40 minute BTC block time - No big deal

[jonald_fyookball]

The more we hash... the longer it's gonna take. Crazy its at 40 minutes though.

I waited 40 minutes for a pizza once. now that was crazy.
BIP399 though says the blockchain will confirm your transaction
within 30 minutes or it's free.

[BurtW]

bad luck and new mining difficulty

my understanding is that the difficulty is based off of how many leading zeros are in the hash of the nonce.
The smallest increase in difficulty is adding one additional zero, correct?  by what order of magnitude does this increase the difficulty?

No, the difficulty is not adjusted in huge four bit increments (adding another zero), the difficulty is adjusted in much finer detail, read this:

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Difficulty

The current target is here:  

http://blockexplorer.com/q/hextarget

and it is:  0x0000000000000000415FD1000000000000000000000000000000000000000000

"The SHA-256 hash of a block's header must be lower than or equal to the current target for the block to be accepted by the network."

So it must be less than or equal to the number shown above, until the next adjustment.

Oh, to answer your question directly "adding another zero" is a shift by 4 bits so it would increase the difficulty by 2⁴ = 16 times the previous difficulty = a 1600% increase in the difficulty.

I am pretty sure that I read somewhere that the maximum the difficulty can increase each 2016 block period is (was) 4x the current difficulty

True.  The maximum allowed increase in one adjustment is 4X.

[Mieehayii]

The fee you pay the miners yet? 
just 0.0001 btc

[Marlo Stanfield]

The target is an average of 10 mins but we have exceeded that target now for a long time and we are ahead of schedule. The next reward division will be much sooner than what it was supposed to be.

[hellscabane]

What could lead to such a long wait?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisson_distribution

+1 (at least)

I love it when people give the correct mathematical reason for the "long/short" block times.

There was a similar discussion not so long ago when there were 6 blocks in like 11 minutes.

As a note, we should be expecting "droughts" like this about once every 4 days (with using the average propagation time of 8 minutes as it has been recently). If the average propagation time was 10 minutes like intended, then it'd be once every 1.5 days.

[Marlo Stanfield]

Again with these super long blocks. 37 mins. 20++.

One quick confirmation is better than an unconfirmed transaction for 40 minutes. Even if ultimately it doesn't provide any more or any less security.

[BurtW]

Again with these super long blocks. 37 mins. 20++.

One quick confirmation is better than an unconfirmed transaction for 40 minutes. Even if ultimately it doesn't provide any more or any less security.

WTF?  What are you babbling about?  Confirmations = security.  There is no such thing as "one quick confirmation".  Confirmations happen when they happen by design.

[Marlo Stanfield]

Again with these super long blocks. 37 mins. 20++.

One quick confirmation is better than an unconfirmed transaction for 40 minutes. Even if ultimately it doesn't provide any more or any less security.

WTF?  What are you babbling about?  Confirmations = security.  There is no such thing as "one quick confirmation".  Confirmations happen when they happen by design.

I'm talking about quicker confirmations and the fact that the same amount of time needs to pass in order to achieve the same level of security. Like when using Litecoin(with it's 2.5 minute target) you still need 4x the confirmations in order to reach the same confidence level as one Bitcoin confirm .

One confirmation however is much, much better than zero confirmations and prevents Finney attacks. If you trust the network then one confirmation is enough, and if you can have that confirmation quicker than 10 minutes it's much better imo. Even if in the end it's not any more secure against double spend attacks that involve confirmations.

Do you see what I mean? If you were running a business and you decided that one confirm by the network to acknowledge the transaction was sufficient(despite the fact that it's never going to be 100% secure, you're accepting the risk) wouldn't you rather have that confirmation quicker than 10 minutes on average?

I just got done watching over 40 minutes to use a service after depositing. It's not a very good system.

[jbrnt]

I have seen a block found in 30sec and I have heard blocktimes as low as 2 seconds. It is only natural we get the other side of the norm too. There was a time I wonder whether it was possible that a block could not be found for a long long time, let's say days. The answer I got was there are so many combinations to the transactions, not ever finding a nonce for a solve is nearly impossible.

If we get more of these long blocktimes, difficultly may even drop, or not rise as much.

[BurtW]

Again with these super long blocks. 37 mins. 20++.

One quick confirmation is better than an unconfirmed transaction for 40 minutes. Even if ultimately it doesn't provide any more or any less security.

WTF?  What are you babbling about?  Confirmations = security.  There is no such thing as "one quick confirmation".  Confirmations happen when they happen by design.

I'm talking about quicker confirmations and the fact that the same amount of time needs to pass in order to achieve the same level of security. Like when using Litecoin(with it's 2.5 minute target) you still need 4x the confirmations in order to reach the same confidence level as one Bitcoin confirm .

