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That's incorrect - in general the miners are opposed to SegWit, but they accepted a compromise of agreeing to SegWit if they could increase the block size to 2

That's incorrect - in general the miners are opposed to SegWit, but they accepted a compromise of agreeing to SegWit if they could increase the block size to 2 MB (from 1 MB currently). SegWit will be activated within 24 hours, but Bitcoin Core (the main developers of current Bitcoin code) have already said they are not going to support an increase to 2 MB blocks. They also claim they never agreed to it in the first place. As a result, it's very likely to see another hard fork to 2 MB in November, so there will be 3 chains with a shared transaction history, and most like all will claim to be the real Bitcoin -- personally I don't think debating which one is the "real" one is worthwhile, just use the one you want, but eventually it's likely that one chain will get the majority of hashing power and have a much higher price per token than all the others.

makomk 9y ago
The Bitcoin Core developers were never part of the agreement to hard-fork and increase the block size - they've said it was a terrible idea all along at least on the time scale proposed. I don't think they even knew about it until it was publicly announced. Also, SegWit increases the block size to 2-ishMB by itself (it's complicated, because older nodes need to think blocks are still under 1MB, which is done by stripping out parts of SegWit transactions when sending to them). This means that in practice the hard fork gives a block size of 4-8MB. The "compromise" framing of "we gave you SegWit, now you have to give us a hard fork" is pretty terrible too, because the two aren't symmetrical - SegWit makes hard forking less urgent, but hard forking to increase the block size makes the SegWit improvements more important because they're designed to make larger blocks work better. Even Bitcoin Cash copied one of the key SegWit improvements, the transaction hashing change, in very slightly modified form for this reason.
- guardiangod 9y ago
  I don't think 'symmetrical' means what you think it means. Just because A makes B 'less urgent' or 'more efficient' doesn't mean we have to choose between A or B. Why not both? Bitcoin Core's dev did not give a good technical reason for not adopting 2MB beyond crowding out smaller miners blah blah blah. I mean, come on. Have they seen the last 1000 blocks list these days?
- pmorici 9y ago
  There is a good explanation on reddit of the history of this. [0] The Core developers did agree to a block size increase though in what is commonly referred to as the Hong Kong Agreement. They didn't follow though on that agreement and made up some truly weaselly excuses for why. More recently a large group of players in the space came together and agreed to what has come to be called the New York Agreement (NYA) This said that they would support Segwit and a 2MB hard fork for bigger blocks. Core and Blockstream who largely controls Core have ignored the NYA and worked against it. They are pretending like segwit has support w/o the 2MB block increase when it doesn't and they are going around doing some truly cringe worthy stuff to tray and scuttle the 2MB part of it. [0] https://www.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/6uw5kf/why_does_core_refuse_to_increase_block_size_and/dlvy1ej/ https://www.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/6uw5kf/why_does_core_r...
  - RustyRussell 9y ago
    > The Core developers did agree to a block size increase though in what is commonly referred to as the Hong Kong Agreement. No, a couple of developers did. I think every core developer not in the room went "wtf, no".
    - pmorici 9y ago
      At least 5 by my count and the CEO of your own company which employs still more. If what you say is true then the HK agreement wasn't made in good faith.
edzorg 9y ago
Could you elaborate on this November fork? I've asked for input here - https://www.reddit.com/r/CryptoCurrencies/comments/6uyz9k/will_bitcoin_fork_again/ https://www.reddit.com/r/CryptoCurrencies/comments/6uyz9k/wi...
deleted 9y ago
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makomk 9y ago

The Bitcoin Core developers were never part of the agreement to hard-fork and increase the block size - they've said it was a terrible idea all along at least on the time scale proposed. I don't think they even knew about it until it was publicly announced. Also, SegWit increases the block size to 2-ishMB by itself (it's complicated, because older nodes need to think blocks are still under 1MB, which is done by stripping out parts of SegWit transactions when sending to them). This means that in practice the hard fork gives a block size of 4-8MB. The "compromise" framing of "we gave you SegWit, now you have to give us a hard fork" is pretty terrible too, because the two aren't symmetrical - SegWit makes hard forking less urgent, but hard forking to increase the block size makes the SegWit improvements more important because they're designed to make larger blocks work better. Even Bitcoin Cash copied one of the key SegWit improvements, the transaction hashing change, in very slightly modified form for this reason.

guardiangod 9y ago
I don't think 'symmetrical' means what you think it means. Just because A makes B 'less urgent' or 'more efficient' doesn't mean we have to choose between A or B. Why not both? Bitcoin Core's dev did not give a good technical reason for not adopting 2MB beyond crowding out smaller miners blah blah blah. I mean, come on. Have they seen the last 1000 blocks list these days?
pmorici 9y ago
There is a good explanation on reddit of the history of this. [0] The Core developers did agree to a block size increase though in what is commonly referred to as the Hong Kong Agreement. They didn't follow though on that agreement and made up some truly weaselly excuses for why. More recently a large group of players in the space came together and agreed to what has come to be called the New York Agreement (NYA) This said that they would support Segwit and a 2MB hard fork for bigger blocks. Core and Blockstream who largely controls Core have ignored the NYA and worked against it. They are pretending like segwit has support w/o the 2MB block increase when it doesn't and they are going around doing some truly cringe worthy stuff to tray and scuttle the 2MB part of it. [0] https://www.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/6uw5kf/why_does_core_refuse_to_increase_block_size_and/dlvy1ej/ https://www.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/6uw5kf/why_does_core_r...
- RustyRussell 9y ago
  > The Core developers did agree to a block size increase though in what is commonly referred to as the Hong Kong Agreement. No, a couple of developers did. I think every core developer not in the room went "wtf, no".
  - pmorici 9y ago
    At least 5 by my count and the CEO of your own company which employs still more. If what you say is true then the HK agreement wasn't made in good faith.

edzorg 9y ago

Could you elaborate on this November fork? I've asked for input here - https://www.reddit.com/r/CryptoCurrencies/comments/6uyz9k/will_bitcoin_fork_again/ https://www.reddit.com/r/CryptoCurrencies/comments/6uyz9k/wi...

deleted 9y ago

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