Announcement - Bitcoin project to full fork to flexible blocksizes

[freetrader]

See also (bit still TBD):

https://github.com/bitcoin/bips/compare/master...btcdrak:patch-7

 

[Nat-go]

Have anyone of you heard about “C-Bit Bitcoin”?
http://bitcoinist.net/c-bit-everything-wrong-bitcoin-community/

It´s basicly Bitcoin Classic but with a new blockchain. Rock´s fork of Bitcoin is more advanced, but i don´t think it get much support from the bitcoin-users, if other projects starting there fork too.

 

[freetrader]

@Nat-go

i don´t think it get much support from the bitcoin-users, if other projects starting there fork too

The article is worth a read IMO.

However, your argument about other forks (I presume you're speaking about a non-POW genesis fork) harming the chances for rocks' POW fork is unclear to me though. And bringing a non-genesis altcoin into the argument doesn't make it any clearer.

The difference between C-Bit and forks like SatoshisBitcoin or some other genesis fork is that the ledger-preserving forks start on a while different playing field, and accordingly will attract a different level of attention. They propose different things to the market, and the market will decide which one to pick.

I certainly don't see C-Bit harming any of their chances.

And as far as competition for user support between serious forks is concerned - that's just something we have to accept as a fact of (forking) life. If the market decides a fork is worthy of survival, it will happen.

 

[freetrader]

As regards running any fork software or altcoins, I will link here to some valuable advice recently posted by Gavin Andresen:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=42465.0

As long as you do it safely (different machines / VMs) you will be able to run (and mine) genesis forks like SatoshisBitcoin and the under-development non-POW fork both simultaneously - your resources permitting of course.

And keep in mind that once they've forked, your bitcoins on these different chains are essentially isolated from each other.

The good news is that you can bet on more than one horse.
I do intend to support both SatoshisBitcoin and a non-POW-fork.

 

[seweso]

Has there been talk about doing a full fork not to introduce a new coin but just to gather better statistics? So respecting even the coinbase transactions of Bitcoin's main-chain? And subsidize these new blocks with love or donations...

 

[freetrader]

@seweso : Why would that need a full fork?

I can't refrain from including a half-joking comment about how gathering "statistics" seems to be what half the connections to nodes do nowadays... although occasionally interesting research results do pop out.

 

[smooth]

I meant DOA as a bitcoin replacement. Certainly a new altcoin can be made, but I thought the former was the goal?

I do not see all the bitcoin based businesses just switching to an altcoin. Just my analysis and we can agree to disagree. Since all existing bitcoin users will get the new altcoin and still have their existing bitcoins, people will just treat this like CLAM. not saying it wont do well, but it doesnt get rid of the old bitcoin,so does not solve the issue

sorry

While not a comment on your overall argument, the CLAM example (one I've seen cited a lot recently) is quite terrible. CLAM did not use Bitcoin as its initial distribution. It awarded CLAMs to all BTC, LTC, and DOGE outputs, regardless of amount. That's more of an airdrop (and as an aside grossly subject to abuse), and quite different from what is being proposed here.

 

[johnyj]

I think the POW changing fork has its merits:

If you don't change the POW, then the fork will double the amount of existing coins like a QE (hash power and economy does not double, but pre-fork coins can be spent on both chains, equals to a 100% increase in money supply without any change in the size of economy), it will crash the coin price and confidence together: I heard that bitcoin has only 21 million coins, now I understand they also have QE at each fork...

However, if you switch to another POW and attract CPU and GPU miners, then the hash power and economy from alt-coin market will be attracted, thus maintain the value of the coins on the satoshiscoin chain. Currently the total hash power on GPU mining are quite large, mining cost is enough to sustain a coin that is $100, this can give strong support to satoshisbitcoin's value, make it a strong branch with its own economy, forming a bitcoin tree.

In fact this could be a perfect method to future forking: You first see if there are potential extra hash power support, then build a fork to attract those hash power, it will not dilute existing hash power because of different POW, it just adds hash power to existing economy. When added money supply were matched with added economy activities, there will not be inflation

Still, I think an April activation time plan is just too rush. Although there are so many problems in bitcoin core devs and mining pools right now, we have not reached a crisis point that such measure must be taken urgently. I think more plan and test and advertisement is needed, get the words out. It is enough to have this option until there is a real measurable threat, like continuously full blocks or the activation of segwit

 

[1QaZxSw2]

What you want is a fork-merge as part of the protocol.

Coins in the new chain should only activate (with the same private key) if burned on the old chain at a special address. Similarly at a later point in time if they want to merge East and West Germany style, coins can be burned on one chain to reactivate on the other.

This ability to fork-merge all the time should allay fears about hard forking/splitting etc.

 

[Norway]

@1QaZxSw2
Welcome to the forum, Obama!

Burning coins breaks fungibility, so it doesn't really transfer any value from one blockchain to another.

