Author: Andrew C 2017-02-05 16:26:30
Published on: 2017-02-05T16:26:30+00:00
A new proposal to signal support for changes in Bitcoin has been suggested by John Hardy via Bitcoin-dev. Currently, miners are the only ones able to signal support through BIP9, which is a criticism of the current system. Hardy's proposal suggests using the output address of a transaction to signal support for a particular proposal, inspired by hashcash and vanity addresses. To generate an address with four consecutive case-insensitive characters would require roughly 34^4 attempts, taking less than a second on typical hardware. Popularity could be measured weighted by fee paid per voting kb. However, this system could be easily gamed by spammers and miners who choose what transactions to include in their blocks. Despite its limitations, it offers an accessible way to allow the entire economic community to signal their support within transactions. If considered effective, it could also be used to activate changes in the future.
Updated on: 2023-06-11T21:24:31.518037+00:00