31 sats \ 12 replies \ @Scoresby OP 20 Mar \ parent \ on: POLL: Bitcoin needs low transaction fees or low cost to run a node? bitcoin
Good point about soft fork signaling.
I'm not sure I agree about the price thing. What people are willing to accept as bitcoin is a pretty strong signal in the event of a hard fork.
What people who are not transacting with btc are running seems like a much weaker signal.
I run a node and do so because I think it's good for Bitcoin to have node runners (I even make posters about it). But I have been trending more and more towards trying to make myself an economic actor in Bitcoin, because I think that is even better for Bitcoin.
https://bitcoinscoresby.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Bitcoin-Mad-Maxi-Node-Warrior.png
Cool! I love the poster! Well done! :)
Regarding the price, the majority of people who own Bitcoin do not run a node. However in order to transact, they are sending Bitcoin via a node running Bitcoin's consensus rules. Are you saying economic actors have more control than node runners even though Bitcoin software itself has no concept of fiat, marketcaps, and exchange rates?
Thought experiment: If the US government prints ungodly amounts of fiat and throws it into Bitcoin Cash or another fork does that then become Bitcoin? If so, whats the point of running Bitcoin?
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First point: I think whoever is running the node for them is going to wield a lot of influence on their behalf--unless they pay attention and demand a say in what consensus rules the node runs. But then, I would wonder why they don't just run a node for themselves.
Thought experiment: at this juncture (March, 2024) I don't think anyone would care and it would remain bch. If it had happened in August 2017, I think it is possible that that fork could have "won" and be called Bitcoin. (It would still be a bad idea and a shitty fork).
In the case of a future contentious fork, government interference via money printing is a real possibility and I think it would sway most of the market.
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A UTXO doesn't reside on a specific node. You may be referring to customers using exchanges, however exchanges don't care what holders on their platform think. They only exist to profit from trades. They don't profit more if you hold one fork or the other (unless its POS). They may still have their own opinion but it doesn't matter any more than any other node. For example, Coinbase sided with big blockers and had the most economic resources behind them. Their node had no extra influence than my node did.
Bitcoin is not here for fiat gains. It does not care who holds more and neither do we. It is here to replace fiat. The side effect of success just happens to be that its worth more fiat. We are opting out of their corrupt trash and ultimately care not where their fiat garbage goes. If fiat is end game, then Bitcoin was dead before it even began.
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I was referring to people who leave their bitcoin on exchanges.
I'm not really interested in fiat value either.
I'm trying to make the case that it is not solely the act if software running on your computer that enforces bitcoin's rules.
I think in addition to running software, transacting with bitcoin enforces the rules.
It's likely that I'm not being clear. Sorry for that.
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No worries, you're good. This is a great conversation.
Can you give an explanation of how transacting enforces the rules?
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What do you use a node for?
It's not just to keep an updated copy of the blockchain. At least for me, I run a node so I can be sure bitcoin I receive is actually bitcoin. And so I don't have to trust someone else to broadcast my transactions.
This is what I mean by enforcing consensus rules with transactions.
If I just run a node, but do not transact, the network doesn't care. But if I say "this thing you sent me, I know it is bitcoin because I have software running on my computer that doesn't need to trust anyone, that can prove it by itself" --well, now I have enforced the consensus rules.
If someone sent me money that violated the rules, I could say "what the hell is this? This isn't money! Pay me something else or no deal."
If all I do is run a node, but don't receive bitcoin, then I can yell and scream about people changing the rules, but nobody has to listen.
With transactions someone actually has to listen. This is why I think economic nodes enforce consensus rules.
What do you think?
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Ok, I get what you are saying now. Thank you for that explanation.
Yes that makes sense. I think you are correct that economic nodes are much more important to users than non-economic nodes. However, I'm not sure it matters in terms of voting.
Here you can see how many nodes are running which version of Bitcoin's software, but I don't know how you could tell which ones are utilizing it for transaction verification and which ones aren't.
How would one then verify which node's vote is weighted higher than others and by how much? I think over the long term, you are correct because economic nodes will outlast non-economic nodes as there is no real benefit to pay to run a node if you aren't using it to verify your own transactions.
This is definitely an interesting idea that I will be thinking more about. Thanks!
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It is an interesting topic. And thanks for the thoughtful questions it's forcing me to articulate some things, which is always good.
I don't really think Luke Jr's count of nodes is relevant to what happens in the event of a contested hard fork.
Say a large movement got going to double the supply of bitcoin to 42 million (it's the answer to life, the universe and everything isn't it?).
I wouldn't accept it.
But I can only know what I'm accepting if I'm running a node. So that's why running a node is important.
If I don't accept bitcoin anyway and I'm just running the node out of solidarity, what can I do? Show up as a number on Luke's graph?
How many nodes are running a certain set of rules is an interesting signal, but do you think it is one that will alter outcomes?
There is no voting and no weighting, there is only people who are willing to accept bitcoin. If a person is not transacting with bitcoin, running a node doesn't have much to do with the matter.
I think what I'm trying to get at with this poll is that noderunners aren't who enforce bitcoin's consensus rules. The rules are enforced by node runners who accept bitcoin transactions.