Gold collapsing. Bitcoin UP.

[bucktotal]

"centralization" is a vector, not a scalar. That is, parameters that promote centralization decrease the number of independently run full nodes and makes it more difficult for the average user to run a full node. Parameters that promote decentralization would lead to the opposite.

 

[Peter R]

There's a joke about the way new knowledge enters the scientific community:

- At first the say "it's wrong!"
- Then they say "it might not be wrong but it's not important"
- Finally they say, "yeah sure but we always knew that anyways."

 

[solex]

I think that Peter R work pretty much kill the "fee pressure" argument in favour of keeping 1MB max size.

In fact, at least on btc dev ml, the usage of such reasoning against block max size increase is almost vanished. It was really present previously.

Yes. This is a major achievement, congratulations Peter.
The arrival of a second paper pretty much nails that debate.

Now the main concern against BIP 101 is centralization. We should find something as effective as Peter's paper also for this matter.

The problem is that there's no clear and rational definition of what centralization risk means, and it seems no one is interested or is able to provide it.

I'm noticing how the node counts have improved since XT was launched. Shows that competing implementations of the software is a healthy situation.
https://getaddr.bitnodes.io/dashboard/?days=90

 

[cypherdoc]

i have noticed but i think i may be a victim of the XT node ddos attack going on


haha, "Anchoring Bias" from Gavin. something we've noted in this thread for quite a while:
meaning, that core dev thinks 1MB is gospel and all other code changes compensate from there; like RBF, minfee adjustments, wallet fee estimations, SC's, LN, etc.

 

[Peter R]

***********************
Dear Greg,

I am moving our conversation into public as I've recently learned that you've been forwarding our private email conversation verbatim without my permission [I received permission from dpinna to share the email that proves this fact: http://pastebin.com/jFgkk8M3].

Greg wrote to Peter R: "You know that your "proof" of this problematic-- outright false under the discussion we had, or at least likely of little pratical relevance under reasonable, pratical assumptions. But you respond to dpinna agreeing with him and not cautioning him on relying on these..."

The proof is not "problematic." Right now you're providing an example of what Mike Hearn refers to as "black-and-white" thinking. Just because the proof makes simplifying assumptions, doesn't mean it's not useful in helping us to understand the dynamics of the transaction fee market. Proofs about physical systems need to make simplifying assumptions because the physical world is messy (unlike the world of pure math).

My proof assumes very reasonably that block solutions contain information (i.e., Shannon Entropy) about the transactions included in a block. As long as this is true, and as long as miners act rationally to maximize their profit, then the fee market will remain "healthy" according to the definitions given in my paper. This is the case right now, this is the case with the Relay Network, and this would be the case using any implementation of IBLTs that I can imagine, so long as miners retain the ability to construct blocks according to their own volition. The "healthy fee market" result follows from the Shannon-Hartley theorem; the SH-theorem describes the maximum rate at which information (Shannon Entropy) can be transmitted over a physical communication channel.

You are imagining an academic scenario (to use your own words: "perhaps of little practical relevance") where all of the block solutions announcements contain no information at all about the transactions included in the blocks. Although I agree that the fee market would not be healthy in such a scenario, it is my feeling that this also requires miners to relinquish their ability to construct blocks according to their own volition (i.e., the system would already be centralized). I look forward to reading a white paper where you show:

(a) Under what assumptions/requirements such a communication scheme is physically possible.

(b) That such a configuration is not equivalent to a single entity[1] controlling >50% of the hash power.

(c) That the network moving into such a configuration is plausible.

Lastly, I'd like to conclude by saying that we are all here trying to learn about this new amazing thing called Bitcoin. Please go ahead and write a paper that shows under what network configuration my results don't hold. I'd love to read it! This is how we make progress in science!!

Sincerely,
Peter

[1] For example, if--in order to achieve such a configuration with infinite coding gain--miners can no longer choose how to structure their blocks according to their own volition, then I would classify those miners as slaves rather than as peers, and the network as already centralized.


Link to forwarded email pastebin: http://pastebin.com/jFgkk8M3
***********************

Source: http://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/bitcoin-dev/2015-August/010737.html

 

[sickpig]

At the time Peter R mentioned this private conversation about the merit of the paper I was wondering why gmaxwell move it to a private venue.

What are the benefits of such a move? still can't see any, fwiw I can only see disadvantages.

The main one is you do no permit others to contribute to the discussion (e.g. see feedbacks sent by Matt Corallo just after Peter R makes the private exchange public).

