Author: Ahmed Zsales 2015-08-22 00:06:26
Published on: 2015-08-22T00:06:26+00:00
The email discusses a proposal for altering the maximum allowed block size of the Bitcoin protocol in a democratic way without making it easy to game. The proposal suggests introducing a cost to increase the block size, ensuring that the mining community will only collude to increase it when there is a clear necessity and reduce it when it is unnecessary. Rogue miners cannot force their wishes easily because they will have to pay extra a difficulty target, and then can be downvoted at no cost by the objecting hash power. Miners can vote for a block size increase by signaling the proposed percentage increase of the "base block size limit" in the coinbase field. For the vote to be considered valid, the block they mine must meet a difficulty target, which is proportionally larger than the standard difficulty target based on the percentage increase they voted for. Every 2016 blocks, the maximum allowed block size will be recalculated by the average of all votes in the last 2016 blocks.Blocks that are larger than the calculated base block size limit are invalid and must be rejected. The maximum change up or down each retargeting period shall be limited to 10% of the base block size limit. The maximum block size may not increase above 8MB. Votes shall be cast by adding the following human-readable multiplier to the coinbase string “/BXn.nnn/” where valid votes would exist between the ranges “/BX0.900/” (10% decrease) and “/BX1.100/” (10% increase). “/BX1.000/” would be a vote for no change. Invalid votes will be counted as a vote for no change: “/BX1.000/”. The proposal acknowledges that predetermined block size increases are problematic because they attempt to predict the future and dynamic block size adjustments also suffer from the potential to be gamed by the larger hash power. It also notes that a global currency can't use many tools for forward planning like credit card providers and retailers use to plan for capacity on a regional basis. Human factors such as religious holidays need to be considered. The proposal is placed in the public domain, and BtcDrak, the author of the proposal, suggests that the details of the algorithm are up for debate, and possibly some formula based determination. The email also raises concerns about miner cartel behavior, where a few emails every week and the larger miners could collude to set prices. The issue with this is forward planning is more important, especially when the moving average is longer than a week.
Updated on: 2023-06-10T20:56:19.907461+00:00