Re: [bitcoin-dev] Fees and the block-finding process

[Venzen Khaosan <venzen@mail.bihthai.net>]

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On 08/12/2015 10:35 AM, Elliot Olds via bitcoin-dev wrote:
> On Tue, Aug 11, 2015 at 2:51 PM, Pieter Wuille via bitcoin-dev 
> <bitcoin-dev@lists.linuxfoundation.org 
> <mailto:bitcoin-dev@lists.linuxfoundation.org>> wrote:
> 
> On Tue, Aug 11, 2015 at 11:35 PM, Michael Naber 
> <mickeybob@gmail.com <mailto:mickeybob@gmail.com>> wrote:
> 
> Bitcoin would be better money than current money even if it were a 
> bit more expensive to transact, simply because of its other great 
> characteristics (trustlessness, limited supply, etc). However...
> it is not better than something else sharing all those same 
> characteristics but which is also less expensive. The best money 
> will win, and if Bitcoin doesn't increase capacity then it won't 
> remain the best.
> 
> 
> If it is less expensive, it is harder to be reliable (because it's
>  easier for a sudden new use case to outbid the available space), 
> which is less useful for a payment mechanism.
> 
> 
> It depends on which use case's reliability that you focus on. For 
> any specific use case of Bitcoin, that use case will be more 
> reliable with a larger block size (ignoring centralization 
> effects).

I read through your message and see the point you're trying to make,
but would like to point out that it is not useful to talk about
hypothetical scenarios involving Bitcoin that include the supposition
"ignoring centralization effects".

Decentralization concerns are fundamental to this innovation, else it
loses its meaning and value. And that's the trade-off that Pieter,
Jorge, Martin, Adam and others have referring to during the past 24
hours: in order to have a secure Bitcoin that is not vulnerable to
centralization, certain sacrifices have to be made and the Consensus
Rule of a relatively small blocksize is the main protection we
currently have.

There are a lot of "larger blocks, more transactions" arguments being
made that overlook this core axiom of decentralization. That is why
the developers and thinkers with the deepest understanding of this
protocol are pointing out the need for another layer on top of
Bitcoin. That is where the scaling can take place to cater for the
use-cases of more txns, quicker txns, remittance, etc. and with it
increased adoption.
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