10 ms·

Bitcoin seems to be a victim of its own success. Transacting in BTC is expensive and very slow now. I think that's what is driving growth in LTC and ETH. BTC pr

Bitcoin seems to be a victim of its own success. Transacting in BTC is expensive and very slow now. I think that's what is driving growth in LTC and ETH. BTC proved the concept is workable, but that doesn't mean it will stick around.

zanny 9y ago
There have been years for bitcoin to adapt the protocol - even in non-forking ways - to ease the transaction backlog. Those with commit access and authority have chosen not to. I got out of it mainly for that purpose. I was interested in a universal currency, not a get rich scheme based on enticing people with the promise of the future just to use that promise as a means to pump exchange rates. Going forward, it is a perfectly serviceable crypto-gold, but it has no greater aspirations anymore. I think there is absolutely still room in the market for a cryptocurrency that isn't a ponzie scheme that can actually function as a daily driver currency replacement, but none have become popular yet. Probably because they aren't ponzie schemes.
- brasky 9y ago
  You can't record every currency transaction on a blockchain it simply doesn't scale. None of the altcoins have figured out how to scale either.
  - dacox 9y ago
    Seriously, was there this much politiking for infighting when people proposed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OSI_model https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OSI_model.
    - detaro 9y ago
      Well, the stack around the OSI model seems to have lost to TCP/IP due to being late and overengineered, so possibly?
  - sp821543 9y ago
    How did we solve the problem of recording every written word into a single book?
  - zanny 9y ago
    You don't need everyone to have a complete blockchain. Etherium, for example, lets you just do fast syncs that use a fairly fixed amount of storage space. You need a copy somewhere to have an actual blockchain, but not every node need host that chain. The major players in the economy, however, with the resources to keep around 100GB every couple years of data are incentivized to to maintain the stability of their currency network. Because blocks are reverse-signed, you can't have a limited pool of old blocks and forge the records. Its a chain for a reason - each blocks signature is dependent on its peer blocks, and we still don't have anything close to breakable sha-256 that would compromise bitcoin.
    - Frogolocalypse 9y ago
      > You don't need everyone to have a complete blockchain. You do if immutability, censorship resistance, and resistance to state capture is what you hope to achieve with your crypto. > Etherium, for example, If Vitalik Buterim were to be arrested for whatever, or if he were even to just have a skiing accident and die suddenly, you'd see how important that decentralization is in bitcoin. There is no single point of failure in bitcoin. That's the point. Hey, for what it's worth, I think the tech behind ethereum is great. Most of the people who acquire it have no idea really what it is good for, but it has real potential. But as a 'store of value'? That's just one of the things that it isn't designed for.
- Frogolocalypse 9y ago
  You are demonstrating a fundamental misunderstanding of how bitcoin works by allocating responsibility to people with commit access to the bitcoin repository. It matters little if you commit a change that the 80,000 nodes that form the basis of the bitcoin network don't uninstall their existing node client software and replace it with your new version. It is this resistance to change that is the entire point of the architecture.
  - amckenna 9y ago
    Bingo. While there are issues with the developers and their decision making process the real issue is with the large mining conglomerates that control huge portions of the network. They have enormous influence on what changes are actually rolled out and have generally been unwilling to implement changes that will affect their profits. Google for the drama around ASICBOOST, Bitmain, and SegWit.
    - zanny 9y ago
      I completely agree, I wasn't trying to single out the bitcoin-core devs in my allegations. The core devs don't want to rock the boat because the miners would resist changes that threaten their immediate bottom lines (high fees per block minted). Its a tragedy of the commons.
      - Frogolocalypse 9y ago
        A tragedy that has doubled in value in six months.
        dsacco 9y ago
        Volatility is not an assurance of consensus valuation or rationality.
        Frogolocalypse 9y ago
        Volatility is a sign of a lack of liquidity in a market that is rapidly gaining (or decreasing) in accumulated capital. In bitcoin, for now, it is increasing. In bitcoin the important point isn't the volatility, but the fact that it is objectively being sought after by an increasing number of people.
Obi_Juan_Kenobi 9y ago
That's certainly true, but I also tend to think that the scaling debate is overblown. Bitcoin, from the outset, has been designed to generate consensus around a majority chain. Forks are ultimately the source of Bitcoin's security and its development. If there's any elegance to Bitcoin, however brutal, it's here. There are several approaches to scaling Bitcoin that should work. The debate focuses on risk aversion and which will be best. In the end, though, any untenable situation should be quickly resolved as a majority choose the least painful option. The New York Agreement appears to be this in action, and represents a major shift in the community as a new client may become the default. Many have compared Bitcoin to TCP: it's not great, but it's good enough to become a standard. I tend to agree with this view, though there are many well-founded concerns.
- Frogolocalypse 9y ago
  The second part of the nya has a hand waving requirement of 80,000 or so nodes uninstalling their existing node client software and installing a new unreviewed and untested node client three months after the segregated witness component is activated. I don't even know how that would be possible even if it was a change that everyone wanted, which they don't. Reckon the first component is going to happen but there is very little chance of the hard-fork part.
127 9y ago
It used to be expensive. It is not anymore, as the bigblockers stopped the spam.
companyhen 9y ago
BTC could start using SegWit and some other stuff shortly to speed up transactions and lower costs.

