Author: Russell O'Connor 2022-07-11 20:35:02
Published on: 2022-07-11T20:35:02+00:00
The discussion on the bitcoin-dev mailing list centers around the issue of transaction fees and their impact on Bitcoin's security. Bram Cohen, a prominent figure in the cryptocurrency community, explains that if transaction fees remain unpredictable due to the established day/night cycle and longer gaps on weekends and holidays, Bitcoin's dependence on fees for security is likely to become a serious problem. This could result in fewer or no blocks being mined overnight, leading to miners adopting more sophisticated strategies such as waiting until enough fees are in the mempool before attempting to make a block. However, the gaming doesn't end there as miners with lower costs of operation may collectively reorg the last hour of the day overnight, which would be profitable. To counter this, miners may create anyone-can-spend outputs to bribe other miners to build on their block rather than reorg it, requiring some amount of floating capital. The potential consequences beyond this point are uncertain.
Updated on: 2023-06-15T22:49:36.862174+00:00