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22 sats \ 12 replies \ @optimism 11 Jun \ parent \ on: Influencers out in Storm: Is *This* the Hill to Die On? bitcoin
Comprehensive configurability, and some form of highly symbolic protest but unfortunately mostly by people that have no idea what they are doing.
some form of highly symbolic protest
Is this really good for Bitcoin though?
mostly by people that have no idea what they are doing.
That's what I thought... but I wasn't sure
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The drama isn't good for bitcoin either, so it doesn't really matter. It's already toxic.
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Bitcoin's "actual" drama is low... really low. It's the social media/Twitter effect of making the drama appear 'worse' than it really is. It makes people think 'is this ok' when they should just be... using bitcoin imo
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I'm not sure if I agree with "low drama". The development community has been under stress for a while, but thus far it hasn't caused irreversible bad decisions, at least not in Bitcoin Core.
Historical perspective: I felt similarly in the "blocksize wars" era1, the effect of which still resonates sometimes in narratives today2. The opinion of developers doesn't matter much for those that remain on the status quo side - after all, nothing changes - but it matters a lot if you're on the "alt" side3 and people will chose a losing side, which can be disastrous, to them. However, you can't stop anyone that wants to fork off, so therefore you can only "let them".
In more recent times, we saw for example a particular rage quit where some of the things that were said, especially about people that were just trying to establish what consensus was or voice their opinion about the proposals made, were coming close to character assassination. All because the process of extending script, from idea to activation is a bit fuzzy and it goes super slow.
Deteriorated personal relations between developers (and especially groups of them) could become a significant obstacle if you consider an ideology like "there should be only Core"4. If that truly is going to remain the main direction (it has been implicitly and sometimes explicitly since the start), then even though I recently accepted Murch's proposal to "agree to disagree"5 regarding banning people from the bitcoin github org, and let it go for the time being, I may have to come back to that and try to convince some key people to the current moderation rules to loosen them.
I think that if you extend the scope beyond the protocol as it is today, not all is guaranteed to be great. If the conservative, properly engineered Bitcoin protocol we have today is to remain that way and it's source of truth remain Bitcoin Core, then as bitcoiners, we must find a way where the polarization that is all too common in western societies at large is overcome in favor of consensus. For consensus you have to communicate though and I hope that a smallest denominator (=consensus rules) can remain common to everyone that is validating them right now, and those that enthusiastically validate them in the future.
Footnotes
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Leaving the hyperbole at the door, do we really believe that Gavin or Mike were actual bad guys? And vice versa, do bcashers really believe gmax or sipa are evil? It's what current statements on twitter/nostr and sometimes even here on SN would make one believe, especially newcomers! ↩
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which is why I quipped about the XEC (=Bitcoin ABC) guys in my original comment: they've found themselves on the losing side of a contentious fork twice but when I spoke to a few of them not too long ago, they were full of what almost looked like religious energy, similar to some of the filter champions, convinced that their way is the only right way. ↩
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Thank you for your comment.
I'm not sure if I agree with "low drama". The development community has been under stress for a while, but thus far it hasn't caused irreversible bad decisions, at least not in Bitcoin Core.
I used to watch Matt Kratter almost every day... wake up, get a coffee and watch. Because he has made some great content, especially for relative beginners.
But he has IMO fallen into the "we need to filter" trap pushed by social media influencers. He doesn't talk about the downsides. He doesn't use nuance. It's all... Black and White and he encourages his users to 'run knots' without stating any of the downsides or risks of what that could entail. He preaches "us vs them" because they're "all corrupt" and "bought off"... and "running knots" is the only "solution". It's nuts.
And then there are other people, prominent folks, who go around saying "core is captured" and "they are corrupt" "bought off by the VCs" "compromised" etc etc...
And I felt like the overall presentation by Core members + Merch was extremely thorough, sober, technically logical and reasonable. "Murch" did a really great job IMO. I don't necessarily understand everything or even agree... but the presentation was very very thorough.
