Mike Hearn: "Progress on the bitcoin protocol has ground to a halt"

[yomofo]

https://epicenterbitcoin.com/eb-025/

Mike Hearn interview quotes:

"Progress on the bitcoin protocol has ground to a halt, complete halt. This is a crisis period for Bitcoin... Only Gavin is working on upgrades" @39'30'

this is in addition to the Peter Todd selling of all his bitcoins after the Ghash timebomb.

so much for that next bubble...

[bitcoinsrus]

Why fix something thats not broken

[cypherdoc]

yet he quits his Google job to focus on Bitcoin full time...

[Dragonkiller]

https://epicenterbitcoin.com/eb-025/

Mike Hearn interview quotes:

"Progress on the bitcoin protocol has ground to a halt, complete halt. This is a crisis period for Bitcoin... Only Gavin is working on upgrades" @39'30'

this is in addition to the Peter Todd selling of all his bitcoins after the Ghash timebomb.

so much for that next bubble...

Selling half*

[cypherdoc]

https://epicenterbitcoin.com/eb-025/

Mike Hearn interview quotes:

"Progress on the bitcoin protocol has ground to a halt, complete halt. This is a crisis period for Bitcoin... Only Gavin is working on upgrades" @39'30'

this is in addition to the Peter Todd selling of all his bitcoins after the Ghash timebomb.

so much for that next bubble...

Selling half*

did anyone hear a ghash bomb go off?

https://blockchain.info/pools

[cypherdoc]

Why fix something thats not broken

this is more important than you realize.

[Torque]

https://epicenterbitcoin.com/eb-025/

Mike Hearn interview quotes:

"Progress on the bitcoin protocol has ground to a halt, complete halt. This is a crisis period for Bitcoin... Only Gavin is working on upgrades" @39'30'

this is in addition to the Peter Todd selling of all his bitcoins after the Ghash timebomb.

so much for that next bubble...

This is the most pitiful attempt at trolling I've seen yet.  Man, the substantial FUD must be getting pretty thin these days.

TROLL HARDER!

Quick, do the 51% attack FUD thing! (it was a week ago, maybe they forgot about it already, hur hur)
Or how about the China bans bitcoin again thing!
No, how about Bitstamp is insolvent thing!  Yeah, that's it!
Wait, how about the SR Coin buyers will dump the next day FUD!  Maybe even same day, if they still have time after the auction closes!


Also, if core bitcoin development really has ground to a halt, then these people continue to get paid because.... ?

[dropt]

Bring on the dumps! 

[Raystonn]

Progress on the ACH protocol has ground to a halt!  Abandon the US Dollar now!

[cypherdoc]

Bring on the dumps! 

laxative please!

[BTCfan1]

[Peter R]

Why fix something thats not broken

this is more important than you realize.

Right.

The core protocol should be simple and robust.  "Features" should be added at a higher-layer.  We don't want "updates" for our money.

What I'd like to see at the core level (over the next decade or so) are:

- phasing out of transaction malleability by specifying a canonical TX form

- floating fees

- floating blocksize

- block propagation by TX hash when possible

- smart blockchain downloads (dispersed across more than one node)

Floating fees are probably most important and that's what Gavin is doing now.  It is vastly more important to get these changes "right" than to get them "right now."

[nwfella]

Why fix something thats not broken

this is more important than you realize.

Right.

The core protocol should be simple and robust.  "Features" should be added at a higher-layer.  We don't want "updates" for our money.

What I'd like to see at the core level (over the next decade or so) are:

- phasing out of transaction malleability by specifying a canonical TX form

- floating fees

- floating blocksize

- block propagation by TX hash when possible

- smart blockchain downloads (dispersed across more than one node)

Floating fees are probably most important and that's what Gavin is doing now.  It is vastly more important to get these changes "right" than to get them "right now."

Couldn't agree with this fella more.  Slow and steady wins the race at this point.  Don't think e-mail has gone through any sort of radical fundamental layer changes since the mid-70's.

[HeliKopterBen]

Mike Hearn has always been one of the more controversial developers.  He is very talented but his ideas such as tainting and blacklisting coins have gone against the grain.

Anyway, only small changes mostly related to solidifying and securing the core protocol will be accepted in the future.  Unintended consequences often arise when changes are made and it won't be practical to make major changes given the high stakes going forward.  A major problem such as the March 2013 fork will be unacceptable with a more mainstream adoption, in which case we will probably just have to live with the core protocol as-is.  As others have stated, more advanced features can be built on top.

[hyphymikey]

Progress on the ACH protocol has ground to a halt!  Abandon the US Dollar now!

