Bitcoin miners extorting people that are making transaction?

[franky1]

ASIC's do not choose the transactions.. they just sha256 hash

[1714804585]

1714804585

[1714804585]

1714804585

[1714804585]

1714804585

[1714804585]

1714804585

[Cookdata]

My friend wanted to make a transaction but it was in the midnight and I was unable to respond to him fast as he was looking for a cheaper way to do it. In the morning, I woke up and he told me that he used almost $10 to make the transaction. He said that miners are extorting people.

I believe your friend saw other options like TRC which he can use and pay some cents instead of the $10 worth of bitcoin but he chose to use bitcoin. No offence but this is not new and I'm very sure he is aware of these ups and downs especially times like this when the bull run is fast approaching, the fees will be higher as the mempool becomes so congested with the transaction and the miners didn't design the chain, they met it like that and they have to use it in accordance to the consensus protocol. If only there was a way this would have been reduced or solved without affecting the decentralization and security of Bitcoin, I believe they would have done so all these years.

I can defend almost everything people are talking about bitcoin before but I was unable to say anything today. We can say it is not really caused by miners but bitcoin developers which have been unable to make bitcoin mempool not to be too much congested.

Did what my friend said somehow right? Is high transaction fee extortion?

Some people will say that the more money miners see the more they will want to increase their hash rate and the stronger the blockchain.

See my friend, if you are saying that miners are extorting people, that's a false accusation because this has been the same since the inception of Bitcoin right in 2010, there have not been any changes regarding this but the only thing I can accuse miners and developers are ordinal inscriptions that were allowed in bitcoin network. Just because something is open source should be a strict rule to disallow some playmakers from taking advantage of people, these ordinal meta structures have taken more than half of mempool transactions and they are paying way more than what ordinary people are paying for their transactions.

Who is enjoying these fees, the miners and their activities are affecting ordinary people who are trying to use Bitcoin. There has been a call to stop it on the network but currently, miners are already in their peak of 2022 revenue fees and they are enjoying it, they don't want their revenues to be affected else if this is not generating fees, it would have been stopped by now but we know meme better how they ended after the 2022 run, even these ones will settle down after the trend and will become useless as usual. They are even given excuses that these ordinals will force people to use LN, like WTF? Must I use LN to use Bitcoin?

[DooMAD]

he told me that he used almost $10 to make the transaction. He said that miners are extorting people.

Seems a little melodramatic.  It's like an auction.  If there aren't many rival bidders, you could get something really cheap.  If there are lots of bidders all trying to buy the same thing, it's probably going to cost you a lot more.  That's not the definition of 'extortion'.  That's just how life goes sometimes.  

[Tamaperdana]

Snip

Did what my friend said somehow right? Is high transaction fee extortion?

Regarding the high cost of Bitcoin transactions, in my opinion there is no element of extortion at all. Because this is absolutely caused by network congestion. One of the reasons is the BRC 20 token. So your friend's opinion is completely incorrect. Because transaction fees in Bitcoin can actually be regulated, and there is no pressure to always comply with expensive fees.

[m2017]

My friend wanted to make a transaction but it was in the midnight and I was unable to respond to him fast as he was looking for a cheaper way to do it. In the morning, I woke up and he told me that he used almost $10 to make the transaction. He said that miners are extorting people.

Miners extorted money from your friend with a gun to his head? What prevented him from using any other cryptocurrency, faster and cheaper, of which there are millions thousands? After all, these altcoins were created as an alternative to bitcoin (faster and cheaper), right?

I can defend almost everything people are talking about bitcoin before but I was unable to say anything today. We can say it is not really caused by miners but bitcoin developers which have been unable to make bitcoin mempool not to be too much congested.

A couple of weeks / months ago (and also in the last cycle, when the bitcoin's price was ~$70k), these developers were not guilty of anything, right, but now they suddenly turned out to be so. It seems to me that we should look for the real reason for what happened.

