I'm Simon, creator of Mempool.Space. AMA.
47.3k sats \ 81 comments \ @softsimon 22 Jul 2022 bitcoin freebie
Hi everyone! I am @softsimon_, creator and co-founder of the @Mempool open source project at Mempool.Space, an increasingly used and loved tool for Bitcoiners around the world and with self hosted installations on thousands of Raspberry Pi home node devices using one-click installation software such as Umbrel.
In just 3 years it has grown from a small side project to an important infrastructure in the Bitcoin ecosystem with integrations on platforms like Umbrel, Raspiblitz and embassyOS. And with Wallet integrators like CashApp, Phoenix, Muun and Zeus.
We self host our infrastructure on multiple locations around the world and support multiple networks like Testnet, Signet and a separate website for the Liquid sidechain at Liquid.Network.
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177 sats \ 1 reply \ @sb 22 Jul 2022
Where do you see Mempool.space going in the next 5 years? Do you see yourself branching out to other projects?
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86 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
Tough question. I could never have imagined how much it has grown in just 3 years from zero so I would guess the coming 5 years would surprise me similarly.
People always asks me "But why do you still have to work on Mempool, isn't it finished?" but yet we continue cranking out new features, networks and we have already started to support more second layer networks. A guess is that the whole Lightning ecosystem will grow a lot the coming 5 years and supporting that in various ways will be a big task ahead.
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156 sats \ 3 replies \ @P2P_bitcoin 22 Jul 2022
The Bisq Dashboard is excellent, thank you for creating that. https://bisq.markets
How did that come to be something added to Mempool? i.e., did Bisq request it, or you just wanted to scratch your own itch, or ???
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101 sats \ 2 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
Mempool has a tight partnership with Bisq from the start. Wiz, the co-founder of Mempool previously did work for Bisq and knew they needed to completely rewrite their legacy super slow PHP explorer, so adding it as a Layer2 network rewritten in more modern technologies was a good addition to Mempool as it always goes inline with our vision to support the full Multi layer Ecosystem of Bitcoin. Mempool is now the official block explorer for Bisq.
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5 sats \ 1 reply \ @P2P_bitcoin 22 Jul 2022
One suggestion I might add for the Bisq Dashboard is that the volume is in BTC only. I'ld like to also see in the chart the volume in USD equivalent (or if not in the chart, at least the USD amount showing parens when it shows the amounts for that date when hovering).
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30 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
The Bisq explorer have very low priority for us unfortunately. You may make the suggestion by open a Github issue in our repo or in the Bisq repo so that it can be noted and prioritized.
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150 sats \ 3 replies \ @tomlaies 22 Jul 2022
Do you feel like Mempool.Space has become too important? This might be a weird question since every developer loves to see his own product succeed.
But people are increasingly using Mempool as a single point of truth about Bitcoin instead of embracing decentralization by looking up stats from their own nodes or from several sources. Of course this does not compromise Bitcoins decentralization - it just is a lost opportunity to convey the culture of Bitcoin to the normies.
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100 sats \ 2 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
Most people aren't going to run their node, and most people aren't going to buy KYC free Bitcoin. That is the hash truth.
But compared to many other Block Explorers we are at least Open source, we self host and own our server hardware, no Amazon or Google surveillance. You CAN access the website over TOR. You CAN one-click install the whole solution on your Raspberry Pi device and be sovereign.
As long as the core Bitcoin community likes what we are doing, it will be a force that continue to help spreading the word of how to run Bitcoin infrastructure properly.
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212 sats \ 0 replies \ @tomlaies 22 Jul 2022
But compared to many other Block Explorers we are at least Open source, we self host and own our server hardware, no Amazon or Google surveillance. You CAN access the website over TOR. You CAN one-click install the whole solution on your Raspberry Pi device and be sovereign.
I get that and think it is awesome.
But have you never felt like "Yes, come to us for information but don't look at us as if we were the authority"?
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @rijndael 23 Jul 2022
This. I run my own copy for mainnet, but use the public instance for testnet, signet, and the L2s. Great to be able to do both!
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260 sats \ 1 reply \ @AJ1992 22 Jul 2022
Mempool.space is the greatest block explorer, easily. And it has never let me down when i check to make sure the fee i use will be in the next block..always always accurate on what block you'll be in too!