I refrain to say anything about the particular issue at hand, I just want to say that this kind of process should be always happening in the open entirely (modulo case when severity security issues are involved).

I'm aware that the same thing happens for BIP proposals, usually there is a private exchange between gmax and the proponent before a BIP number is assigned.

I just can't find this way of operating healthy.

 

[cypherdoc]

I would be extremely skeptical with whatever gmax has to say as he has this bad habit of lying and just making stuff up. I know this firsthand.

Get your second opinions elsewhere.

 

[Zarathustra]

We're only missing TPTB_means_war (or was it TPTB_want_war?) and iceBREAKER now

The iCEMAN is philosophizing about network effects ...

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1164828.msg12282728#msg12282728

 

[Peter R]

I'm still quite annoyed that Greg forwarded our private email chain to dpinna without my permission, and then made a comment that I was causing dpinna to "waste time" with his paper, claiming that I somehow agree that my paper is "fundamentally flawed" (I don't).

His claim is absurd. I don't agree at all. The only thing I agreed with Greg about is that I could further clarify two of the assumptions used.

Many of the small-block supporters see that -- from IMO a superficial perspective -- the most cost-effective configuration for Bitcoin would be a single "super node" for the entire network run out of a data center. They then conclude that this will happen unless they do something about it, neglecting to consider how the game theory and incentives already do something. This is similar to the logic Greg used to "prove" that decentralized consensus was impossible when he heard about Bitcoin. There are many smart people contributing code to Bitcoin who do not really understand Bitcoin beyond the technical level.

 

[cypherdoc]

forwarding your private email conversations is highly unethical esp while using it to try and undermine both yours and dpinna's research. where's gmax's research paper?

this just goes to show you how financially conflicted he has become. he'll stop at nothing to further the appreciation of the $21M invested in him.

 

[cypherdoc]

the other sides can do all the yelling they want but if hashers and user run full nodes and continue to migrate to 101 and slush, it won't matter.

 

[Zangelbert Bingledack]

Many of the small-block supporters see that -- from IMO a superficial perspective -- the most cost-effective configuration for Bitcoin would be a single "super node" for the entire network run out of a data center. They then conclude that this will happen unless they do something about it, neglecting to consider how the game theory and incentives already do something.

This is the old myth that the devs are who shape Bitcoin, rather than the market. They think that without their wise guidance, investors would be lost in the woods. Dev input is taken into account by investors, but not just that of the Core devs or Core committers.

Gmax even seems to believe - as the unstated logical endpoint of some of his reasoning - that without Core committers' veto power, soon the market would go wild and lift the 21M coin limit, too! This shows a total misunderstanding of the implications of Bitcoin being open source. Some big investors could bid up BTC in a fork where the 21M limit was removed, and make it worth more than Bitcoin - at least temporarily - if they have deep enough pockets, but unless that change somehow turned out to be value-enhancing, that fork would eventually fall in price and be eclipsed by classic Bitcoin again.

For the same reasons, investors will not support a fork that results in centralization. Or even if some investors do, there will be plenty that won't and the rest of us can just ignore the ill-fated fork. In fact, with all forks being on the market, anyone astute stands to make big money trading these forks, selling their coins in the value-damaging forks and buying coins in the most value-enhancing one (which will almost certainly be the one that doesn't change the crucial parameters, of course (if you think small blocksize caps really are crucial, go ahead and make your money by selling off your coins in the bigger block forks)). This will ensure that the full wisdom of the community is marshalled toward determining the most valuable changes. Like how a prediction market distills the wisdom of crowds in such a strikingly effective manner.

 

[cypherdoc]

quoted you here:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1164828.msg12284221#msg12284221

 

[awemany]

I'm still quite annoyed that Greg forwarded our private email chain to dpinna without my permission, and then made a comment that I was causing dpinna to "waste time" with his paper, claiming that I somehow agree that my paper is "fundamentally flawed" (I don't).

Indeed, I don't think your paper is flawed either. I guess it would help to have the information/shannon argument as crystal clear as possible, though, so Greg can't invent funny ideas of how to supposedly circumvent fundamental laws that won't work out in the end. And I am certain they ALL won't work out, haven't yet put my thoughts into exact words yet; basically it appears easy to attack every single scheme that he might propose, but the general proof that they are all impossible probably takes a bit more effort - or it maybe just needs a better explanation. A nice example of how it is relatively easy to pick apart Greg's objections here is all threads involving him in this discussion.