One confirmation however is much, much better than zero confirmations and prevents Finney attacks. If you trust the network then one confirmation is enough, and if you can have that confirmation quicker than 10 minutes it's much better imo. Even if in the end it's not any more secure against double spend attacks that involve confirmations.

Do you see what I mean? If you were running a business and you decided that one confirm by the network to acknowledge the transaction was sufficient(despite the fact that it's never going to be 100% secure, you're accepting the risk) wouldn't you rather have that confirmation quicker than 10 minutes on average?

I just got done watching over 40 minutes to use a service after depositing. It's not a very good system.

Then the answer is obvious.  You should use Litecoins.

[Marlo Stanfield]

Again with these super long blocks. 37 mins. 20++.

One quick confirmation is better than an unconfirmed transaction for 40 minutes. Even if ultimately it doesn't provide any more or any less security.

WTF?  What are you babbling about?  Confirmations = security.  There is no such thing as "one quick confirmation".  Confirmations happen when they happen by design.

I'm talking about quicker confirmations and the fact that the same amount of time needs to pass in order to achieve the same level of security. Like when using Litecoin(with it's 2.5 minute target) you still need 4x the confirmations in order to reach the same confidence level as one Bitcoin confirm .

One confirmation however is much, much better than zero confirmations and prevents Finney attacks. If you trust the network then one confirmation is enough, and if you can have that confirmation quicker than 10 minutes it's much better imo. Even if in the end it's not any more secure against double spend attacks that involve confirmations.

Do you see what I mean? If you were running a business and you decided that one confirm by the network to acknowledge the transaction was sufficient(despite the fact that it's never going to be 100% secure, you're accepting the risk) wouldn't you rather have that confirmation quicker than 10 minutes on average?

I just got done watching over 40 minutes to use a service after depositing. It's not a very good system.

Then the answer is obvious.  Use should use Litecoins.

I don't like Litecoin though. And I have no desire to use Litecoin. Nor would I want to buy a coin with such an obvious lack of development.

I use Bitcoin though and I would hope to see it improve over the years instead of stagnating.

[BurtW]

I don't like Litecoin though. And I have no desire to use Litecoin. Nor would I want to buy a coin with such an obvious lack of development.

I use Bitcoin though and I would hope to see it improve over the years instead of stagnating.

OK.   So then are you suggesting a hard fork to reduce the confirmation time from 10 minutes?  What confirmation time would you prefer?  If you say 5 minutes then you will still randomly get very long confirmation times of over 5 minutes.  This does not seem to work.  What would work is to figure out a way to make zero confirmation transactions much safer and leave the protocol alone.

[rhino34567]

Does anyone know what led the devs to 10-min block times instead of shorter ones?

[justusranvier]

Does anyone know what led the devs to 10-min block times instead of shorter ones?

Bitcoin was designed to grow into a universal currency, used all over the world.

This means it needs to be able to reach consensus among miners located on every continent.

There unavoidable communication delays inherent to that process.

Satoshi picked 10 minutes to give blocks and translations time to propagate globally to reduce the amount of wasted work that occurs when somebody starts mining a block that has already been found.

[Marlo Stanfield]

Does anyone know what led the devs to 10-min block times instead of shorter ones?

Bitcoin was designed to grow into a universal currency, used all over the world.

This means it needs to be able to reach consensus among miners located on every continent.

There unavoidable communication delays inherent to that process.

Satoshi picked 10 minutes to give blocks and translations time to propagate globally to reduce the amount of wasted work that occurs when somebody starts mining a block that has already been found.

Yeah, the main issue comes down to the potential wasted hashes. I definitely see the logic in it from that angle. But I think when you look at it from a users perspective and not as miners perspective it really makes sense to lower the block target in my opinion.

[ShakyhandsBTCer]

Again with these super long blocks. 37 mins. 20++.

One quick confirmation is better than an unconfirmed transaction for 40 minutes. Even if ultimately it doesn't provide any more or any less security.

WTF?  What are you babbling about?  Confirmations = security.  There is no such thing as "one quick confirmation".  Confirmations happen when they happen by design.

I'm talking about quicker confirmations and the fact that the same amount of time needs to pass in order to achieve the same level of security. Like when using Litecoin(with it's 2.5 minute target) you still need 4x the confirmations in order to reach the same confidence level as one Bitcoin confirm .

One confirmation however is much, much better than zero confirmations and prevents Finney attacks. If you trust the network then one confirmation is enough, and if you can have that confirmation quicker than 10 minutes it's much better imo. Even if in the end it's not any more secure against double spend attacks that involve confirmations.

Do you see what I mean? If you were running a business and you decided that one confirm by the network to acknowledge the transaction was sufficient(despite the fact that it's never going to be 100% secure, you're accepting the risk) wouldn't you rather have that confirmation quicker than 10 minutes on average?

I just got done watching over 40 minutes to use a service after depositing. It's not a very good system.

