There have been a vast number of proposals for soft fork activation in recent months and it is important that all these important ideas don’t go to waste. Hence I propose a new standard for soft fork activation incorporating all the ideas into one standard. I appreciate this standard has come too late for Taproot activation but it should be ready for any future soft forks. It is a multi phase, multi year standard. No soft fork can activate unless and until it has successfully passed through all of the different 14 phases. This will demonstrate Bitcoin’s ultimate conservatism.
Phase 1) Let’s See What Happens - BIP 8 (false, 0.25 years). The shortest phase just to whet appetites.
Phase 2) Start now, improve later - BIP 8(false, 1 year) A confusing name, it starts but it doesn't improve later
Phase 3) BIP 9 equivalent - BIP 8(false, 1 year)
Phase 4) Gently discourage apathy - BIP 8(true, 1 year) Forced signaling at the end of this phase but obviously there are still many phases before the soft fork can actually activate.
Phase 5) BIP 91 (1 year). As a nod to our SegWit history we have a BIP 91 activation phase.
Phase 6) BIP 148 (1 year). Some people disagree that BIP 91 activated SegWit so we do a BIP 148 activation phase to keep those people happy. Again forced signaling doesn’t actually mean activation. There are still many more phases to pass through.
Phase 7) Speedy Trial (using block height, 0.5 years) on mainnet
Phase 8) Speedy Trial (using MTP, 0.5 years) on mainnet
Phase 9) Speedy Trial on the default signet (0.5 years)
Phase 10) Speedy Trial on a combination of three different custom signets in parallel (0.5 years)
Phase 11) Speedy Trial on testnet and a custom signet in parallel (0.5 years)
Phase 12) Modern Soft Fork Activation (3.5 years) This is the longest phase of the soft fork activation standard. It is itself multi phase and multi year so this can be considered a nested activation phase within this standard.
Phase 13) UASF BIP 8 (LOT=true, 1 year). Forced miner signaling at the end of this phase but ultimately the soft fork doesn’t yet activate as there is one final additional phase the activation must pass through. This gives Samson the opportunity to sell some hats. We are close now. The natives are getting restless.
Phase 14) Second flag day (1 year) We don’t want those pesky users actually activating a soft fork on their own so an additional flag day is added just so we can tell users that we prevented a chain split.
Assuming a soft fork activation has successfully passed through all these 14 phases it should activate. It will take a minimum of 13 years. However, if it fails during any one of these phases it has to start from Phase 1 again. We should take Bitcoin’s conservatism very seriously. If a soft fork activation can’t pass successfully through all these phases it shouldn’t activate. Ultimately we don’t really mind what is in the soft fork (any idiot can design consensus changes and write secure bug free C++ code) that is very much secondary in importance to *how* the soft fork is activated. The activation design absolutely must be conservative.
I expect this rigorous standard for soft fork activation will get a BIP number. If you are going to propose a future soft fork I recommend you plan for activation in approximately 13 years from the point the soft fork code is merged into Core.
I am happy to settle the soft fork activation question once and for all for the community. I expect in time my contribution will be recognized in the annals of history with Satoshi Nakamoto and Hal Finney.
Addendum: Although all future soft forks will ultimately use this standard, this standard is copyrighted. Every time it is used royalties must be paid into this quantum secure Bitcoin vanity address 1quantumsecureaddress
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Michael Folkson
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