I DON'T get that from the filter crowd. Quite the opposite it's emotional pleas.
Historical perspective: I felt similarly in the "blocksize wars"
I wasn't "here" for the blocksize wars. But looking back... doesn't it just seem so obvious?
Deteriorated personal relations between developers (and especially groups of them) could become a significant obstacle if you consider an ideology like "there should be only Core"
My non-technical understanding of this... is that Knots isn't another "implementation". It is a fork. "Implementations" would be other blockchains (BCH BSV for example) whereas knots is a 'client'... a forked client? Twitter is so noisy and influencer-oriented it's hard to get any valuable information typically. So I understand that people cannot work in that environment. I also get that 'feedback' is valuable and 'community engagement' is too...
But there's a fine line. It's hard to find that balance and it shows the challenges of "decentralized" software development where eventually somewhere somehow decisions have to be made.
I think that if you extend the scope beyond the protocol as it is today, not all is guaranteed to be great. If the conservative, properly engineered Bitcoin protocol we have today is to remain that way and it's source of truth remain Bitcoin Core, then as bitcoiners, we must find a way
The pro-filter people... don't really talk about consensus. They talk about mempool policy. Many of the pro-filter voices on Twitter for example... could not explain the difference between mempool policy and consensus. They don't look at mempool.space. They don't coinjoin. They don't use Lightning. They want to "stop the Spam" because "core is corrupt" because "core wants spam"...
But I think they would have a hard time explaining "the spam" as it actually presents in mempool.space on a day-to-day basis.
It's very much "us vs them because they are corrupt" lol
which is why I quipped about the XEC (=Bitcoin ABC) guys in my original comment: they've found themselves on the losing side of a contentious fork twice but when I spoke to a few of them not too long ago, they were full of what almost looked like religious energy, similar to some of the filter champions, convinced that their way is the only right way.
Increasing the block size is "logically" delusional. Blockchains don't scale? No decentralized chain can contain every transaction for every coffee or every candy bar for 8 billion people across the entire Earth for hundreds of years... it's impossible. In addition we have periods now of +spam and/or half-empty blocks how people could advocate 'bigger blocks' thinking that's 'a solution' < 15 years into Bitcoin. It's like ideology over practicality especially obvious now... that Lightning works pretty good and facilities with usage for apps like Stacker News.
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Alright let take these on bit by bit.
I used to watch Matt Kratter almost every day... wake up, get a coffee and watch.
I had to search who this Matt Kratter is... a trader? What was he talking about every day? Not code and protocols I hope?
they're "all corrupt" and "bought off"
Were any receipts brought? As in direct evidence? I've personally not seen any. All I hear is accusations based on hasty generalization and appeal to motive (such as: they get grant payments and they have power and don't do what I want, therefore they must be corrupt), kind of pathetic imho.
And I felt like the overall presentation by Core members + M[u]rch was extremely thorough, sober, technically logical and reasonable.
I have great respect for all maintainers of Bitcoin Core (incl BIP maintainers (and yes, Luke too)) and frequent contributors, they are all talented and I've not seen much malice over the years. Not every proposal is the right proposal though, and no one is infallible; and they all know it. It's impossible to get a PR merged in Bitcoin Core if you think you're "the GOAT" and you're unable to listen to people, fix mistakes or improve things based on their comments, or if you're simply impatient. The collaboration makes it great software; not the individuals.
I don't necessarily understand everything or even agree... but the presentation was very very thorough.
What did you disagree with? I couldn't find your disagreement in the comments but I may have overlooked it?
But looking back... doesn't it just seem so obvious?
It's a tradeoff. I ran my main economic node off a Raspberry Pi 2 and later a little more modern armv8 board with a fast disk interface, for many years; I've always been a small blocker because I liked the abiity to do these kinds of things small scale. The only reason I don't run my node on a small board anymore is because I travel too much: I now run it in a datacenter because that's easier to manage when abroad.
My non-technical understanding of this... is that Knots isn't another "implementation".
