Chapter 0 Introduction

Xingkong published an article yesterday titled "Principled Thinking on Bitcoin Expansion", which was widely circulated in major forums and groups. As someone who has mined with Satoshi Nakamoto, I have always looked up to Xingkong. As soon as this article came out, I dared to ask Xingkong for advice.

(Hereinafter referred to as the article "Principled Thinking on Bitcoin Expansion" is the original text.)

I will not repeat the original text. Careful readers can read it according to the original text.

Chapter 1: Reject conspiracy theories, but don’t ignore them

Support Starry Sky’s “other conspiracy theory” view.

Speak with evidence and logic. Those who pick and choose evidence and distort logic are not good. The impact of large blocks and small blocks on handling fees will indeed affect the handling fees of haobtc, and the price of the coin will affect the income of haobtc. Both of these points are well-founded and reasonable. I completely agree with Xingkong's views.

But I think that we can’t just label or define conspiracy theories. Otherwise, what is the PR department for?

We are now in an era of information explosion. The direct result of the information explosion is that it has become more difficult to distinguish the truth from the false because there is too much noise.

We are also living in an era of numerous circles. Before one circle intersects with another, it is a world of secrecy. Once the trains are in opposite directions and about to meet, a lot of misunderstandings and suspicions are bound to arise. At this time, conspiracy theories are almost inevitable.

These two reasons force every company to face conspiracy theories head-on. When conspiracy theories come, it is irresponsible to avoid them.

The conspiracy theory against HaoBTC in the market is not that HaoBTC is afraid of handling fees and electricity costs. I think the conspiracy theory against HaoBTC mainly comes from @币之王 that the Bitcoin financial management model naturally prevents the expectation of hard forks, that is, it is afraid that users will come to run after the hard fork. If you pay attention to reddit and bitcointalk, you will find that there are a lot of high leverage haters criticizing HaoBTC for resisting classic due to leverage. I am not a conspiracy theorist on this point, I am just listing the posts I read.

If I were the PR department of Haobtc, I would mainly explain how Haobtc will work to reduce leverage and calm the risk of bank runs. For example, I would emphasize that Haobtc lowered interest rates to deleverage and increased reserves to deal with bank runs. (I know that Haobtc has done these things, and Xingkong has also publicly stated that it will deleverage. Haobtc’s ​​homepage has public cold wallets and even bankruptcy value announcements.)

Chapter 2 Refusing to Guess Motives

I fully support the original statement. Guessing motives is the logic of the weak.

Chapter 3 Please keep the context consistent

The original text of Starry Sky claimed that "we think blockchain is precious."

Logically, this point contradicts the second point. In this point, Xingkong is talking about subjective attitude, and the motivation behind it is that my motivation is to maintain the high status of blockchain. This expression of subjective consciousness is not conducive to resolving disputes.

Chapter 4 Bitcoin Transfers Should Remain Cheap

Forgive the claim that “never advertise or expect Bitcoin transfers to be cheap or free.”

I clearly oppose this.

The low transfer fee is one of the advantages that Bitcoin can exploit. Please remember that this is only an advantage that can be exploited, not an advantage that must be implemented. If Bitcoin can win the competition with other advantages, it can completely abandon the low transaction fee.

Starry Sky’s current view is that “the characteristics of Bitcoin transfer fees are more disadvantages than advantages”, and its reason is that “the transfer fee is the cost of attacking the Bitcoin network. The lower the fee, the easier it is to attack, which means the Bitcoin network is less secure”, so the transfer fee should be rejected.

Let me make my position clear: I am against the idea of ​​starry sky. My reasons for opposition are as follows:

1. In addition to DDOS attacks such as dust attacks, there is also a more terrifying 51% attack. The reason why Bitcoin is immune to 51% attacks is that it is secure due to its high computing power, not the high transfer fees that add up to the attack costs.

2. Deploying computing power to mine and earn fees based on the amount of coins is a model with low marginal costs and high marginal effects. Therefore, a single high fee does not take advantage of computing power benefits, but should be to maintain low fees and increase the number of transfers.

3. If you want to earn money by deploying computing power and mining in RMB, in addition to executing 2, you should also expect the price of the currency to rise. The increase in the number of users is roughly equivalent to the increase in the price of the currency. The increase in the number of users requires low transfer fees. On the contrary, high fees will exclude a large number of people from the Bitcoin circle.
   

Chapter 5: DDOS Bitcoin Network Costs Should Be Calculated in Fiat Currency

The original article stated that "Bitcoin transfer fees are getting lower and lower, which shows that the security of Bitcoin transfer network is not taken seriously."

