Author: Cameron Garnham 2017-04-15 06:28:41
Published on: 2017-04-15T06:28:41+00:00
In a recent email to the Bitcoin-dev mailing list, Cameron expressed his views on the community's desire for SegWit activation. Cameron stated that while he was initially a supporter of BIP17, which was seen as the more elegant solution in comparison to BIP16, he now believes that technical elegance should be sacrificed for expediency. The Bitcoin community is tired of the ongoing scaling debate and wants swift action towards a resolution. Cameron suggests that BIP148 is the best solution to activate SegWit quickly, despite Gregory Maxwell's objection. Maxwell argues that BIP148 does not measure up to the standard set by SegWit or the existing best practices in protocol development in the Bitcoin community. The primary flaw in BIP148 is that it forces the activation of non-UASF SegWit nodes, which almost guarantees minor disruption. In contrast, SegWit was carefully engineered so that older unmodified miners could continue operating without interruption after its activation.Maxwell does not oppose the general concept of a UASF but generally, a soft-fork does not need to risk disruption of mining. However, there have been other UASF proposals that avoid forced disruption by defining a new witness bit and allowing non-upgraded-to-uasf miners and nodes to continue as non-upgraded.Cameron emphasizes that Swiftness should be the top priority after viability if any engineering solution to activate SegWit is provided. He believes that both the empirical view and the larger Bitcoin community want SegWit quickly, and it has come to represent a political solution to the conflict in the community. Cameron is willing to go through a minor level of disruption with BIP148, rather than continuing with the daily disruption from the scaling debate war.
Updated on: 2023-06-12T00:11:23.932035+00:00