Did what my friend said somehow right? Is high transaction fee extortion?

$10 is not such a high commission that others have encountered. Also, your friend could delay his transaction or use alternative solutions. In any case, he was the one who pressed the “send” button.

Some people will say that the more money miners see the more they will want to increase their hash rate and the stronger the blockchain.

And I will say, we need to look for a solution to this problem, because this is not the first time this has happened and each time it creates a lot of whining and extra costs for users. Only miners is happy.

[tjtonmoy]

This is not extortion by any means. The network is crowded because more people are making transactions. If they don't do it, there will be less traffic and the fees will be low. If we choose to make a transaction when the network is crowded, how does that make it an extortion? We are the ones choosing to give fees in order to make transactions. So we hold the power in this case. All we can do right now is to wait for the mempool to become normal again or use some alternatives.
Imagine when the BTC price will skyrocket. It will be more crowded than this. And people will still pay higher fees because they will be making more profits anyway. So it is always a "US" issue. The miners or the developers have nothing to do with this. They can come up with a solution but things takes time.

[Latviand]

It's not an extortion scheme but it's not a good thing for many people, it's like an exploit scheme more than anything but then again, we can't blame miners for going with all this even if it's a dogshit times for doing transactions due to ordinals, they're trying to get as much profit as they can while halving hasn't arrived yet. Your friend is lucky OP, he's only paying 10 dollars for the transaction meanwhile I'm still sitting on my bitcoins in Binance waiting for the fixed transaction fee to go down, the amount that I'm paying is enough to buy myself a novel so I'm waiting for the opportunity that it finally goes much lower, losing sleep waiting for the tx fees to go down.

[Fiatless]

Did what my friend said somehow right? Is high transaction fee extortion?

I don't think it is extortion because the money they are making is legally earned. You won't also blame them because everybody wants to make a profit. If you are in their shoes you would want this inscription to continue. Except miners take a moralistic position on Ordinals inscriptions, it will continue because money is now the determining factor.  

Miners aren't extorting people to spend money for transaction fees, it was created by demand, if you don't mind to pay $30 then do it, if you don't want to pay $10, cool down and wait until the mempool less congested.

This high transaction fee is a serious issue that is not affecting just individuals but businesses. Some businesses depend on Bitcoin to pay for goods and services so telling them to wait until the mempool becomes freer makes little sense to them because they need to make urgent payments. Paying high transaction fees will affect the profitability of the business. I think these businesses should consider using the lighting network or switch to an altcoin until the network becomes stable.  

[ImThour]

Umm wrong word used here I would say, they are not extorting anyone. It's just that they are taking advantage of a situation that is going on right now.
Due to these Ordinals, people are willing to pay high amount of transaction value and those who are not involved in these Ordinals are not willing to pay such a high fee which makes them feel like they are being extorted. It's just miners earning money on people being impatient.

[Poker Player]

In short. A lot of people don't understand how markets work and when they don't understand basic things like this, which are based on supply and demand, they start seeing conspiracies.

I've spared myself the "free" market because they are often more intervened than we think but in Bitcoin it's pretty close to what a free market is. If you want a transaction confirmed fast, you pay more.

The use of the word "extortion" is either a joke or not understanding anything at all.

[Razmirraz]

This is not blackmail, when your friend is willing to pay high transaction fees to send Bitcoin, it is called his willingness to pay a certain amount of fees on a transaction. If he objects to high transaction fees, he can postpone it until transaction fees return to normal. He has two options, agree to high transaction fees or not.

Blackmail can be interpreted as coercion or forcing Bitcoin users with all threats to follow the miners' wishes to immediately carry out transactions at high fees. So far I have never seen Bitcoin miners doing such ridiculous things, so what your friend is experiencing is not blackmail.

[stompix]

He said that miners are extorting people.

He's a moron!

