Will there ever be a way to put orphaned coins in the reward for mining?

[deus-ex-machina]

Orphaned coins lower the amount left. That can add up, since it never goes down. Because of this, it will at some point reach 21 million. The key is to somehow put all of these coins in the reward without the used ones going as well. Is there any way to do so?

[BurtW]

This has been discussed before.  The main issue is determining with 100% accuracy that coins have been lost (private key lost or never created) or just sitting there.  Just because coins have been sitting for two years does not mean that the private key has been lost.  What if I am just saving them for a rainy day?

EDIT:  There are some BTC that we know for sure are never coming back (like BTC that were lost during certain tests and bugs in clients, etc.) but the vast majority of the coins that are lost to the sytem just look like long term savings.

[deus-ex-machina]

I guess there's always "garbage collecting". When the reward for mining goes below 5 BTC for a month or so, run a collection from the addresses that lasts 1 year. If an address is online for even 1 picosecond of that year, they keep the balance. No need to spend anything. Think it would work?

[wogaut]

Orphaned coins lower the amount left. That can add up, since it never goes down. Because of this, it will at some point reach 21 million. The key is to somehow put all of these coins in the reward without the used ones going as well. Is there any way to do so?

Just to use proper terms, 'orphaned' (as in orphaned blocks) is not the same as 'lost' (as in lost coins).

A 'lost coin' is generally a coin where the private key has been lost (like with a lost wallet.dat) and this is not recoverable. Such coins reduce the total number of bitcoins available. As Burt pointed out, this has been discussed in several threads on this forum, just search for it.

An 'orphaned block' is a block that is not part of the longest chain, something like that could happen if someone else mined faster and the network always recognizes the longest chain as the valid one. Orphaned blocks thus don't count towards the total coins mined, and the don't 'add up'. The only way to use orphaned blocks is to continue your own alt-chain (if anyone cares). Bitcoin would only care for blocks in the longest chain.

[wogaut]

I guess there's always "garbage collecting". When the reward for mining goes below 5 BTC for a month or so, run a collection from the addresses that lasts 1 year. If an address is online for even 1 picosecond of that year, they keep the balance. No need to spend anything. Think it would work?

Please search the forums for threads discussing that. This has REALLY been discussed up and down already. You're re-inventing the wheel.

Also, this thread should go into General Bitcoin Discussion, not the Speculation forum.

[deus-ex-machina]

I'll spend a while searching for what's been suggested and a possible answer. If there is one, I'll see if I can find it. In the meantime, I guess It's only polite to close this.