Blocks are still taking way too long.

[Este Nuno]

If we had shorter block times then we would see more orphaned blocks and more orphaned chains. If we had a 30 second block time then 20 confirmations would be less secure then one confirmation as it is now. 20 confirmations would be less secure then a 0/unconfirmed TX as it is now.

But orphans don't affect the people who really matter: the users of the currency. Sure some hash gets wasted. But if usability increases don't you think it's worth it?

Just one confirmation eliminates a whole category of unconfirmed transaction double spend attacks that are possible. Having that one confirmation 5-10 times quicker on average would be a big benefit. Even if the total time you would need to wait to reach full double spend security remains the same. For some transactions like a coffee, unconfirmed might be fine. But for others 1 confirmation is enough. Having that one confirmation come fast enough that you rarely if ever need to wait a very long time is an improvement. And when you're buying a house or something, you end up waiting the same amount of time anyway, so in that case it's a wash.

I'm surprised that more people in Bitcoin aren't trying to get them to change the block target time next time a hard fork gets done(which sounds like one will be happening in the near future anyway according to Gavin). If the only downside of faster blocks is wasted hash, why does anyone care? These hundred million dollar mining corporations shouldn't be a concern to you. The people who actually want to use Bitcoin as their daily use currency and have it work as best as it can should be the ones you're concerned with.

[Este Nuno]

Unfortunately I've had this issue as well (10mins though not 30 lol)

10 minutes is an awfully long time to sit around and wait for your payment to be approved when you could simply swipe your credit card or hand over cash, for this reason I never use BTC in the real world.

A credit card transaction takes months to be confirmed. Accepting a bitcoin transaction with 0 confirmations is safer than accepting a credit card transaction.

In your personal experience, which merchants are insisting on confirmation ?

I've used lots of websites that wait on at least one confirmation. The only exceptions seem to be when someone uses BitPay ot Coinbase. But lots of business would rather accept Bitcoin on their own and not pay processing fees.

We will see how greenaddress.it ends up working out. It could be quite good if people use it.

[Dabs]

That's the problem of that particular website for not accepting your transaction when BitPay or Coinbase will accept it within seconds. Lots of businesses can accept Bitcoin on their own and not pay processing fees and still proceed with your transaction within seconds, but they chose not to.

[Bitcoin Magazine]

too long for what

[Este Nuno]

That's the problem of that particular website for not accepting your transaction when BitPay or Coinbase will accept it within seconds. Lots of businesses can accept Bitcoin on their own and not pay processing fees and still proceed with your transaction within seconds, but they chose not to.

Websites have had problems with accepting unconfirmed transactions though. There have been double spends before. BitPay and Coinbase have their own technology I believe that monitors the network for attempted double spends I think. Not sure about Coinbase but people have mentioned that about BitPay before.

[kokojie]

20 confirmations would be less secure then a 0/unconfirmed TX as it is now.

That's complete BULLSHIT, 20 confirmation in a fast block system, would be vastly more secure than a 0/unconfirmed TX in a slow block system.

The vast majority of double spend attack are by using 0 confirmation because there's no cost to try double spend a 0 confirmation.

With 20 confirmation, the attack difficulty/cost is immediately skyrocketing, because then it requires actual mining power to attack.

[jonald_fyookball]

Unfortunately I've had this issue as well (10mins though not 30 lol)

10 minutes is an awfully long time to sit around and wait for your payment to be approved when you could simply swipe your credit card or hand over cash, for this reason I never use BTC in the real world.

A credit card transaction takes months to be confirmed. Accepting a bitcoin transaction with 0 confirmations is safer than accepting a credit card transaction.

In your personal experience, which merchants are insisting on confirmation ?

I've used lots of websites that wait on at least one confirmation. The only exceptions seem to be when someone uses BitPay ot Coinbase. But lots of business would rather accept Bitcoin on their own and not pay processing fees.

We will see how greenaddress.it ends up working out. It could be quite good if people use it.

You weren't talking about websites. You said real world, hand over cash etc

[Este Nuno]

Unfortunately I've had this issue as well (10mins though not 30 lol)

10 minutes is an awfully long time to sit around and wait for your payment to be approved when you could simply swipe your credit card or hand over cash, for this reason I never use BTC in the real world.