Is high transaction fee extortion?

extortion:

the practice of obtaining something, especially money, through force or threats

Who did threaten him? Did they take his dog hostage and told him he won't see it unless he will pay up?
NOBODY is forcing you to pay something for a tx, nobody is forcing you do make a tx, nobody is forcing you to use bitcoin!

Think of it as going to a restaurant, nobody is forcing you to go there, but don't expect the owner to allow you to sit a able for 6 hours with a  cola while other customers might pay $300 for a dinner and go out in 30 minutes!

Some people will say that the more money miners see the more they will want to increase their hash rate and the stronger the blockchain.

Yeah, that's how bitcoin was supposed to work!
Remember how when there will be no block reward you're going to have to pay fees for the security, you're just experiencing it now !

Angry at the high fees? That's what everyone predicted the future will be like!

Who is enjoying these fees, the miners and their activities are affecting ordinary people who are trying to use Bitcoin. There has been a call to stop it on the network but currently, miners are already in their peak of 2022 revenue fees and they are enjoying it,

NO, they are not!
Income per th/s is 12 cents, it was 20 cents for Q1 2022, and it was 40 cents per th/s much of 2021.
So miner's income is actually 3 times lower than the peak!
https://bitinfocharts.com/comparison/bitcoin-mining_profitability.html#3y

[Oshosondy]

He said that miners are extorting people.

He's a moron!

You are correct but it has not gotten up to this unless you want to prove that you are a moron. Just make correction and let us have a happy discussion.

[stompix]

He said that miners are extorting people.

He's a moron!

You are correct  but it has not gotten up to this unless you want to prove that you are a moron. Just make correction and let us have a happy discussion.

Let me spell this again for you!

HE IS A MORON!

definition:
moron
/ˈmɔːrɒn/ noun a stupid person

When you say stupid things, you're being stupid which makes you a moron!
Clear enough for you?

Second, this is not tinder so I have to butter up to you and watch my language so I can have a one night stand with you, I tell things as they are!
And the more people and sooner they do call your fried a moron the sooner he realizes and stops saying stupid things, but pampering him will just lead to more non-sense!

[Oshosondy]

Second, this is not tinder so I have to butter up to you and watch my language so I can have a one night stand with you, I tell things as they are!
And the more people and sooner they do call your fried a moron the sooner he realizes and stops saying stupid things, but pampering him will just lead to more non-sense!

Still with what you have explained I can easily have more points to let him know that he is wrong. Sometimes you may not know the right meaning of the word that you used except the people that are using a native English. People also correct each other.

You can call someone a moron if you want but not in cases like this. We are different and people can not be the same but if you call someone like a friend a moron in something like this. I wonder how your friends would feel comfortable around you unless you are not like this in real life.

There are times to use the word moron, foolish person or a stupid person, but like I said, it has not gotten up to that.

As I have also learned from people like LoyceV and many other veteran members, I have not seen them call anyone a moron or using an abusive word. People are not the same though but I prefer people like LoyceV approach. They make their word also stand out but without abusive words.

[Z-tight]

It is a free market and your friend was free to attach any fee at all to their tx, they chose the fee for high priority in order to outbid other users in the mempool and the miners confirmed their transaction, that is complete freedom and the opposite of extortion. If miners controlled the fee rate in the mempool and forced people to pay whatever they want, then people can complain about the miners, but they don't control the fee rate in the network, the 'community' does, in the sense that when the network is congested, fee rate rises and when it is free, fee rate drops. Your friends has to learn this.

[SamReomo]

He said that miners are extorting people.

Tell him that miners are not extorting people because the network congestion is a network related problem and miners have nothing to do with it. The miners aren't doing anything to harm the Bitcoin community but those useless ordinals have caused congestion in the network and the miners have their limits which they can't cross.

There are more than 354,110 unconfirmed transactions at the moment of writing this post and the number is growing. Currently, the low priority transaction fee is 353 sat/vB and the high priority transaction fee is 531 sat/vB and that's why the miners aren't accepting the transactions that have no priority, I mean the ones with low fees. I'm sure that the network congestion will end soon and we may have good transactions once again.

