Gold collapsing. Bitcoin UP.

_mr_e

Active Member
Aug 28, 2015
159
266
As much as this UASF stuff is bullshit in this particular case, it is actually a great thing to consider it's possibilities to DEFEND the network. For example, if the Chinese government ever forced all their miners to behave in a certain way or add a certain patch, a UASF would be an excellent way for the rest of the network to defend against such an attack. For that reason I appreciate that the concept is being explored. However in this particular case it's clear that core has overplayed their hand as this solution is similar to a POW change in scale, and it is clear that this is not a situation where such a extreme solution is going to fly. Not when Bitcoin Unlimited as actually an excellent protocol upgrade, not a clear attack (even though core would claim it is).
 

Richy_T

Well-Known Member
Dec 27, 2015
1,085
2,741
And I bet most of them will be scratching their heads, failing to understand why they lost. They will be utterly convinced that logically, they should have won.
As so often with politicians, it won't be that their position was wrong, they just failed to communicate it effectively.
[doublepost=1488865590][/doublepost]
In any case, I think it is not a huge issue. I am fine either way. I'd also be fine with a 2MB default for now. Or 32MB, or whatever. I think if we get a HF going, the dust will settle and handling of blocksize will get a lot saner anyways.
Label 32 as "natural" and make it the default.
 

molecular

Active Member
Aug 31, 2015
372
1,391
Thanks everyone for your opinions on default EB setting.

My vote on the limit would be: Leave it empty, make it mandatory to fill in.
I actually like this idea. Might have some drawbacks (usability, ease-of-switch), though.
 

Zangelbert Bingledack

Well-Known Member
Aug 29, 2015
1,485
5,585
@Mengerian The talk of fork arbitrage on the Core side, and them seeing the advantages of it, has been a long time coming.

Fundamentally, small blockers should be eager for a hard fork where they can make money off us "fools" in the trading, yet strategically Core's lockdown of the blocksize setting and theymos's censorship must appear to many small blockers as beneficial to their cause. They turn a blind eye to the irony of turning to central planning to maintain decentralization, and resorting to censorship to maintain censorship resistance.

For now.

But what happens if the cat is out of the bag, a hard fork is recognized as imminent, and Core jiggering is no longer effectual? Perhaps Core gives in and lets users adjust the blocksize while still sternly recommending 1MB (the only way they can stop their market-share bleeding without actually endorsing a higher blocksize limit). Then we have achieved an EC world and we return to a cleaner debate just over blocksize, uncomplicated by dev team considerations.

When any forks to bigger blocks are tried, it will then be purely a matter of investor uptake. It will become clear to all the futarchic situation whereby Bitcoin is ruled by a prediction market (especially when fork futures start trading*).

In some ways, any talk of fork arbitrage already represents a movement to dethrone Core, either directly through adoption of other implementations, or indirectly by forcing them to stop rigging consensus with their hardcoded blocksize caps.

People wonder about ledger immutability, since the Ethereum split showed investors can back ledger mutation, leaving one to wonder where true ledger immutability comes from. I hope it will soon be clear to all that ledger immutability comes from the fortitude of the investors in the ledger, that more generally the investors control the effective (read: valued on the market) direction of governance, and that every hard fork is a new chance to enrich the best stewards and thereby increase their influence while systematically removing the worst stewards from having any influence at all.

*Imagine if exchanges had a mechanism set up for fork futures where anyone could apply to have an upcoming fork be tradable. You specify certain conditions and, like on the prediction market sites, a proposition is opened for people to bet on.
 
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albin

Active Member
Nov 8, 2015
931
4,008
I'm starting to think that UASF might just be another cynical stalling tactic versus BU, because they extol that miners can "opt-out" by sitting behind a "border node", but that also prevents any BU miner from ever seeing a chain that attempts to build >1MB.

I feel like it's as thought they're saying "the network is permissionless.... as long as we make your gateway".
 
Thanks everyone for your opinions on default EB setting.

.
Hey, I wanted to recommened something, too: Make EB=1MB, as this is the current state of affairs and is safe against any potential Jonny1000-attack. Every miner mining with BU uses 1MB. That it is possible to increase it , is what BU is all about. Maybe introduce an information at the first start ... or in the download-page with a screenshot.
 

awemany

Well-Known Member
Aug 19, 2015
1,387
5,054
@satoshis_sockpuppet : Very good point on the bikeshedding. Lets not change what works well and is taken by larger and larger fractions of the market.

Am I the only one who thinks the proverbial on-chain coffee might be highly unlikely for at least the next coming months, even with a BU activation scenario?

I don't expect fees to be below $1 anytime soon. Because I think the shift to bigger blocks with BU will remove the last hurdle for an absolutely massive influx of money into Bitcoin and public interest in Bitcoin. Maybe I am Antpool-drunk, but I think it s quite possible to likely that this beast will be squarely on the political agenda of many nations by the end of this year and talked and thought about by everyone. For better or worse.
 

freetrader

Moderator
Staff member
Dec 16, 2015
2,806
6,088
Meanwhile, in the Philippines...
"Thus, the Bangko Sentral recognizes that Virtual Currency (VC) systems have the potential to revolutionize delivery of financial services, particularly for payments and remittance, in view of their ability to provide faster and more economical transfer of funds, both domestic and international, and may further support financial inclusion."
http://www.bsp.gov.ph/regulations/regulations.asp?id=3748

https://np.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/5y5kge/really_proud_of_the_philippine_central_bank_for/
 

awemany

Well-Known Member
Aug 19, 2015
1,387
5,054
The problem with comparing Bitcoin to "digital gold" is that gold is occupying a quite small niche in our current, fiat-powered world.

Bitcoin promises a Bitcoin-powered instead of a fiat-powered world. A lot of the talk of "Bitcoin as digital gold" is arguing that Bitcoin should fill or replace the niche of what is gold currently. But that is futile: Because gold exists already and serves its purpose as purely a hedge against fiat that is free of counterparty risk.

Of course, Bitcoin in a Bitcoin-powered world will *also* have digital gold properties.

I furthermore think that 'free of counterparty risk' is prone to conflate things: With gold and with Bitcoin and all physical commodities, it is true that there is no counterparty risk when using it with whomever you are transacting with.

But in terms of value, it has a risk to a 'counterparty' in another sense: The whole of humanity.

And if you look at gold, it suffered greatly from the devaluation that happened by it being largely replaced by fiat.

I think *that* is what Bitcoin should and could change. And that is also where the true risks to Bitcoin lie.
 

jake

New Member
Sep 26, 2016
10
72
I mentioned in my introductory post on bitco.in that I'm not much of a forum user, but I've been avidly reading this thread for a while now and I think it is truly the hub of people who grok bitcoin and understand why it works.

I found the following screenshot in one of the reddit threads following the latest Wikileaks release. I think the users of 4chan were facetiously copy/pasting the original comment, but I notice that the same shill tactics are at play trying to cast doubt on Wikileaks as are at play in Bitcoin.



Doesn't this rhetoric sound familiar by now?