A credit card transaction takes months to be confirmed. Accepting a bitcoin transaction with 0 confirmations is safer than accepting a credit card transaction.

In your personal experience, which merchants are insisting on confirmation ?

I've used lots of websites that wait on at least one confirmation. The only exceptions seem to be when someone uses BitPay ot Coinbase. But lots of business would rather accept Bitcoin on their own and not pay processing fees.

We will see how greenaddress.it ends up working out. It could be quite good if people use it.

You weren't talking about websites. You said real world, hand over cash etc

That wasn't me who posted that.

[santaClause]

That's the problem of that particular website for not accepting your transaction when BitPay or Coinbase will accept it within seconds. Lots of businesses can accept Bitcoin on their own and not pay processing fees and still proceed with your transaction within seconds, but they chose not to.

Websites have had problems with accepting unconfirmed transactions though. There have been double spends before. BitPay and Coinbase have their own technology I believe that monitors the network for attempted double spends I think. Not sure about Coinbase but people have mentioned that about BitPay before.

Unless a website is going to be giving access to whatever is being sold immediately that cannot be reversed after 10 minutes then it should be safe to accept an unconfirmed TX. The only real time that an unconfirmed TX should not be accepted is when something is to be downloaded that would generally take less then 10 minutes to download and is not protected via DRM. 

[Nagle]

It is applicable if we use a centralized on line wallet.

Then you don't need Bitcoin.

[Este Nuno]

That's the problem of that particular website for not accepting your transaction when BitPay or Coinbase will accept it within seconds. Lots of businesses can accept Bitcoin on their own and not pay processing fees and still proceed with your transaction within seconds, but they chose not to.

Websites have had problems with accepting unconfirmed transactions though. There have been double spends before. BitPay and Coinbase have their own technology I believe that monitors the network for attempted double spends I think. Not sure about Coinbase but people have mentioned that about BitPay before.

Unless a website is going to be giving access to whatever is being sold immediately that cannot be reversed after 10 minutes then it should be safe to accept an unconfirmed TX. The only real time that an unconfirmed TX should not be accepted is when something is to be downloaded that would generally take less then 10 minutes to download and is not protected via DRM. 

This should be the case with many websites but for some reason I guess some developers take the less user friendly way and lazy way out of waiting for confirms rather than setting up a system where they could lock down a double spender.

[cbeast]

Can somebody please post a transaction to demonstrate this long verification time? I'm just not seeing it.

Yeah, this. I've had a free (no fee) transaction take several hours, but that's my fault for not including a fee.

It's not your fault for using experimental beta software. Did someone put a gun to your head to use it? Still, I'm surprised any transactions go through without fees.

[leopard2]

Over 30 minutes for a single confirmation does not (and will not ever) work in the real world.
(Almost) Every time I start to believe that BTC is "going mainstream", I have a delay waiting for a 30+ minute block.... 

solution:
if your paying for a coffee or a mars bar, dont wait. if your buying a house wait 30 minutes

solution:
if your paying for a coffee or a mars bar, use LTC or DOGE. if your buying a house wait 30 minutes 

[jonald_fyookball]

Over 30 minutes for a single confirmation does not (and will not ever) work in the real world.
(Almost) Every time I start to believe that BTC is "going mainstream", I have a delay waiting for a 30+ minute block.... 

solution:
if your paying for a coffee or a mars bar, dont wait. if your buying a house wait 30 minutes

solution:
if your paying for a coffee or a mars bar, use LTC or DOGE. if your buying a house wait 30 minutes 

How is using an alt coin to buy coffee a better solution than bitcoin with zero confirmations?

[iwillwin]

You could try emailing the body concerned and let them know about your problem. Maybe they can help. Have a nice day.

[CryptoCarmen]

You could try emailing the body concerned and let them know about your problem. Maybe they can help. Have a nice day.

Or even use a phone and call him. Maybe?