The calculation model for the cost of attacking the Bitcoin network, whether it is based on the amount of currency or the price of currency, should be considered from the perspective of where the attacker comes from.

If the attacker is a coin holder who does not recognize Bitcoin and does not care how many coins he has, and wants to maliciously damage the Bitcoin network, then he should use the amount of coins to calculate the attack cost. The higher the coin attack cost, the more likely it is to prevent the attack.

If the attackers are people who need to rely on fiat currency to purchase services in real life, they will lose their quality of life every time they launch an attack. The quality of life is judged by fiat currency. In this case, the cost of the attack should be calculated based on the currency price. The higher the cost, the more it can deter attackers.

Now I want to ask, where do people who use DDOS to attack the Bitcoin network come from? Xingkong is an early user, a miner in 2009. If Xingkong's answer is the former, it is understandable that the answer should be calculated by the amount of coins. But I think it is the latter. I use RMB to enter the market and hold Bitcoin. If someone like me attacks the network, every time I launch an attack, I have to eat an extra meal of instant noodles.

My conclusion is that given the current Bitcoin economic system, DDOS attacks on the Bitcoin network should be calculated in legal currency.

Chapter 6 Focus on long-term interests

Support Star Sky to focus more on long-term interests.

But Starry Sky's long-term perspective is to focus on the strength of the Bitcoin development team, and classic dev is obviously weaker than Core dev. I think this is precisely short-sighted behavior.

1. From a practical point of view: Bitcoin is a decentralized product, and decentralization has a future. (This is why I do not advocate going directly to unlimited at the current bandwidth and storage costs) The most powerful center of Bitcoin now is Core dev. This center is so powerful that it goes against the expansion expectations of the entire community and does not take action. This center is so powerful that it ignores a lot of opposition to RBF and forces RBF. This center is so powerful that it ignores the dissatisfaction of the majority of the community with the timeline of the launch of Segregated Witness and insists on moving forward. Obviously, this is a failure of decentralization.

2. From a pragmatic point of view. The Bitcoin network is facing a serious congestion problem, and the block size has been maintained at more than 0.9M for a long time. Even the price is locked. The user experience is extremely poor. If there is a disease, it must be treated. Now the Classic dev immediately prescribed a prescription, and the Core dev only promised an unimplemented segregated witness, and there is no lightning network. I would like to ask, in the long run, should the development rights be handed over to a dev who is willing to cure the disease and save people, or to a dev who only promises but does not give anything?

3. Let's look at it a little more. The Core development roadmap focuses on developing LN and Sidechain and excludes Bitcoin expansion, while the Classic development roadmap focuses on strengthening the Bitcoin main chain, but does not exclude LN and Sidechain. In addition, someone has already built a sidechain - Rootstock. Then the question is, the development of Core dev excludes Classic, while Classic dev is inclusive of Core. In the long run, if we choose Core, we may be locked below 2M blocks forever (or even 1M). Please note that the vast majority of the community now agrees to upgrade to 2M blocks, and the vast majority of people also agree that as long as it does not harm decentralization, the blocks can be made larger. Choosing Classic is much less risky, unless the truth is really only in the hands of a few Core devs. We can choose possible larger blocks and LN and Sidechain at the same time.

So I think in the long run, it is more in the long-term interest to choose a development team that is willing and able to safely expand to 2M. I don't necessarily mean only Classic dev here, but we should refuse to indulge Core dev and force them to take a better path. Teams that restrict without reason or find excuses to limit 2M expansion cannot be trusted.

Chapter 7 Who is competent for Bitcoin development?

The original text stated that "the Core team is still the only mature professional open source team capable of developing complex improvements to Bitcoin."

There is no evidence that "only" Core dev is competent to develop Bitcoin. Starry Sky also publicly claimed that LN belongs to haobtc, and haobtc will organize the development of the Lightning Network. Classic dev is also a development team and has its own works. There is no reason to believe that its development capabilities are limited to modifying the upper limit of the block size. I can't find any evidence or logic to prove that Classic dev will definitely stagnate.

You think Core is a "mature" development team, I can give examples to prove that they are not mature. When the whole community wanted 2M blocks, they went against public opinion.

But when RBF was so opposed, they bundled the "libsecp256k1 signature that speeds up signature verification by 7 times" with RBF. The former is completely in the interests of the mining pool, while the latter completely harms the interests of merchants. Core dev did such a lousy thing. What's the difference between this and forced selling? Is this what a mature person should do?

It is also immature for Core dev to forcibly resist and postpone the 2M expansion.

Chapter 8: Just talk about facts, reason and logic

The original article claims that "the original intention of open source projects is to not talk nonsense and just do it. Don't talk nonsense and just look at the code."

