Author: Erik 2015-11-13 13:07:33
Published on: 2015-11-13T13:07:33+00:00
A proposal has been put forth by Erik Fors regarding the BIP proposals for maximum block size in Bitcoin. The main problem with BIP101 is that it will centralize the currency. Meanwhile, BIP102 is only a one-time solution, which means new discussion of the next block max size will need to arise soon after implementation. On the other hand, BIP100 allows miners to vote on the block max size, but this could create several issues such as never being able to extend 32 MiB, even if the need arises for larger blocks in the future. It also has the potential to damage trust in the network by pushing back block max size and making transaction fees higher. Fors’ proposal aims to provide a long-term solution that gives opportunities to the network to cope with the actual state and hardware limits of the future network. It provides a smooth growth rate based on a large consensus, thus making the growth for the near future almost predictable. The growth rate decision should be in the hands of the miners. There is always growth in the block max size, and it should never decrease. Furthermore, it's good to have limits on the block max size to keep back spam transactions. The proposed rules indicate that the main target growth will be 2^(1/2) every second year, or a doubling of the block max size every four years. The growth rate every second year will strictly be limited by the formula 2^2 > growth > linear growth. Target growth is based on votes from the last 26280 blocks (half a year), and block max size grows at the same time as block difficulty retarget (2016 blocks). While there are some cons to this proposal, such as the possibility of a few single, large entities voting for smaller growth of blocks for an extended period of time causing mistrust in the bitcoin network, the overall aim is to provide a long-term solution that eliminates fluctuating block size and provides stability to the network.
Updated on: 2023-06-11T01:09:36.386969+00:00