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131 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
Thanks :)
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125 sats \ 1 reply \ @0xtr 22 Jul 2022
  1. How did you initially get into Bitcoin?
  2. What triggered you to start building mempool.space?
  3. What are some future features you'd want to see on mempool.space/liquid.network?
  4. Favorite mobile Bitcoin wallet?
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831 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
  1. I used bitcoin as an online "anonymous" currency 2013-2015 without understanding the monetary aspects. In 2016 after som austrian economics I finally started to get it and from 2017 it has been almost full time focus.
  2. See earlier motivation reply. But to expand.. After understanding how the Bitcoin network and the Mempool work, I didn't find any tools that actually visualizes what is going on in a Bitcoin Node, I know the data is there, but just not so easily accessable.
  3. I think the only big thing I want to see is seamless Bitcoin and Lightning integration
  4. Blixt Wallet (made by a good friend of mine) as non custodial wallet. And Zeus when connecting to a node.
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143 sats \ 1 reply \ @kr 22 Jul 2022
will community and corporate sponsors sustain the development of mempool for the foreseeable future?
what other funding models did you consider/are you considering?
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124 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
We have a few ideas. For now it's going to be Enterprise sponsoring. We have server hosting and development expenses that needs to be long term sustainable. We might be able to share more on this topic later this year.
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30 sats \ 1 reply \ @k00b 22 Jul 2022
How do you use mempool.space? Which features maybe aren't obvious to the average user, but provide a lot of value if you're aware of them?
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180 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022 freebie
I use it for various things, mainly check the status of the Mempool or track transactions. My favorite hidden feature is how it automatically detects if a transaction got replaced (RBF) and offer to take you to the new one, very handy when you are trying to get a low fee but slowly bumping the fee to make sure to get into the next block.
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200 sats \ 9 replies \ @sagaz 22 Jul 2022 freebie
so, peter todd one of these days here on tt suggested increasing the supply on btc if necessary, because of the activity of the miners.... What do you think of this?
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130 sats \ 8 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
Most Bitcoiners including me disagree. Bitcoin security is fine, and if security would be lowered, we do what all altcoins and Bitcoin forks has to do when security is lowered, you need to wait more confirmations and you get the exact same security. Go to https://howmanyconfs.com/ and see how Bitcoin Cash (BCH) requires 1,121 conf for the same security of 6 Bitcoin Confs. So in 50 years when block reward is close to zero, fees will probably be very high because increased adoption with small block space causes a fierce fee market that will pay for security. But if security is low enough to make Bitcoin attack prone from miners... We might have to get used to waiting 2 hours instead of 20 minutes for our transactions to be considered secure, and that is OK, because most of us will transact on Layer 2 or Layer 3 anyway and won't notice.
This feature is described in the white paper actually.
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21 sats \ 6 replies \ @bigrouter 22 Jul 2022 freebie
How do you know most bitcoiners disagree? Is it subjective or do you have some data?
I've been following the fee market development closely and I am not that optimistic. Once I thought that introducing an inflationary component to bitcoin was heresy but the past few years made me question that.
What Peter Todd suggests does seem to make sense considering the coins that are lost in organic ways.
Bitcoin is becoming increasingly important to the energy sector and having a tiny block rewards without any meaningful fees will impacts that progress.
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25 sats \ 2 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
It's just my general understanding that the majority of the Bitcoin maximalists that I see on twitter and meet IRL all agree that the 21M hard cap is holy and should not be touched. That of course fees with cover the security in the future if Bitcoin is successful.. And just like I stated in my first reply.. if security is lowered, we just increase the number of confirmations before calling it final settlement... So what is the issue exactly?
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20 sats \ 1 reply \ @bigrouter 22 Jul 2022 freebie
I understand the "21 million forever" concept but that's not my question or the original question (I think)
What do you specifically think about the idea of a fixed reward that Peter Todd recently opted for discussion on the bitcoin-dev mailing list?
In short: organically coins/sats are lost and therefore a small inflationary reward for miners might not absolutely impact the 21 million cap.