Knots is basically a set of patches on top of Bitcoin Core, which Luke publishes and reapplies every time there's a Bitcoin Core release, so yeah, it's 99.99% the same implementation. He's been doing that for many years, starting from the real early days where he was the maintainer for the Bitcoin Gentoo Linux package. Over time, Luke has added increasing amounts of patches to Knots, mostly whenever he disagreed with Core consensus (or vice versa), and I think that that's fine: Luke's repo, Luke's rules.
"Implementations" would be other blockchains
Not really, that's what the dude you showed me the video from imho got wrong. Those are not Bitcoin but simply hard forks from people that didn't want to follow Bitcoin's consensus rules anymore and failed to get developer alignment to their cause: in both cases these were minority forks initiated by the minority themselves, not by any action on Bitcoin Core. They were made for the sole reason to change consensus in a disruptive way; and at least in one of the cases, to consolidate power to a scammer.
Instead, "implementations" of the Bitcoin protocol and consensus rules are for example btcd and libbitcoin. Those are written from scratch to implement functional nodes.
Twitter is so noisy and influencer-oriented it's hard to get any valuable information typically. So I understand that people cannot work in that environment.
imho Twitter is a crap platform if you're a serious person; always has been. The only way to use it safely is in chronological echo-chamber (following) mode and that's dangerous too when you're not following a diverse enough set of people. Nostr is a bit better if you're using a plain, algo-less client, but let's be honest: it's not really diverse enough. There's more diversity (of topics and opinions) on SN than on the entire nostr network.
It's hard to find that balance and it shows the challenges of "decentralized" software development where eventually somewhere somehow decisions have to be made.
I'd argue decisions don't really have to be made as long as Bitcoin Core does what they do: fully compatible softforks. That's why the key property here isn't
decentralization but the much nicer feature on top: permissionless. As long as Bitcoin is permissionless, you too can patch whatever you want (or use Luke's or Peter's published patches) and make it just how you like it. This is why ultimately, Luke can publish whatever tf he wants, and people can run whatever they want. But ...Many of the pro-filter voices on Twitter for example... could not explain the difference between mempool policy and consensus.
... having the option to run whatever tf you want, including software that is nasty, doesn't mean you should just run whatever someone else tells you you should run. It means you should do your own research, and run what you, after careful consideration, think is best. For most people this unfortunately means they are in desperate need for immediate tech skills and critical thinking development.
There is no difference between noobs following some trader on youtube that preaches "Luke's dysfunctional tweet content" for likes and followers, and therefore are convinced that Knots is the only way one will be admitted to heaven, and noobs following Udi that wanted some likes and followers, and therefore were convinced that the safest way to hold your coin is to put it all in FTX custody. It's in both cases the blind herd being led by the one eyed Shepard. In the latter case, off a cliff. In the former case, hopefully that won't happen; I still don't expect that Luke will push a minority fork, but I can't be 100% certain of this. Maybe some follower retard will though.
Increasing the block size is "logically" delusional.
The segwit implementation chose to 4x the blockspace, so it's literally happened on the chain you're holding your sats on. It could imho (and I'm not alone in that opinion) have been engineered to just keep it 1x with a slightly differently implemented mechanism for size calculation. So yeah... this actually happened and whatevs, it's consensus now.
No decentralized chain can contain every transaction for every coffee or every candy bar for 8 billion people across the entire Earth for hundreds of years... it's impossible.
Correct. Also I don't care about anyone's coffee and I don't want to validate coffee purchases. I just want to validate that my coins aren't counterfeit, and I want to help others to make sure their coins aren't counterfeit. Preferably their 1M sat utxos, perferably not their 500 sat utxos: they can just do small txs on LN so that it doesn't bother everyone.
And then one could ask: but do you want to validate jpegs? And my answer is no. But there is no way to prevent it as it's a tradeoff of having a permissionless system; to truly address it other than by dealing with high fees, permissionless properties must be weakened. And since that property is the greatest good for me, I am personally not willing to compromise. And that's all there is to it, imho.