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Bitcoin will soon block small transaction outputs

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Re: Bitcoin will soon block small transaction outputs

#11

Post by stormbrew »

nwh wrote: post #3
trevelyan wrote: post #2

I do not understand this move. If blockchain size is an issue, I don't understand why the focus isn't pruning the blockchain so that only the hashed headers are stored for past transactions. This defeats the point of having 8 decimal places if you can only reasonably use 3+.

It's presumably only temporary measure, and only present in the reference client. Anything below four decimal places is completely worthless at this point anyway; do you really have a use for being able to send 0.01c USD?

What if I have need to send $0.10c tomorrow if BTC is then worth $1000?

Placing the constraint right on the edge of the current value seems like it will just cause a lot of problems as the value continues to fluctuate.

Re: Bitcoin will soon block small transaction outputs

#13

Post by trevelyan »

nwh wrote: post #3
trevelyan wrote: post #2

I do not understand this move. If blockchain size is an issue, I don't understand why the focus isn't pruning the blockchain so that only the hashed headers are stored for past transactions. This defeats the point of having 8 decimal places if you can only reasonably use 3+.

It's presumably only temporary measure, and only present in the reference client. Anything below four decimal places is completely worthless at this point anyway; do you really have a use for being able to send 0.01c USD?

Yeah, I do actually.

Re: Bitcoin will soon block small transaction outputs

#14

Post by lwat »

tocomment wrote: post #12

This sucks. I thought one of the killer apps for bitcoin was going to be micropayments. Oh well maybe the world will switch to litecoin.

No this is awesome. Only transaction smaller than about half a cent is blocked. There's no good reason to make a transaction that small on the blockchain. Satoshidice sends thousands of transactions of one satoshi each every day and it adds gigabytes of data to to millions of computers worldwide. What a waste of resources.

Re: Bitcoin will soon block small transaction outputs

#15

Post by lwat »

stormbrew wrote: post #11
nwh wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's presumably only temporary measure, and only present in the reference client. Anything below four decimal places is completely worthless at this point anyway; do you really have a use for being able to send 0.01c USD?

What if I have need to send $0.10c tomorrow if BTC is then worth $1000? Placing the constraint right on the edge of the current value seems like it will just cause a lot of problems as the value continues to fluctuate.

The limit will be adjusted if BTC becomes worth thousands.

Re: Bitcoin will soon block small transaction outputs

#16

Post by fianchetto »

jasonkolb wrote: post #8

I assume the reason behind this is to block people from encoding data into the block chain by doing thousands of worthless transactions. If I recall correctly someone recently encoded the URL to a child porn site into the block chain, this is the only reasonable response to prevent it from happening again IMO.

I don't think developers care about that issue.

Per the lead developer:

"If you have a better suggestion for fixing the problem of new users wasting lots of time gathering tiny drips and drabs of bitcoins, and then getting upset when they can't spend them (because it costs more in fees that they are worth), I'm open to suggestions."

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=191425.msg1985498#ms...

Re: Bitcoin will soon block small transaction outputs

#17

Post by lwat »

waterlesscloud wrote: post #5
nwh wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's presumably only temporary measure, and only present in the reference client. Anything below four decimal places is completely worthless at this point anyway; do you really have a use for being able to send 0.01c USD?

Maybe I do, yes. A handful of developers shouldn't be deciding acceptable business models for bitcoin. That's not going to lead anywhere good.

If you're making transactions smaller than 1 cent, keep them off the blockchain. You're just wasting everyone's resources. Aggregate them until they're big enough to matter and THEN commit them to the blockchain.

Re: Bitcoin will soon block small transaction outputs

#18

Post by lwat »

trevelyan wrote: post #13
nwh wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's presumably only temporary measure, and only present in the reference client. Anything below four decimal places is completely worthless at this point anyway; do you really have a use for being able to send 0.01c USD?

Yeah, I do actually.

Why

Re: Bitcoin will soon block small transaction outputs

#19

Post by stormbrew »

lwat wrote: post #15
stormbrew wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if I have need to send $0.10c tomorrow if BTC is then worth $1000? Placing the constraint right on the edge of the current value seems like it will just cause a lot of problems as the value continues to fluctuate.

The limit will be adjusted if BTC becomes worth thousands.

Yes, I see that they're adding command line flags. I don't really think BTC can be considered so stable at this point that a run up to $1000 and then a drop back down to the low hundreds within a day or two could be considered impossible. And if its value grows beyond even that the fluctuations may swing even wilder in terms of monetary value.

I'd also point out that in much of the world, the local equivalent of $0.01 USD may actually not be a trivially dismissable amount of money.

But I'm not sure it's a bad idea, I just think they chose a very awkward value to peg it at.

Re: Bitcoin will soon block small transaction outputs

#20

Post by trevelyan »

lordgilman wrote: post #6
trevelyan wrote: post #2

I do not understand this move. If blockchain size is an issue, I don't understand why the focus isn't pruning the blockchain so that only the hashed headers are stored for past transactions. This defeats the point of having 8 decimal places if you can only reasonably use 3+.

The UTXO acronym stands for unspent transaction output. Think of it as the total number of Bitcoin bank accounts. Pruning past transactions doesn't shrink this size at all. These UTXOs have to stick around and can never[1] be pruned as they're used in future transactions. And yes, it does seem like 8 decimal places was too much for the current time and they're now correcting for that. [1] If they really wanted to do…

If people are worried about an explosion of ghost accounts with 1 satoshi (80 bytes, right?), just give unspent transaction output to miners if the receiving account has below a certain threshold of funds. Don't tell me I can't send arbitrary payments if I am willing to pay whatever the necessary transaction fee is to process them.
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