Bitcoin 20MB Fork

[ujka]

... and others that have very slow internet connections under 2Mbps wont be able to assist with being a full node.

You mis-interpreted my post. My point was with 20MB blocks, you will no longer be able to host a node on consumer Internet Plans. The important number was not the 2Mbps download, but the 4Mbps upload. BTW, to get those numbers, I simply multiplied my former node's bandwidth usage by 20.

My current ISP has reduced the speeds it is offering for consumer access. The fastest upload offered on a consumer plan is 3Mbps. Business plans have an option with 5Mbps of upload. (Experiments like 250Mbps down and 15Mbps up are being grandfathered)

Telus, the local phone company, is better with it's VDSL offerings. You can get 5 or 10Mbps of upload speed. For independent providers (using the same lines), like the one I was with, your maximum upload speed is 5Mbps. To get 10Mbps or more, you have to go to fibre, costing $$$$. VDSL and cable may technically be able to handle that, but the companies involved don't want to cannibalize their lucrative fibre offerings.


My overall point is that if we go ahead with this fork, we have to do it with the understanding that the era of running a full node on a consumer Internet connection will be over. Due to extra CPU overhead (due to transaction processing), the days of running on a VPS may be over as well.

Now, with 20MB, I expect dedicated hobbyists and small businesses will still be able to run a node, but it will be a considerable expense: hundreds if not thousands per month. Webhosting may be cheaper, but then you can't keep an eye on your box; or plug hashers directly into it.

By the time blocks get to being 20MB in size, what internet speed will be common? And what processing power? Remember, for 20MB blocks bitcoin network needs 84K transactions per block! When will we get there?

1k GB per year is a bigger problem than the 1MB vs 20MB thing imho or at the very least equivalent...

This is misinformation and you are confusing people.

That number isn't true as it assumes we will immediately be processing 84k transactions per block which isn't going to happen.
20GB is the future limit and not the size of most blocks in the future. We are only 600-700tpb at the moment
https://blockchain.info/charts/n-transactions-per-block which means we are typically 15-25% full blocks for 1MB blocks.... do you really expect this to shoot up to 100% full 20MB blocks overnight?.... it will take years to start getting close to those levels.

Additionally, you are completely ignoring the work that is being completed on merkle tree pruning.

This needs repeating again, and again, because many here are thinking that we will have 20MB blocks added to blockchain the very moment the block limit is raised. Calm down. Average block size is now 0.35MB, https://blockchain.info/charts/avg-block-size

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[e4xit]

Anyone got any constructive arguments against? Bitching about capitalism and the size of Gavins brain doesn't count.

Have a read.

Well, you made yourself sound quite silly there Davout 

[davout]

Anyone got any constructive arguments against? Bitching about capitalism and the size of Gavins brain doesn't count.

Have a read.

Well, you made yourself sound quite silly there Davout 

Where? Be specific.

[nikkihalbrook]

Pro. We need bigger blocks.

[waaat?]

Now technocrats revert to calling other people stupid again. This discussion is as useless as it gets.

Agree to bigger blocks or be called an idiot. Nice discussion...

[sangaman]

Having read very much about this topic over the last few years, I'm quite firmly in the 'Pro' camp as far as increasing the block size limit goes. I find the arguments in favor of increasing the block size limit much more persuasive, logical, and less driven by emotion or anger than the arguments against. I see little good reason to hold on to a 1 MB block size limit, a restriction that was put in place to limit spam in the early days but could wind up sharply limiting what bitcoin can be used for in the future. And while I agree that it's very important for typical consumer computers to be able to run full nodes, or at least nodes that can validate transactions on their own, I think that's possible even with much larger blocks. That is especially true as computing power increases and as progress is made on ways to run nodes without having to download and store the full contents of every block that was ever made.

[RoadStress]

anti-fork

Reason:

centralization of the network caused by bloat. Planning and decision-making that control that network would become even more vulnerable to attack.  
Once done it can't be undone. The risk of spam filling up blocks is real. In 10 or 20 years will need the incentives from transactions for the miners.

And most important of all; consensus is everything! I will not be forking with the rest of you. I won't be alone.

The bloat is just another technical problem that can and will be solved. If bloat is your only anti-fork argument then you should be pro-fork

Nobody seems to understand Gavin's view on this. Bitcoin should be usable by all kinds of services and technilogies and having a 1MB block size hinders that. It's so easy.

[LeMiner]

Seems like the majority (consensus) has come to an agreement, let's get this over with. The 1MB hard limit has no reason to stay, why hard limit an open market concept? If we want Bitcoin to continue growing we will need a higher TPS limit. Preferably one that can grow X% each year so we wont have to hard fork again in the future.

Obviously there will always be people that are against such change, mostly bringing silly arguments about that bitcoin was never meant to be used for paying coffee at a restaurant (why shouldn't it? And why wouldn't we let the market decide instead of putting hard-limits?) or relating to the transaction fees per block in the future. I rather see a near-high-frequency trading/sending in the future where miners get lots of little transaction fees (more optimizations will be needed for this in the future) than much fewer transactions resulting in much higher fees per transaction.

[altcoin hitler]

The majority decides 'ok, there is consensus now'

god, you are so cute.

[Lauda]

That and a lot of the nay sayers seem to be at a misunderstanding of what this will bring. If this hard fork came in today there would be no noticeable change for the short term future. Yes eventually in years from now the block sizes may end up being 20mb each but that seems like it would be a LONG time from now probably 5+years and I if history has anything to say in 5 years our average Storage Drives will have no issue and our Internet should be fine to handle it.

The only way for blocks to become bigger is if there is the demand, so the only other option is to strangle the network if there is that demand and have overly long confirmation times.