 

[satoshis_sockpuppet]

@rocks
I just built your fork from the latest git commit and tried to run it on a virgin server without an existing blockchain and it did not start syncing and kept being stuck at 0 blocks.

 

[VeritasSapere]

I will be writing an article explaining genesis forks in more detail. Sorry it has taken me so long but it should be finished relatively soon, at least significantly before the official announcement for Satoshi's Bitcoin is made.

If you don't change the POW, then the fork will double the amount of existing coins like a QE (hash power and economy does not double, but pre-fork coins can be spent on both chains, equals to a 100% increase in money supply without any change in the size of economy), it will crash the coin price and confidence together: I heard that bitcoin has only 21 million coins, now I understand they also have QE at each fork...

I do not think that this type of split is anything like inflation, what we are doing is splitting the currency, creating two separate currencies essentially. For instance you can not say that the Euro causes inflation on the Dollar. In the same way that Ethereum does not create inflation on Bitcoin. They essentially become separate currencies, each with their own twenty one million dollar limit. It would be wrong to equate this with inflation or quantitative easing.

However, if you switch to another POW and attract CPU and GPU miners, then the hash power and economy from alt-coin market will be attracted, thus maintain the value of the coins on the satoshiscoin chain.

However the objective should primarily be for Bitcoin users to have an alternative, for value to be pulled out of Bitcoin and into Satoshi's Bitcoin is exactly what we would want.

Currently the total hash power on GPU mining are quite large, mining cost is enough to sustain a coin that is $100, this can give strong support to satoshisbitcoin's value, make it a strong branch with its own economy, forming a bitcoin tree.

Mining power will always match the value of the coin itself, there can be periods where the mining infrastructure is just catching up but for the most part you can expect most of the mining to be done by larger server farms, competition drives it to become a more professional and competitive industry, whether an ASIC resistant algorithm is used or not these basic economics remain the same, we saw the centralization of GPU mining in the altcoin world before the introduction of Ethereum, which has become so profitable to mine that we are now in this catch up phase in regards to GPU/CPU mining.

In other words mining power follows the value, the value is not determined or limited by the mining power itself, since it can expand and contract depending on the value of the block reward of the various cryptocurrencies that support that hardware, whether it is ASIC's or GPU/CPU, this aspect of the economics remain the same.

In fact this could be a perfect method to future forking: You first see if there are potential extra hash power support, then build a fork to attract those hash power, it will not dilute existing hash power because of different POW, it just adds hash power to existing economy. When added money supply were matched with added economy activities, there will not be inflation.

Like I said before I do not think we can equate genesis forks to inflation. I also think that competing over the same PoW algorithms hashpower would be a good thing. Collectively it helps to create a better market for ASIC's considering the problem of centralization of manufacturing. It also allows for the alternative chain to become the longest chain again, with all of the benefits that having such massive hashing power bestows.

There is something else to consider, which is that because these genesis forks are possible and relatively simple to carry out, we should consider this as already being a part of Bitcoin, it does not matter if someone has released it or not, what matters is whether it is possible, and since it is you can pretty much guarantee that it will be done, whether it is done now or in a few decades from now does not matter in regards to how we should perceive Bitcoin today.

Still, I think an April activation time plan is just too rush. Although there are so many problems in bitcoin core devs and mining pools right now, we have not reached a crisis point that such measure must be taken urgently. I think more plan and test and advertisement is needed, get the words out. It is enough to have this option until there is a real measurable threat, like continuously full blocks or the activation of segwit

I agree with you on this actually, I would also agree that the activation of segwit would also be a good trigger for any genesis forks as well.

 

[VeritasSapere]

I do intend to support both SatoshisBitcoin and a non-POW-fork.

I will also be supporting Satoshi's Bitcoin and the non-PoW change genesis fork.

Supporting both as a holder, miner, trader and investor. While using the power of words for good, hopefully.

Helping to preserve the origanol vision of Satoshi, if Bitcoin completely diverges from the origanol vision and plan, it can be seen as the equivalent of breaking the social contract, we have the right to self determination. This is how Bitcoin solves the problem of tyranny of the majority or minority. Welcome to the revolution.

 

[corsaro]

@rocks

any ETA about sources release?

 

[Tsontar]

Is this the best place for updates?

 

[freetrader]

This place is pretty good compared to /r/Bitcoin

 

[Domrada]

Any updates from @rocks? I see no commits for 26 days. Is this still happening?

 

[freetrader]

Jorge Stolfi being serious?


If so, perhaps another POW fork in development?

EDIT: looks like Stolfi was only joking to make a point about 1-man consensus. Too bad...

 

[satoshis_sockpuppet]

@rocks are you still working on this?

 

[Tsontar]

Was @rocks whished away by Core operatives in black helicopters? (joke)

Everything was going along smoothly, then *poof*.