+1

[cr1776]

Why fix something thats not broken

this is more important than you realize.

Right.

The core protocol should be simple and robust.  "Features" should be added at a higher-layer.  We don't want "updates" for our money.

What I'd like to see at the core level (over the next decade or so) are:

- phasing out of transaction malleability by specifying a canonical TX form

- floating fees

- floating blocksize

- block propagation by TX hash when possible

- smart blockchain downloads (dispersed across more than one node)

Floating fees are probably most important and that's what Gavin is doing now.  It is vastly more important to get these changes "right" than to get them "right now."

Exactly.  It is like saying "progress on the htt protocol (http) has ground to a halt."  Things are built on top of http/https and it should be simple and easy to implement.  ;-)

[cypherdoc]

Why fix something thats not broken

this is more important than you realize.

Right.

The core protocol should be simple and robust.  "Features" should be added at a higher-layer.  We don't want "updates" for our money.

What I'd like to see at the core level (over the next decade or so) are:

- phasing out of transaction malleability by specifying a canonical TX form

- floating fees

- floating blocksize

- block propagation by TX hash when possible

- smart blockchain downloads (dispersed across more than one node)

Floating fees are probably most important and that's what Gavin is doing now.  It is vastly more important to get these changes "right" than to get them "right now."

Exactly.  It is like saying "progress on the htt protocol (http) has ground to a halt."  Things are built on top of http/https and it should be simple and easy to implement.  ;-)

this is why we need to stop new proposals that want to change the protocol to their own advantage, like Sidechains.

[ajola90]

<snip>

Also, if core bitcoin development really has ground to a halt, then these people continue to get paid because.... ?

Because maintaining software is work. Bug fixes and other things as well - not just feature creation.

[Torque]

<snip>

Also, if core bitcoin development really has ground to a halt, then these people continue to get paid because.... ?

Because maintaining software is work. Bug fixes and other things as well - not just feature creation.

As a former software developer, I "maintained" about 8 software programs and several systems on about 4 hrs work per day.  Some days I didn't touch any of them at all.  

These people have just one application to maintain.

What else you got?

[Benjig]

Why the need of constantly upgrading something if its already good enough?? this kind of news is surely from bears.

[ninjarobot]

Why the need of constantly upgrading something if its already good enough?? this kind of news is surely from bears.

It might be 'good enough' for today, but certainly not for tomorrow.

Bitcoin needs a more decentralized PoW model and a way to scale to 1000's of transactions/sec.

[Raystonn]

Why the need of constantly upgrading something if its already good enough?? this kind of news is surely from bears.

It might be 'good enough' for today, but certainly not for tomorrow.

Bitcoin needs a more decentralized PoW model and a way to scale to 1000's of transactions/sec.

No.  PoW will never change until it's broken.

[TERA]

ACH, Email, and http are all going to become obsolete and replaced with something else. It seems most people now prefer to communicate with something besides email, such as social networking and apps. Businesses send you email messages which just tell you to 'check the message center in your account on our website' because email is too insecure to transmit the message itself.

[runam0k]

Anything that gets people to pay attention.  Big Bitcoin businesses should be allocating time and money to aiding Bitcoin's development.

[smoothie]

Bring on the dumps! 

laxative please!

Ex-lax!

[smoothie]

<snip>

Also, if core bitcoin development really has ground to a halt, then these people continue to get paid because.... ?

Because maintaining software is work. Bug fixes and other things as well - not just feature creation.

As a former software developer, I "maintained" about 8 software programs and several systems on about 4 hrs work per day.  Some days I didn't touch any of them at all.  

These people have just one application to maintain.

What else you got?

How many decentralized applications that were open-source and run by millions of people you managed?

Yeeeaaahh....lol 

[piramida]

I don't want "progress according to Hearn".

This. Mike may be smart, but his ideas are not. Very short-sighted, chasing small immediate gains without understanding even the mid-size picture. No, thanks. That's exactly how software gets overbloated and dies, usually, with someone like Mike driving.

[cypherdoc]

<snip>

Also, if core bitcoin development really has ground to a halt, then these people continue to get paid because.... ?

Because maintaining software is work. Bug fixes and other things as well - not just feature creation.

As a former software developer, I "maintained" about 8 software programs and several systems on about 4 hrs work per day.  Some days I didn't touch any of them at all.  

These people have just one application to maintain.

What else you got?

How many decentralized applications that were open-source and run by millions of people you managed?

Yeeeaaahh....lol 

and worth 8 billion each?

[Torque]

<snip>

Also, if core bitcoin development really has ground to a halt, then these people continue to get paid because.... ?