Saying things like “If you can do it, go ahead and stop talking nonsense” is a fundamental denial of the division of labor in society.

Think about it, when the Chinese national football team played badly, you scolded the national football team. When the party was messing around in governing the country, didn't you always mock the party? When traditional Chinese medicine was popular, weren't you the first to criticize it? If I were a traditional Chinese medicine practitioner, and you scolded me, and I scolded you back by saying "Don't talk nonsense, if you can do it, come and treat the disease", what would you think, Xingkong?

If I don't study medicine to treat illnesses, can I not criticize traditional Chinese medicine? If I can't go into politics, can I not criticize corrupt officials? If I don't know how to write code, can I not criticize unreasonable developers? If I don't have a mining machine, can I not criticize miners who maliciously block network upgrades? If eggs are not delicious, do I still have to lay them?

The so-called "If you can do it, go for it, don't talk nonsense" advocates a kind of empathy, thinking from the other person's perspective. It accuses you of being unreasonable, unprofessional and unscientific in your criticism, not because you have not accomplished the other person's career.

As long as my criticism is based on facts, reason and logic, why can't I talk nonsense?

Chapter 9 When to exercise voting rights

The original text claims that "everyone has corresponding voting rights."

You claim that everyone has the right to vote. Yes, everyone has the right to vote. I don't know what you mean by emphasizing the "right" of each person. In the context of the text, I can understand that you think you should just exercise your power instead of talking nonsense. I think that is not possible. Before exercising the right to vote, there must be a lot of communication and arguments.

Every independent individual who makes judgments in the market invests real money with the expectation of the commodity. Please remember that it is "expectation". If I "expect" Bitcoin to rise in the long run, I will hold a long-term long position, otherwise I will sell the currency.

The reason why the market is unbeatable is that all the information in the market cannot be 100% understood. Even if it is understood, it is difficult to keep up with the action in time.

It is obvious that it is almost impossible to bet on the market and exit the market at the same time.

When developers develop a version, they will make references based on future needs and technologies. For example, Core dev believes that everyone’s future needs should be on the side chain.

Miners also consider future needs and technologies when choosing which version to run. For example, most miners reject XT because they believe that future bandwidth and storage technology cannot run XT under the premise of decentralization.

Whether the currency holders are long or short is still a judgment on the future value of the currency.

Because the future is bound to be uncertain, in the Bitcoin system, the three divisions of labor will have different expectations for the future. When there is a disagreement, people will inevitably try to influence the result, except for waiting foolishly. This disagreement is the reason for the current quarrel.

If we exercise voting power directly, then why do we invent a language for "communication"? Why do we learn English?

Having expectations for the future but being dissatisfied with the current situation is the norm in society. Adults should not immediately abandon their hands and clamor for exercising their voting rights. Adults should make rational voices. Those who tell others to shut up and say you have no right to talk nonsense are childish. Back then, Chairman Mao advocated that a hundred flowers bloom, but now it is the 21st century and he still asks us to shut up. Then what are we doing with our mouths!

Chapter 10 Don't despise technology

The original text says "Bitcoin is a technical project, and talking about Bitcoin will return to the technology itself..."

This is correct nonsense. There are thousands of technical routes to accommodate more transactions. You can directly expand the block or develop the lightning network. Both are technologies. I don't know what you are trying to illustrate with this paragraph. You are probably implying that the technicality of directly expanding the block is not as advanced as the lightning network and side chain.

I don't know where this contempt chain comes from, but some people always think that this technology is advanced and that technology is low-level. Let me give you an example to prove why this contempt is wrong.

While programmers were optimizing storage, Satoshi Nakamoto directly copied the blockchain data thousands or tens of thousands of times and stored it all over the world in an extremely wasteful way. As a programmer, who dares to despise Satoshi Nakamoto?

Lightning Network, Segregated Witness, and sidechains are superior and more powerful than simply increasing the size of the block. I don’t know where this kind of contempt chain comes from in front of Bitcoin. Technology is technology, and technology will not despise another technology. They all exist to solve problems.

While we have contempt, we must be clear about whether it is more important to save costs or to ensure functionality. If the marginal cost is low, then economists support ensuring functionality first.

Chapter 11 I Won't Be Scolded to Death

Xingkong, please don't scold me. You are making me die of anger.

I'm sure a lot of people will scold me for this article.

If you love me, please give me a reward.

Thanks for reading.

If you find the article useful, please give me some Bitcoin to encourage me to continue writing.

Author: tan90d (Weibo @LightningHSL WeChat tan90d)

My BTC address: 14mhzjkJ71oMAMkKu3dy98dnUpkyQBHL1r

Source: Babbitt Information