop big NFTs to be created (depending on the kB limit). And the current problem is caused by BRC-20 transactions, which are very small in size, and thus would not be blocked by such a patch. The problem is not the size of the BRC-20 transactions, the problem is their number. You can see in this graph that the small inscriptions (in green), like BRC-20, are causing almost the whole congestion:



Source

There is also a general problem: Even if the developers managed in some way to block Ordinals completely, the BRC-20 crowd could simply swap their memecoins to another competing token standard like Counterparty or Omni. It would actually be a little bit better, because BRC-20 tokens are extremely ineffective regarding data usage, which was even admitted by Casey Rodarmor himself (who did not create BRC-20 nor does endorse that standard). But it would not solve the problem completely.

So what can be done? I think the approach has to go into another direction: support sidechains, LN and other off-chain and partly-offchain techniques like rollups.

[franky1]

certain troll now talks about "permission-less"

sorry but bitcoin works via permission
it needs my permission to move my funds if someone want my funds they have to ask for my permission. i have to sign my funds over.. they cant just take my funds permissionlessly

it needs someones permission to move their funds if i want their funds, i have to ask for their permission. they have to sign their funds over.. i cant just take their funds permissionlessly

consensus is mass consent.. consent is permission

rules permit function.. permit is a permission

what the troll does not want is core devs needing users permission to upgrade. core devs want to upgrade unhindered unscrutinised. uncriticised(apart from within themselves and their sponsor group and cult followers)

where as we should be reviewing scrutinising and securitising them, and if their promises are empty or theres a bug in the code, we jsut dont mass consent.. (well that was an option pre 2017)
funnily enough the troll loves to tell other brands/dev teams to fork off to an altcoin instead of upgrade the network(hypocrite)

bitcoin is made secure via rules.. relaxing the rules has caused problems as this topic and many like it have revealed. now its time those that made the problem to fix their error.. yes he knows and its now established that core are the reference to all new upgrades so yes its them that should and could fix their problems

him pretending they should not, but others should is his silly game of not having the issues fixed because he knows if others try.. he will be first inline to push them off the network to protect his overlords rule

[tread93]

Why can't the devs just figure out how to make the transactions smaller so that they don't clog the chain up?

[franky1]

Why can't the devs just figure out how to make the transactions smaller so that they don't clog the chain up?

there are many ways,
they know how. but it involves closing the trojan horse open door that allows them to upgrade unhindered. meaning they have to relinquish power to fix their error.. yes it should be done but they dont want to

[d5000]

Why can't the devs just figure out how to make the transactions smaller so that they don't clog the chain up?

Depends who you mean with "the devs".

BRC-20 indeed has a lot of optimization potential. It's so ineffective that its data footprint could be basically halved. But the problem is that there are practically no BRC-20 devs interested in optimizing it, they seem to simply squeeze out all money they can from uneducated buyers.

If you mean the "Bitcoin devs", it's not so easy. Segwit already provided some optimizations. Rollups, what I mentioned in my previous post, are a way to optimize their footprint even more, but as far as I know there is no way to implement them without code changes which are controversial in the Bitcoin developer community (covenants like in BIP 118/119, as far as I'm aware).

they know how. but it involves closing the trojan horse open door that allows them to upgrade unhindered.

So you think this would simply be solved rolling back or restricting Taproot. That's naive, we've already discussed that. See my post above - that would simply mean they would swap their tokens to other mechanisms like Counterparty or Omni. Nothing solved. Or they use Dogecoin's Doginals, which don't even need Segwit and could be ported to Bitcoin without issue.

Actually the only way I know which is already available to restrict data storage on BTC is to completely change the protocol using a very restrictive privacy coin mechanisms like Grin does. But that would also cancel Lightning, atomic swaps and a lot of other useful stuff, and need a hard fork.

There is a long-term possibility mentioned by Gregory Maxwell in another thread: the storage of blockchain data could be done in a way that the "raw" transaction data isn't needed anymore for old transactions, but replaced by other kind of proofs (often with Zero-Knowledge proof tech). This would mean that full nodes would not have to store all inscriptions anymore, and would really be an interesting solution because it would prevent also attacks based on illegal data (military information, illegal pornography/violence and abuse imagery, etc.) stored in ordinals. I think the devs are open for this possibility but currently these techniques are in its infancy.

I've started a thread about those concepts some time ago and will update it as soon as I have news about new developments in this area. One of the most advanced projects seems to be ZeroSync at this moment.