Thanks for the link to the email conversation though, it was still interesting to see his objections. So basically, he's still believing that you could make agreement on a transaction set O(1) for all times? And somehow create a formula (without communication) that will select these sets? I think that's just shifting the problem around in essence - at some point the miner simply has to create a merkle root hash to mine on, and he has to include real transactions with real entropy from real people, meaning real bits to transfer, meaning real cost that will reflect in the txn fees.

I have not yet figured out the math yet, but I think for a closer look at the effects of IBLT or the fast relay network one needs to take the whole communication into account here, which will include also the initial transaction broadcast.

Is your paper the last word on it so far, or is there anyone else who worked on this? I am curious to get a bit deeper in this whole thing.

Maybe it would be worth to model a system with fast relay and where transactions arrive with poisson process, too?

His claim is absurd. I don't agree at all. The only thing I agreed with Greg about is that I could further clarify two of the assumptions used.

Many of the small-block supporters see that -- from IMO a superficial perspective -- the most cost-effective configuration for Bitcoin would be a single "super node" for the entire network run out of a data center. They then conclude that this will happen unless they do something about it, neglecting to consider how the game theory and incentives already do something. This is similar to the logic Greg used to "prove" that decentralized consensus was impossible when he heard about Bitcoin. There are many smart people contributing code to Bitcoin who do not really understand Bitcoin beyond the technical level.

Indeed. The other comment about the 21MIO limit nailed it. Bitcoin is an incentive system that works through our self-interest and self-reinforcement, and not because some self-appointed #bitcoin-wizards keep care of the code base and tells everyone else to not touch it. Just looking at the code is by far not the perspective that explains Bitcoin. Gets lost on people who only see their vim window all day. Well, I do, too, sometimes, but I know it is easy to get a tunnel vision perspective.


Oh, I forgot: Are you heading to that upcoming, scalability conference in Canada?

 

[Peter R]

I originally wanted to. I still haven't heard whether my fee-market paper has been accepted for presentation, and time is quickly running out:

http://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/bitcoin-workshops/2015-August/000012.html

Does it not seem unusual that the conference committee hasn't let anyone know if they are actually invited to present yet? If we hear back early this week, that still only gives people a bit more than one week to book flights, reserve accommodations, and put together PowerPoint presentations.

 

[cypherdoc]

i don't know about you guys but i'm seeing all these cool new features popping up on this forum such as the quick scroll bars at the top and right edge of screen. i've been putting in continuous requests to Bloomie and these things are getting done. and it isn't costing thousands of BTC!


oops.

Dow futures down -192. we now have a daily swing high that could indicate a reversal back down after the temporary bounce. we'll see after tomorrow close:

hmmm.

don't forget that one of my theories on the table is that EVERYTHING goes down in this next crisis incl stocks, UST's, and the USD while Bitcoin goes up. looking at the long term charts of those 3 since Feb, Mar of this year shows them all going down now. that's very interesting and something to keep an eye on very closely...

 

[solex]

Does it not seem unusual that the conference committee hasn't let anyone know if they are actually invited to present yet? If we hear back early this week, that still only gives people a bit more than one week to book flights, reserve accommodations, and put together PowerPoint presentations.

Jeez. Is nothing ever straightforward? Now I'm wondering whether the small-blockers are hoping to bias the conference (in the spirit of /r/bitcoin)

Looks like PeterR will have to gatecrash the conference with his presentation!, but hey, this is Bitcoin and things are done differently than with normal disciplines. Alex Morcos is a co-organizer and could be pm'd for alternative info.

Adam is saying all the Core Dev's will be there:

Some face-time with the devs would be very valuable, especially with Adam and Pieter to find out whether they really do have some valid deeper technical concerns about scaling which are not properly aired, or that they are indeed stalling as smaller main-chain blocks makes the BS business case stronger.

i don't know about you guys but i'm seeing all these cool new features popping up on this forum such as the quick scroll bars at the top and right edge of screen. i've been putting in continuous requests to Bloomie and these things are getting done. and it isn't costing thousands of BTC!

This forum is technically far better than bct, which seems starved of investment for years.

 

[Justus Ranvier]

Gmax even seems to believe - as the unstated logical endpoint of some of his reasoning - that without Core committers' veto power, soon the market would go wild and lift the 21M coin limit, too!

Perhaps what they mean is that because they can't counter the arguments of those who argue for "flexible" money supplies, that no one else can either.

 

[cypherdoc]

this is great, Szabo trolling his buddies:


the relay network is still kinda a mystery. are the miners using that only relaying headers and if so how are they reconstructing the tx's incl in the block? IBLT?

 

[Flailing Junk]

This is a nice forum you have. Must have cost you millions.