[franky1]

Over 30 minutes for a single confirmation does not (and will not ever) work in the real world.
(Almost) Every time I start to believe that BTC is "going mainstream", I have a delay waiting for a 30+ minute block....  

solution:
if your paying for a coffee or a mars bar, dont wait. if your buying a house wait 30 minutes

solution:
if your paying for a coffee or a mars bar, use LTC or DOGE. if your buying a house wait 30 minutes  

the time and hassle to deposit bitcoin into an exchange (which requires 3-6confirms for exchange deposits) to then buy litecoin or doge. and then send litecoin or doge to a merchant.

you might aswell realise that merchants will start accepting 0 confirm transactions or have their own pre-deposit wallet services that then move funds from account to account offchain ( imagine it like storecards/loyalty cards)

[mnmShadyBTC]

Over 30 minutes for a single confirmation does not (and will not ever) work in the real world.
(Almost) Every time I start to believe that BTC is "going mainstream", I have a delay waiting for a 30+ minute block.... 

solution:
if your paying for a coffee or a mars bar, dont wait. if your buying a house wait 30 minutes

solution:
if your paying for a coffee or a mars bar, use LTC or DOGE. if your buying a house wait 30 minutes 

One confirmation with LTC or DOGE is much less secure then a 0/unconfirmed TX with bitcoin. Both of their network is not secure so it would be easy to attack the network and reverse your TX. Once a TX is propagated throughout the network, nodes will not accept TXs that use the same inputs so you will not be able to broadcast a TX that spends the same inputs, the only way to double spend is to confirm a block that uses at least one of the same inputs as what you just spent. As long as the value of your cup of coffee is less then what it costs to mine the next block then you are almost certainly safe to accept a 0/unconfirmed TX after the TX has been properly propigated

[jonald_fyookball]

Over 30 minutes for a single confirmation does not (and will not ever) work in the real world.
(Almost) Every time I start to believe that BTC is "going mainstream", I have a delay waiting for a 30+ minute block.... 

solution:
if your paying for a coffee or a mars bar, dont wait. if your buying a house wait 30 minutes

solution:
if your paying for a coffee or a mars bar, use LTC or DOGE. if your buying a house wait 30 minutes 

One confirmation with LTC or DOGE is much less secure then a 0/unconfirmed TX with bitcoin. Both of their network is not secure so it would be easy to attack the network and reverse your TX. Once a TX is propagated throughout the network, nodes will not accept TXs that use the same inputs so you will not be able to broadcast a TX that spends the same inputs, the only way to double spend is to confirm a block that uses at least one of the same inputs as what you just spent. As long as the value of your cup of coffee is less then what it costs to mine the next block then you are almost certainly safe to accept a 0/unconfirmed TX after the TX has been properly propigated

Not disagreeing with you , but isnt LTC fairly secure? 

[mnmShadyBTC]

Over 30 minutes for a single confirmation does not (and will not ever) work in the real world.
(Almost) Every time I start to believe that BTC is "going mainstream", I have a delay waiting for a 30+ minute block.... 

solution:
if your paying for a coffee or a mars bar, dont wait. if your buying a house wait 30 minutes

solution:
if your paying for a coffee or a mars bar, use LTC or DOGE. if your buying a house wait 30 minutes 

One confirmation with LTC or DOGE is much less secure then a 0/unconfirmed TX with bitcoin. Both of their network is not secure so it would be easy to attack the network and reverse your TX. Once a TX is propagated throughout the network, nodes will not accept TXs that use the same inputs so you will not be able to broadcast a TX that spends the same inputs, the only way to double spend is to confirm a block that uses at least one of the same inputs as what you just spent. As long as the value of your cup of coffee is less then what it costs to mine the next block then you are almost certainly safe to accept a 0/unconfirmed TX after the TX has been properly propigated

Not disagreeing with you , but isnt LTC fairly secure? 

It is the most secure altcoin out there as of now but the short block time gives a misleading picture as to how secure it's network is. Even if it has the same difficulty as bitcoin it's 2.5 minute block time means that it takes 25% of the work to find one block and there will be at least 4x as many orphaned blocks.

If you want to do an apple to apples comparison of network security the LTC network has a difficulty of ~36.5 thousands now, compared to 35 million for bitcoin. Granted BTC and LTC miners are not interchangeable but I think this gives a pretty good comparison as to how easy it would be to attack either network.