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167 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
It's an interesting argument for sure. But there is no way of measuring or proving how much that organically gets lost. I still prefer the 21M hard cap meme. All money that existed before Bitcoin was "leaking", even Gold with its yearly 2%(?) inflation. So Bitcoin is the perfected money with a actual hard cap first time in the history of humanity. So introducing a small leak would mean that there could in theory be something "better" than Bitcoin still. I want Bitcoin to continue being the perfected money in this aspect, and if 0.001% of coins gets lost every year it just slowly increases the value of everyone's coins in a deflationary way.... just my 2 sats. Especially without any inflation required to secure the network due to the arguments I stated above.
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110 sats \ 2 replies \ @Spartan 22 Jul 2022
It's not hard to know. One of the first principals of Bitcoin is scarcity. If you increase the supply, it will no longer be Bitcoin.
That is just the simple truth of the matter. 21 million forever.
It is difficult to solve a problem that does not exist today. If we are at the very beginning of the adoption curve (which I personally believe we are) then the network is only be used at <2% of future network traffic.
This problem is a problem for tomorrow, because we cannot foresee the future and have it hang around our necks like an albatross.
IF this issue needs addressing, then it will be addressed at the appropriate time. That time is not now.
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45 sats \ 1 reply \ @bigrouter 22 Jul 2022 freebie
Point well made and taken. Too early to think about it.
I was hoping for a more nuanced response from @softsimon since he is more aware of the fee market development and likely has thought more about it therefore.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 26 Jul 2022
Just based of what I've seen. Bitcoin block size and block space are scarce and the limitations are also very arbitrary. Currently you can do 1 sat/vb, but what happened in 2020 for example is that as soon as the fee market starts for real, it will shoot up to 100 sats/vB .. and we get true price discovery for block space.
What happens when fees go up is that the market adapts, stop doing some transactions, migrate to other technologies like Lightning. This part is very unpredictable. It's like the people 100 years ago that predicted that food and oil would run out in the world... They base their assumptions on current data. We don't know how the market adapt and what scaling tech will exist in 20 years.
Personally I think one thing is for sure,, if Bitcoin is successful and adoption continues,, there will be a fee market enough to cover security. And it will not be like now with empty blocks during a bear market, it will have a steady market price as world trade continues 24/7.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @ermicin 23 Jul 2022 freebie
There's a web app that illustrates how this could be wrong: https://www.btcsecuritybudget.com/
You can change failure/success thresholds in the settings, but you can get the idea pretty quickly just playing with the sliders.
That's not to say inflation or tail emission is a good idea either, but I think more people ought to be taking this seriously as its potentially an issue coming sooner than later.
Also:
  • long conf times are bad for UX.
  • high security is one of the biggest selling points of btc (helps with censorship resistance). If eth surpasses BTC in security, then why wouldn't people just move to eth?
  • high fees are a negative because that turns the base layer into something closer to banking than what we have today.
120 sats \ 2 replies \ @And1 22 Jul 2022
What new features are you looking forward to?
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307 sats \ 1 reply \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
Lightning :)
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @BlokchainB 23 Jul 2022
Yay!!
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120 sats \ 1 reply \ @02cec24a32 22 Jul 2022 freebie
Will you add mining pools that are now offline to avoid those gaps in the pool dominance offline chart?
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70 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
We are adding all old and current mining pools and tagging as many blocks as possible throughout the history of the chain. If you know of any blocks that is tagged as Unknown but can be identified as a miner please let us know.
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120 sats \ 1 reply \ @sagaz 22 Jul 2022 freebie
How do you analyzed the narrative evolving around Bitcoin Maximalists is a cultural war?
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50 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
I don't know about any cultural war. I just find it a good thing that there is a culture among Bitcoiners that say "no" to bad ideas and attempts of changing the Bitcoin protocol.
A cultural change away from maximalist is a big attack vector on Bitcoin, because if nobody cared, bad ideas might start trickle down into the Bitcoin protocol, like inflation, like unsecure features, like centralisation.
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110 sats \ 2 replies \ @BTCMiner 22 Jul 2022
Did you see that yesterday a top post here on SN was for Mempool?
Strangely, the link for that post was to the home page, not even the mining page.