zanny 9y ago

There have been years for bitcoin to adapt the protocol - even in non-forking ways - to ease the transaction backlog. Those with commit access and authority have chosen not to. I got out of it mainly for that purpose. I was interested in a universal currency, not a get rich scheme based on enticing people with the promise of the future just to use that promise as a means to pump exchange rates. Going forward, it is a perfectly serviceable crypto-gold, but it has no greater aspirations anymore. I think there is absolutely still room in the market for a cryptocurrency that isn't a ponzie scheme that can actually function as a daily driver currency replacement, but none have become popular yet. Probably because they aren't ponzie schemes.

brasky 9y ago
You can't record every currency transaction on a blockchain it simply doesn't scale. None of the altcoins have figured out how to scale either.
- dacox 9y ago
  Seriously, was there this much politiking for infighting when people proposed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OSI_model https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OSI_model.
  - detaro 9y ago
    Well, the stack around the OSI model seems to have lost to TCP/IP due to being late and overengineered, so possibly?
- sp821543 9y ago
  How did we solve the problem of recording every written word into a single book?
- zanny 9y ago
  You don't need everyone to have a complete blockchain. Etherium, for example, lets you just do fast syncs that use a fairly fixed amount of storage space. You need a copy somewhere to have an actual blockchain, but not every node need host that chain. The major players in the economy, however, with the resources to keep around 100GB every couple years of data are incentivized to to maintain the stability of their currency network. Because blocks are reverse-signed, you can't have a limited pool of old blocks and forge the records. Its a chain for a reason - each blocks signature is dependent on its peer blocks, and we still don't have anything close to breakable sha-256 that would compromise bitcoin.
  - Frogolocalypse 9y ago
    > You don't need everyone to have a complete blockchain. You do if immutability, censorship resistance, and resistance to state capture is what you hope to achieve with your crypto. > Etherium, for example, If Vitalik Buterim were to be arrested for whatever, or if he were even to just have a skiing accident and die suddenly, you'd see how important that decentralization is in bitcoin. There is no single point of failure in bitcoin. That's the point. Hey, for what it's worth, I think the tech behind ethereum is great. Most of the people who acquire it have no idea really what it is good for, but it has real potential. But as a 'store of value'? That's just one of the things that it isn't designed for.
Frogolocalypse 9y ago
You are demonstrating a fundamental misunderstanding of how bitcoin works by allocating responsibility to people with commit access to the bitcoin repository. It matters little if you commit a change that the 80,000 nodes that form the basis of the bitcoin network don't uninstall their existing node client software and replace it with your new version. It is this resistance to change that is the entire point of the architecture.
- amckenna 9y ago
  Bingo. While there are issues with the developers and their decision making process the real issue is with the large mining conglomerates that control huge portions of the network. They have enormous influence on what changes are actually rolled out and have generally been unwilling to implement changes that will affect their profits. Google for the drama around ASICBOOST, Bitmain, and SegWit.
  - zanny 9y ago
    I completely agree, I wasn't trying to single out the bitcoin-core devs in my allegations. The core devs don't want to rock the boat because the miners would resist changes that threaten their immediate bottom lines (high fees per block minted). Its a tragedy of the commons.
    - Frogolocalypse 9y ago
      A tragedy that has doubled in value in six months.
      - dsacco 9y ago
        Volatility is not an assurance of consensus valuation or rationality.
        Frogolocalypse 9y ago
        Volatility is a sign of a lack of liquidity in a market that is rapidly gaining (or decreasing) in accumulated capital. In bitcoin, for now, it is increasing. In bitcoin the important point isn't the volatility, but the fact that it is objectively being sought after by an increasing number of people.

Obi_Juan_Kenobi 9y ago

That's certainly true, but I also tend to think that the scaling debate is overblown. Bitcoin, from the outset, has been designed to generate consensus around a majority chain. Forks are ultimately the source of Bitcoin's security and its development. If there's any elegance to Bitcoin, however brutal, it's here. There are several approaches to scaling Bitcoin that should work. The debate focuses on risk aversion and which will be best. In the end, though, any untenable situation should be quickly resolved as a majority choose the least painful option. The New York Agreement appears to be this in action, and represents a major shift in the community as a new client may become the default. Many have compared Bitcoin to TCP: it's not great, but it's good enough to become a standard. I tend to agree with this view, though there are many well-founded concerns.

Frogolocalypse 9y ago
The second part of the nya has a hand waving requirement of 80,000 or so nodes uninstalling their existing node client software and installing a new unreviewed and untested node client three months after the segregated witness component is activated. I don't even know how that would be possible even if it was a change that everyone wanted, which they don't. Reckon the first component is going to happen but there is very little chance of the hard-fork part.

127 9y ago

It used to be expensive. It is not anymore, as the bigblockers stopped the spam.

companyhen 9y ago

BTC could start using SegWit and some other stuff shortly to speed up transactions and lower costs.