The users who want to have their transactions in high priority mode are paying very high fees and if a miner is getting high fee for a transaction then why would he include the low fee transaction in the next block? The system is getting out of control and I believe the whole blame should not be put on the shoulders of the miners.

The users are also increasing the fees to have faster transactions. We should have to find an alternative way for the transactions at the moment, I believe in current network congestion times we may move towards the alternative coins that have low fees, and when network's congestion ends then we can again have Bitcoin transaction or we may move towards LN as that's also a possible solution.

[stompix]

You can call someone a moron if you want but not in cases like this.

You call somebody a moron when he is doing or saying stupid things, this is the perfect example of a situation when one needs to do so!

I wonder how your friends would feel comfortable around you unless you are not like this in real life.

When my friends do or say stupid things I call them the same, idiot, stupid, retarded, my language has a full book for this, and when I do something stupid they do the same, again we're leaving in a country and a society where you don't need to fake everything and just be lovely dovely with everyone.  Look around you and see how this fear of criticizing people and telling them in their face they are fucking morons has led to !

There are times to use the word moron, foolish person or a stupid person, but like I said, it has not gotten up to that.

Yeah, the time is when he is accusing miners of extorting him
I'm a miner, how am I supposed to react when a moron tells me I'm extorting him?
When somebody calls us miners extortionist what am I suppose to do other than tell him to find and ditch and end it?

As I have also learned from people like LoyceV and many other veteran members, I have not seen them call anyone a moron or using an abusive word. People are not the same though but I prefer people like LoyceV approach. They make their word also stand out but without abusive words.

Well, get ready for a surprise. I'm not LoyceV and I can't have his attitude and I don't want to! Also you should rejoice I'm not TMAN because you might have run in the woods if I would have used his language! See, this is the true freedom, something so many of you are afraid of, I can have my own way of thinking, my own way of saying things and my own views, and at the same time I can not give a rat's ass about whose feeling I hurt.  You really need to wake up from whatever fake and false impression of society you have, what you think is pinky unicorn chocolate land is in reality a dystopian nightmare.

And don't even bother keeping this up as it's already boring the hell out of me, if you think I'm going to change my ways for not hurting some stranger's feeling over the internet on an anonymous forum you're in for the shock of your life!

[jrrsparkles]

We can say it is not really caused by miners but bitcoin developers which have been unable to make bitcoin mempool not to be too much congested.

Did what my friend said somehow right? Is high transaction fee extortion?

Some people will say that the more money miners see the more they will want to increase their hash rate and the stronger the blockchain.

We know that it's caused by spam transactions and its not going to last forever unless these stupid investors got unlimited funds to fund the miners to move their worthless tokens over Bitcoin network. As there are many speculations we may expect a fix that eliminates these spams from the bitcoin mempool but also people say it's not possible because Bitcoin never intends to have censorship so which one do we have to choose now?

[pawanjain]

My friend wanted to make a transaction but it was in the midnight and I was unable to respond to him fast as he was looking for a cheaper way to do it. In the morning, I woke up and he told me that he used almost $10 to make the transaction. He said that miners are extorting people.

I can defend almost everything people are talking about bitcoin before but I was unable to say anything today. We can say it is not really caused by miners but bitcoin developers which have been unable to make bitcoin mempool not to be too much congested.

Did what my friend said somehow right? Is high transaction fee extortion?

Some people will say that the more money miners see the more they will want to increase their hash rate and the stronger the blockchain.

Bitcoin is decentralized and if bitcoin transaction fees is getting increased it means there are people on the other side who are willing to pay higher fees.
As long as there are people paying higher fees to get their transactions processed then the miners won't take low fee transactions for processing.
In such cases, we can only wait till the tx fees are back to normal or increase the tx fee ourselves.
We cannot call it miners' extortion but the demand for bitcoin transactions and that's how it works.