Difficulty Adjustment (-5.01%) - Third Negative Adjustment in a Row #47904 https://mempool.space
I was able to use the Pools Dominance chart to help answer a question asked, ... how to tell which pools had the biggest dip in hashrate (with now three of the last four difficulty adjustments being decreases).
https://mempool.space/graphs/mining/pools-dominance
That's a nice feature I hadn't even noticed before. Any other features coming for the /mining dashboard?
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95 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
I just remembered. We have a big feature coming up for the mining dashboard regarding block prediction comparison and statistics!
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96 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
The mining dashboard and all related graphs was a big feature we worked on for several months and is considered done for the time being. Focus is on other areas at the moment but we will continue to add more graphs and stats in the Mining dashboard as people request for it.
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125 sats \ 1 reply \ @cryptocoin 22 Jul 2022
Have you ever been asked to cough up info (e.g., IP address) for a bitcoin address inquiry?
I suppose that's why warrant canaries exist, because if you had been asked you probably would be prevented from stating that you had been.
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464 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022 freebie
Only from random individuals who claim they got hacked or scammed, and obviously we don't have that info as we are not a chainalysis company.
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120 sats \ 4 replies \ @gms 22 Jul 2022
Hey Simon, I love your project. Thank you for creating this tool 🧡. My question may be insignificant, but I love data📈 How many users per day/month do you have on average mempool?
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269 sats \ 3 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
Between 20-40k per day and close to a million per month, both unique. When the Mempool is full, it is usually A LOT more traffic.
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30 sats \ 0 replies \ @gms 22 Jul 2022
that crazy, congrats.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @nout 24 Jul 2022
The million is a huge number! (I'd be careful a bit though, since most analytics solutions tend to overcount uniques especially on long ranges)
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @faithandcredit 24 Jul 2022
That's probably a million users that don't know about lightning. Do you have any plans to put up lightning network reccomdations? For example when the mempool is full it could remind people that second layers might be cheaper
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105 sats \ 1 reply \ @rheedi0 22 Jul 2022
What kinds of design principles do you consider when putting together and iterating on a UI? Do you have any recommendations to learn more about the process?
Big fan of mempool.space, btw. Really changed the way I think about what a block explorer can be
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189 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
A few design principles has carried me from the start.
  • A visualization is more intuitive than an endless list of data rows
  • Visualizations has to be practical. Many fail this step, making sites where transactions fly by or rain down etc but you can't really use it for anything. So combining visualization with something actually useful is the trick.
  • No settings, one config fits all. Reduces complexity. This is very Apple-inspired.
  • It has to be super easy to use for newcomers, but at the same time have all the advanced data and features for power users.. Also very Apple-inspired.
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105 sats \ 1 reply \ @OneOneSeven 22 Jul 2022 freebie
Actually seeing the blocks and transactions helps a ton when trying to understand/learn/explain BTC, are you working on anything to further this visualization of the blockchain?
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149 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
We just recently partnered with Mononaut to integrate advanced Mempool Block and Block content visualization. So just click on a random block now and you'll see it. I think that was a major improvement to the visualization of a block. I don't have any upcoming changes in mind but suddenly we get a new idea or find someone with an idea and we will implement it.
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100 sats \ 1 reply \ @sandbeach123old 22 Jul 2022 freebie
I love the tool on my umbrel thanks!. How do you calculate the next block to be mined? Do you have a miner that prepares like a candidate block?
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50 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
Miners want to earn as much as possible. So there is a default algorithm in Bitcoin called "getBlockTemplate" that picks the most rewarding transactions first, in order. This is what the Mempool app is doing when it sorting the transactions by transaction fees with highest fee first in line.
So we are merely guessing that miners will pick and it usually hits 97%+ accuracy because not all mempools are the same, there is delay in the network and miners could also manually pick transactions we can't predict.
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20 sats \ 1 reply \ @k00b 22 Jul 2022
In what ways have users of mempool.space surprised you?
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263 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022 freebie
I was overwhelmed with the amount of love from the community, especially how many that wanted to become community sponsor. Also how people tell me they use Mempool space as education material in school, or how they watch the website moving for hours just like sitting around a camp fire.
