Author: Jeff Garzik 2015-05-08 15:49:48
Published on: 2015-05-08T15:49:48+00:00
The email conversation is about the scalability of the bitcoin network. Alan Reiner argues that a global transaction system cannot be fully audited by everyone and their mother, and that the goals of "a global transaction network" and "everyone must be able to run a full node with their $200 dell laptop" are not compatible. He believes that the important feature of the network is that it is open and anyone can get the history and verify it, but not everyone is required to. He thinks that clinging to the goal of running the history on a low-end PC limits the capability for the network to scale to be a useful global payments system. Jeff Garzik agrees that 7 transactions per second (tps) is too low but questions how high the network can realistically go and if Layer 1 bitcoin can really scale to get there. He argues against blindly endorsing "moar bitcoin volume!" without thinking about what bitcoin looks like at desired levels, what network resources are required to get to those levels, and who can support it. He suggests working backwards from the desired tps level to discern a maximum tps.
Updated on: 2023-06-09T19:36:55.357255+00:00