Because maintaining software is work. Bug fixes and other things as well - not just feature creation.

As a former software developer, I "maintained" about 8 software programs and several systems on about 4 hrs work per day.  Some days I didn't touch any of them at all.  

These people have just one application to maintain.

What else you got?

How many decentralized applications that were open-source and run by millions of people you managed?

Yeeeaaahh....lol  

and worth 8 billion each?

I worked in Finance and Banking, on transaction systems that ran hundreds of millions of dollars worth of transactions per day.  Bitcoin hasn't even reached transaction throughput parity yet with just ONE of the client systems I worked on.

Straw man much?

[cr1776]

Exactly.  It is like saying "progress on the htt protocol (http) has ground to a halt."  Things are built on top of http/https and it should be simple and easy to implement.  ;-)

this is why we need to stop new proposals that want to change the protocol to their own advantage, like Sidechains.

I agree.

Things built on top of the protocol are good.  Most big changes to the protocol are bad. 

[alexeft]

https://epicenterbitcoin.com/eb-025/

Mike Hearn interview quotes:

"Progress on the bitcoin protocol has ground to a halt, complete halt. This is a crisis period for Bitcoin... Only Gavin is working on upgrades" @39'30'

this is in addition to the Peter Todd selling of all his bitcoins after the Ghash timebomb.

so much for that next bubble...

Ok, let's fix this, we should ask that it is made to print more coins...........

[kwukduck]

This was a very good reason for me to sell every last satoshi i had yesterday, and it seems that was a smart choice, it's all starting to collapse now.

When the development of such a big project comes to a halt, it's time to get the f*ck out.

[HeliKopterBen]

This was a very good reason for me to sell every last satoshi i had yesterday, and it seems that was a smart choice, it's all starting to collapse now.

When the development of such a big project comes to a halt, it's time to get the f*ck out.

You sold all because Mike Hearn's crazy radical projects won't be implemented?   

[cr1776]

This was a very good reason for me to sell every last satoshi i had yesterday, and it seems that was a smart choice, it's all starting to collapse now.

When the development of such a big project comes to a halt, it's time to get the f*ck out.

http, ftp, smtp, dns, DHCP  (had one of the guys who developed it for CS networking class), tcp/ip, OSI (gone away) have had very few changes at the protocol level over the years.  Plenty of things have been built on top of them which is where the value on the internet and web have been.  There are certainly cases where they could be improved (e.g. dns, smtp), but they have been slow to have changes without having very good reasons to do so.

Similarly, I think we'll see many things built on top of the blockchain - e.g. colored coins, namecoin - and things built to extend and use bitcoin - e.g. silk road type markets, international payments etc - and that is continuing development.  But it doesn't have to be changes at the tcp/ip or bitcoin protocol level to be useful.

 

[ajola90]

As a former software developer, I "maintained" about 8 software programs and several systems on about 4 hrs work per day.  Some days I didn't touch any of them at all.  

These people have just one application to maintain.

What else you got?

Clearly your former experience is the rule and not the exception, huh? You were still being paid to maintain software. The point stands.

[bitbouillion]

Protocol development came to an halt, when Satoshi published the white paper. Should we be concerned?

[YipYip]

yomofo is a chinese operative trying to FUD cheap coinz

Go and cook me some special fried chickun ..and dont skimp on the sauce !!!

[Hyena]

I hated the last changes to Bitcoin official wallet anyway. It's much more inconvenient now to see your receiving addresses than before. When we need thousands of TXs per second, TX fees will just rise and people start using altcoins more often. I expect large amounts of wealth to be transferred with Peercoin and Bitcoin. Smaller amounts with scam coins and other forks. This ether sniffing project might also turn out to solve the 1000s of TXs per second problem, who knows.

[Este Nuno]

The one thing that specifically gets my attention is the mention of the two developers other than Gavin not touching the protocol code for political reasons.

Can anyone elaborate on this at all? Thanks.

[cypherdoc]

The one thing that specifically gets my attention is the mention of the two developers other than Gavin not touching the protocol code for political reasons.

Can anyone elaborate on this at all? Thanks.

i think it's important to distinguish btwn social infighting btwn core devs versus increasing fear for being responsible to introduce a core protocol change that could screw the entire community and the billions involved.  Mike didn't consider the latter while emphasizing the former.

[coinsolidation]

this is why we need to stop new proposals that want to change the protocol to their own advantage, like Sidechains.

Sometimes a well thought out response to user requirements is required. Colored coins are a mess.

I'm genuinely interested to hear why you feel it's to their own advantage, can you expand on your reasoning?