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59 sats \ 1 reply \ @KingZing 22 Jul 2022
one of the most impressive bitcoin tools! thanks for making it all nice and easy to interpret
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97 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022 freebie
Thanks for using it and spreading the word :)
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20 sats \ 1 reply \ @k00b 22 Jul 2022
What motivated you to build mempool.space?
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320 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022 freebie
I don't know about you, but for me, when truly understanding the possible impact Bitcoin can give to the world, you just want to join the movement and contribute in any way you can to help it grow. I used my previous front end developing skills to start making small visual and practical Bitcoin related tools, and Mempool was the first one.
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20 sats \ 2 replies \ @kenn3d 22 Jul 2022 freebie
My MyNode instance of Mempool has stopped connecting since the last update (v2.4.0) It launches but remains in a constant offline/reconnecting loop. Re-installing doesn't fix it. Rebooting MyNode doesn't fix it.
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30 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
One reason for the Mempool backend crashing is too low memory raspberry pi.. 2gb or 4gb.
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30 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
It's not a known bug in the Mempool app, so you need to contact the MyNode support. It's what the MyNode premium subscription model is for ;)
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100 sats \ 1 reply \ @selfish_gene 22 Jul 2022
привет! отличный мемпул. он у меня открыт круглые сутки! есть просьба. можно поставить в первом блоке (12 _блоков) тут пробел? иногда похоже на 126
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
исправлено, спасибо! (обновление займет некоторое время)
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130 sats \ 0 replies \ @1GLENCoop 23 Jul 2022 freebie
I love https://mempool.space and even run my own to keep my Bitcoin queries private.
Has there been any talk of possibly adding the ability to monitor the Monero mempool?
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10 sats \ 1 reply \ @spraveenitpro 23 Jul 2022
I know some JavaScript /React, How can I contribute to this project? Any suggestions on some contained easy issues?
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10 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 23 Jul 2022
We have a big backlog of random issues. If you start by setting up the project, getting familiar with the structure you can just try look into some simple issue and open a Pull Request. https://github.com/mempool/mempool/issues
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10 sats \ 0 replies \ @rijndael 23 Jul 2022
Thank you SO much for supporting signet. And everything else :-) I love mempool.space. I self host a copy and the public instance is just a feature of all my machines
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10 sats \ 1 reply \ @kim 22 Jul 2022
awesome website, it's cool to see it evolve and grow like this would love to have a bit of simple fiat-btc features like preev.com though but awesome job, love the site
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 22 Jul 2022
I've been wanting a preeve like calculator on the Mempool site for a long time now... hopefully one day :)
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0 sats \ 2 replies \ @LaserStack 24 Jul 2022
Do you have any plans to add an RSK explorer? What about non-sidechain L2s such as LN and Mercury?
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5 sats \ 1 reply \ @softsimon OP 24 Jul 2022
No immediate plans. Mercury would be the most possible candidate in that case because it's more close to Bitcoin. RSK is more like a separate network with their own coin.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @LaserStack 26 Jul 2022
RSK is a federated sidechain though, just like Liquid. And you have developed liquid.network.
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0 sats \ 3 replies \ @shyfire 24 Jul 2022
is OXT.ME run by the feds?
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0 sats \ 2 replies \ @softsimon OP 24 Jul 2022
No idea. I believe it's run by the Samourai wallet company.
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0 sats \ 1 reply \ @shyfire 24 Jul 2022
thanks for the honest reply. it would be cool to see some of their features ported to mempool, although I guess transaction explorer != block explorer?
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @softsimon OP 26 Jul 2022
I guess OXT is more of a chain analysis tool. Is there some specific feature you would want to see?
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0 sats \ 1 reply \ @metalogician 26 Jul 2022 freebie
Are you hiring?
0 sats \ 1 reply \ @Pash36 24 Jul 2022 freebie
Is your project available for us in Africa, because most things are not supported here?
0 sats \ 1 reply \ @ca 24 Jul 2022 freebie
Thanks so much for your work.
The sound when I have an unconfirmed transaction that get confirmed while I keep the Chrome tab in the background is so delightful, such a pleasant surprise the first time!
  1. What are the most important UX principles you follow?
  2. Which UX feature are you most proud of?