LTC only has confirmations after 2.5 minutes on average, LTC should have a 10 minute block roughly as often that bitcoin has a 40 minute block. Having shorter confirmation times will also mean a much higher orphan rate as miners have an incentive to build on their orphaned blocks to try to get them to be part of the longest chain to get their block rewards. 

[Marlo Stanfield]

Again with these super long blocks. 37 mins. 20++.

One quick confirmation is better than an unconfirmed transaction for 40 minutes. Even if ultimately it doesn't provide any more or any less security.

WTF?  What are you babbling about?  Confirmations = security.  There is no such thing as "one quick confirmation".  Confirmations happen when they happen by design.

I'm talking about quicker confirmations and the fact that the same amount of time needs to pass in order to achieve the same level of security. Like when using Litecoin(with it's 2.5 minute target) you still need 4x the confirmations in order to reach the same confidence level as one Bitcoin confirm .

One confirmation however is much, much better than zero confirmations and prevents Finney attacks. If you trust the network then one confirmation is enough, and if you can have that confirmation quicker than 10 minutes it's much better imo. Even if in the end it's not any more secure against double spend attacks that involve confirmations.

Do you see what I mean? If you were running a business and you decided that one confirm by the network to acknowledge the transaction was sufficient(despite the fact that it's never going to be 100% secure, you're accepting the risk) wouldn't you rather have that confirmation quicker than 10 minutes on average?

I just got done watching over 40 minutes to use a service after depositing. It's not a very good system.

LTC only has confirmations after 2.5 minutes on average, LTC should have a 10 minute block roughly as often that bitcoin has a 40 minute block. Having shorter confirmation times will also mean a much higher orphan rate as miners have an incentive to build on their orphaned blocks to try to get them to be part of the longest chain to get their block rewards. 

Yeah, there will be more orphaned blocks which is bad for miners and is a waste of their hashing power. But even a 10 minute wait on the high end is much better than a 40 minute wait on the high end. It's a killer for some businesses. Unless there is a trusted third party system like coinbase or something that everyone uses that can make that a non issue I think it's a major problem.

[hellscabane]

Again with these super long blocks. 37 mins. 20++.

One quick confirmation is better than an unconfirmed transaction for 40 minutes. Even if ultimately it doesn't provide any more or any less security.

WTF?  What are you babbling about?  Confirmations = security.  There is no such thing as "one quick confirmation".  Confirmations happen when they happen by design.

I'm talking about quicker confirmations and the fact that the same amount of time needs to pass in order to achieve the same level of security. Like when using Litecoin(with it's 2.5 minute target) you still need 4x the confirmations in order to reach the same confidence level as one Bitcoin confirm .

One confirmation however is much, much better than zero confirmations and prevents Finney attacks. If you trust the network then one confirmation is enough, and if you can have that confirmation quicker than 10 minutes it's much better imo. Even if in the end it's not any more secure against double spend attacks that involve confirmations.

Do you see what I mean? If you were running a business and you decided that one confirm by the network to acknowledge the transaction was sufficient(despite the fact that it's never going to be 100% secure, you're accepting the risk) wouldn't you rather have that confirmation quicker than 10 minutes on average?

I just got done watching over 40 minutes to use a service after depositing. It's not a very good system.

LTC only has confirmations after 2.5 minutes on average, LTC should have a 10 minute block roughly as often that bitcoin has a 40 minute block. Having shorter confirmation times will also mean a much higher orphan rate as miners have an incentive to build on their orphaned blocks to try to get them to be part of the longest chain to get their block rewards. 

Yeah, there will be more orphaned blocks which is bad for miners and is a waste of their hashing power. But even a 10 minute wait on the high end is much better than a 40 minute wait on the high end. It's a killer for some businesses. Unless there is a trusted third party system like coinbase or something that everyone uses that can make that a non issue I think it's a major problem.

I agree that the variance can be a major issue; but let's face it, most transactions now days are done virtually within minutes if not seconds;, which goes hand in hand with the fact that most businesses and consumers rely on fallbacks to ensure their security. Reconciling speed with the protocol will be one of the trickiest things and things may end up with a company like Coinbase acting as a "bank" intermediary.

[As a note, assuming normal block propagation times, the probability of a 10 minute LTC block is the same as a 40 minute BTC block, time duration though is drastically different with 9 hours for said LTC block and 1.5 days for the same BTC block.]

[Mayuyu48]

i wait for 30 minutes today to get 1 confirmations
the more we have hashing power, more we need to wait for confirmation, is it right?
not good if we use bitcoin for payment if we must wait for long time

[BurtW]

i wait for 30 minutes today to get 1 confirmations
the more we have hashing power, more we need to wait for confirmation, is it right?
not good if we use bitcoin for payment if we must wait for long time

Actually because the hashrate is going up at a fast rate the average confirmation time is below 10 minutes.  See:

https://blockchain.info/charts/avg-confirmation-time

The average confirmation time is actually about 8 minutes.