Let me quote myself:

You can't achieve consensus when you let people who are actively against Bitcoin have a say in this. This can't completely be compared to an election, where party x and party y will try to improve something (hopefully).

How can there be consensus when you have people who will be against the fork no matter what we want to implement in it? It is true that if only a specific amount of people have the vote, it would be centralized, but there needs to be a line between centralization and decentralization. Pursuing either one to the fullest isn't the optimal solution and will not work(!).

If you want to try and achieve consensus with these haters, or trolls (I'm not saying that all the nay sayers are trolls and haters!) whose arguments (if you can call them like that..) have mostly been proven invalid, have fun.

[Lauda]

How can there be consensus when you have people who will be against the fork no matter what we want to implement in it? It is true that if only a specific amount of people have the vote, it would be centralized, but there needs to be a line between centralization and decentralization. Pursuing either to the fullest isn't the right thing to do here.

If you want to try and achieve consensus with these haters, or trolls (I'm not saying that all the nay sayers are trolls and haters!) whose arguments (if you can call them like that..) have mostly been proven invalid, have fun.

Deep misuse of the word 'consensus' here, by people that want to give legitimacy to their fork.

It's definitely not my fork. You don't even know who I am.

[Lauda]

...
If the fork happens the exchanges will fork and so will everyone.

Most of the exchanges can do what the hell they like, they're trading IOUs and calling them bitcoins. Until those IOUs turn into transactions on the blockchain they're worthless, ie. users 'coins' on Gox.

Exactly. If Gavin gets the top 4 exchanges on board and pools, user complaints won't matter (sadly it is like this, and the average Joe can't do anything).
(worst case scenario) This brings even more concern, if Theymos does not support the changes and they get forced we will end up in a very bad situation. Everything will split and the fight for survival will start.

[pawel7777]

Exactly. If Gavin gets the top 4 exchanges on board and pools, user complaints won't matter (sadly it is like this, and the average Joe can't do anything).

Disagree. Gavin cannot do it if majority of users are against it. Every (official, registered) exchange will have to announce their decision beforehand (otherwise they could potentially be facing legal actions). Same with cloudmining businesses and pools.

So theoretically speaking, if pools/exchanges etc announce that they'll go with the new fork, then people, who want to stay on old one, could just move elsewhere. Therefore pools/exchanges probably will check for the average joes' opinions before making any decision.

(worst case scenario) This brings even more concern, if Theymos does not support the changes and they get forced we will end up in a very bad situation. Everything will split and the fight for survival will start.

Why is Theymos that relevant in this case?

[altcoin hitler]

If the fork is announced and main core forks the exchanges will fork and so will everyone.

i won't

[Lauda]

Disagree. Gavin cannot do it if majority of users are against it. Every (official, registered) exchange will have to announce their decision beforehand (otherwise they could potentially be facing legal actions). Same with cloudmining businesses and pools.

So theoretically speaking, if pools/exchanges etc announce that they'll go with the new fork, then people, who want to stay on old one, could just move elsewhere. Therefore pools/exchanges probably will check for the average joes' opinions before making any decision.

(worst case scenario) This brings even more concern, if Theymos does not support the changes and they get forced we will end up in a very bad situation. Everything will split and the fight for survival will start.

Why is Theymos that relevant in this case?

I disagree on this. Although I'm not familiar with legal procedures in this case, so it is better to avoid commenting for me. I never implied that a fork would instantly, it would definitely be announced beforehand.
Like I've said, how can you take into consideration everyones opinion when there are a lot of people deliberately hating Bitcoin and against the fork (their opinion being absolute)?

Well you need to take into consideration the reputation of this place. This is like the central place for Bitcoin related discussions. Everything else is pretty minor (except reddit maybe). If the forum breaks down into 2 along with everyone else, well then, then we would live though the darkest days of Bitcoin (along with the losing fork, whichever it turns out to be).

[waaat?]

I disagree on this. Although I'm not familiar with legal procedures in this case, so it is better to avoid commenting for me. I never implied that a fork would instantly, it would definitely be announced beforehand.
Like I've said, how can you take into consideration everyones opinion when there are a lot of people deliberately hating Bitcoin and against the fork (their opinion being absolute)?

Well you need to take into consideration the reputation of this place. This is like the central place for Bitcoin related discussions. Everything else is pretty minor (except reddit maybe). If the forum breaks down into 2 along with everyone else, well then, then we would live though the darkest days of Bitcoin (along with the losing fork, whichever it turns out to be).

Both forks will be worthless. There will be no winning fork.

[runpaint]

what is 20MB Fork

It's old news, you can get a 16GB fork now

[Lauda]

Both forks will be worthless. There will be no winning fork.

That's also a very likely possibility, but only if everything splits into 2.
If 90% people go with the fork, the ones left behind will lose though.

[waaat?]

Both forks will be worthless. There will be no winning fork.

That's also a very likely possibility, but only if everything splits into 2.
If 90% people go with the fork, the ones left behind will lose though.

people will dump their bitcoin before the fork occures because nobody will want to take the risk

bottom line: you fork without consensus, you're toast

(the most simple form of consensus means: you get no veto for your proposal. In case a proposal gets a veto it need to be changed - that's consensus principle. You can't just shove your porposal down everyones' throat like you would love to. There is also more advanced consensus principles where you can calculate from different proposals the ones that meet the least resistance but since you are all pigs i don't care to help you more. You need to educate yourselves. Getting to a consensus in a group is very easy to do once you understand how. Most people have no idea. People tend to engage in war before finding consensus, haha)

[forevernoob]

Both forks will be worthless. There will be no winning fork.

That's also a very likely possibility, but only if everything splits into 2.
If 90% people go with the fork, the ones left behind will lose though.

And how can you verify 90% consensus?
This poll?