I remember that the initial discussions around 'EC' with
@Peter R. et al. led to someone (was it you, Peter?) saying EC has a feeling of being *inevitable*.
You can see some folks who are now pro bigger blocks on reddit, but still dislike the BU approach, because it is all chaos and will lead to chaos (that's essentially the complaint).
Here's why I think it is *inevitable* if the majority wants bigger blocks:
- Bitcoin being decentralized means with no central authority. This appears to be already hard to swallow for some, as, as we all know, a circular reference to Core's 'authority' slips in for many at some point. I think each of us has argued lots and lots on this mental hang-up. However, I *have* seen people who are pro bigger-blocks, critical of Core and still dislike BU. So assume this is accepted and lets get to the next point:
- We had a dozen or so proposals on a blocksize increase. All of them except BU have not gathered widespread, unanimous support.
- It thus appears that people have varying and different preferences for blocksize.
- With different preferences for blocksize, *no single blocksize proposal* will gather widespread support.
- That means that the only thing you can do
if you indeed truly want bigger blocks is to signal your readiness for them.
- Which means a form of EC.
The alternative to EC is to have some magic authority decide on blocksize and everyone to accept that authority. Which actually exists in Bitcoin, but is Nakamoto consensus, meaning the
miners.
So I think there are three groups:
1) rabid, hardcore 1MB small-blockers
2) reasonable blockers who want to increase blocksize but do not want to give it to the miners
3) reasonable blockers who want to increase blocksize and do not care if the miners decide
EC works for both 2) and 3).