If 51% of the computing power agrees to change the limit, the limit changes.

TexasRebel said:

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If 51% of the computing power agrees to change the limit, the limit changes.

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Does that mean 51% of the miners?
51% of the nodes?
51% of the users?

Or all of the above?

Edit: and For how long?

For a limit change, it would be 51% of the nodes.

When it benefits the majority of the network to change the limit, the limit will change. Simple game theory. The difficult part would be finding a number of agreement (which would also be temporary). 21,000,000 is arbitrary, as would be the new limit. If different limits serve different groups, they may only be the need for a plurality. If 1/4 wants 21MM, 1/3 wants 19MM, and 5/12 want 210MM, a majority may not be necessary. Then you'd get fun political games like the 19's siding with the 210's to force a change, so the 21's might side with them to lower it back down and they'd agree on 20MM with a majority.

Miners that aren't producing valid transactions would update their software pretty quickly.

Indefinitely.

It's mutable code.

Not exactly. And 51% wasn't even the real number in the first place, I'm just trying to get you to think further.

I decide that I'm going to add create a BIP (bitcoin improvement protocol) that changes the code and adds another 1M bitcoin and extends the block rewards out another 300 years (block rewards will cease according sometime in the year 2140 assuming 10 minute blocks and reward halving schedules).

BIP404 is created. Now I must advocate that this is a necessary change or we will all die to all of the users, nodes and miners.

Assuming I am persuasive enough, I get a large group of supporters who want to see more mining rewards because.

The next day we all download and start signaling BIP404 and fork the existing blockchain and only solve BIP404 supporting transactions. The previous version is still active as well. Now we have competing and separate blockchains.

What next?


There have been plenty of hard forks of bitcoin, why have they not succeeded?

An increase in the total allotment would require a hard fork, why would it succeed?

Miners, nodes and users would all have to benefit for a hard fork to succeed. What is the incentive for all parties to move onto a fork that has more bitcoin?

How many people need to be convinced, today, to add more bitcoin?

And while it is arbitrary, 21M, there's a lot of hidden Easter eggs in satoshis code that got us to 21M.

Just to clarify the confusion, The 51% number is the percentage of hashing power that must be dedicated to attacking bitcoin to create doublespending (counterfeit) transactions.

The 51% attack currently requires about 12-15 countries worth of electricity not including the actual computational resources, and be able to maintain this behavior (nigh impossible and completely irrational due to no incentives).

That's only if the network is intact.

A fractured network (think widespread communications failures due to power outages for whatever reason) could quickly switch branches once restored. A communications network split into many smaller sections is not guaranteed to stay on the same page.

A change in the limit doesn't have to benefit everyone. Just enough to agree that this is how things are going to be. Call it a fork if you will, but it's more of an amendment.

TexasRebel said:

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That's only if the network is intact.

A fractured network (think widespread communications failures due to power outages for whatever reason) could quickly switch branches once restored. A communications network split into many smaller sections is not guaranteed to stay on the same page.

A change in the limit doesn't have to benefit everyone. Just enough to agree that this is how things are going to be. Call it a fork if you will, but it's more of an amendment.

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Okay, so to be clear, you understand how a soft and hard fork work. And now we are moving onto a different discussion. So we are moving away from how to actually change bitcoins coding and moving onto fantasyland.

In this fantasyland scenario somehow it becomes impossibly simple to change the code and call it bitcoin. Show your work.

We entered fantasyland when people started trading money for random numbers and expecting profits.

TexasRebel said:

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We entered fantasyland when people started trading money for random numbers and expecting profits.

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Don't get off track, we are talking about bitcoin not Robinhood or post-bretton woods government paper.

How does your fantasy world scenario make it easier to alter bitcoin? I'm trying to understand this complex scenario you've envisioned.

So global communication is permanently disabled? Is that the idea? And all bitcoin nodes are unable to communicate and/or are destroyed? What would cause this scenario? This sounds like an apocalyptic scenario but maybe you can simplify it.

Not disabled. Temporarily isolated.

If the proper actor reestablishes communication with small enough chunks as to keep 51% at a time they eventually take the whole. It wouldn't have to take long.

So the assumption is that global communication is altered enough that bitcoins network is fractured and thereby easily controllable, forever.

Let's try that assumption out.

Global communications come back to normal. Miners, nodes, users decide to revert blockchain back to the last block before the code was temporarily usurped (this usurpation is incredibly unrealistic but I'm playing along) and we are back to the original chain. The forked coin is useless and bobs your uncle.

Roll back? As far as any of the nodes and miners are concerned nothing happened. Why would they want to? The network confirmed their activity.

There are also legit transfers during the disruption? What happens to them if the blocks were (somehow) rolled back.

Don't forget Chia Pets!

I'll try to break it down simply:
1. Bitcoin is forked (for this scenario during a communication disruption that doesn't really matter)
2. Forked bitcoin isn't supported as main chain.
3. Original bitcoin continues on and Forked chain disappears into bolivia.

#2 is not assured.

TexasRebel said:

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#2 is not assured.

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Nothing is assured, but a change has to benefit all parties or it results in a contentious fork. Adding more bitcoin would absolutely be a contentious fork and there's no clear benefit at any level that would allow the consensus amongst all participants necessary to proceed.

Jaime Dimon and the other expert fintech derp quoting him claiming there's like 6 people who control bitcoin are absolutely misinforming everyone, whether purposefully or not. Multiple times in the past Dimon has said one thing and had JP Morgan act opposite to his public stance.

If you can give a small digestible soundbite to someone, it'll prevent them from researching or experiencing bitcoin on their own.

I mean, here you are Treble, at least 5-7 years arguing against bitcoin and still full of completely incompetent data. It's quite unfortunate to watch.

Except you agree with me.

You're just too deep in the scheme to care how money gets into crypto.

Any given moment the world could end. I agree.

TexasRebel said:

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Except you agree with me.

You're just too deep in the scheme to care how money gets into crypto.

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Throwing this back at you.

You're too deep in fiat schemes to recognize or adapt to dramatic environmental changes. Keep worshipping the stinky feet of incompetent officials, and praying to the FED that Bitcoin will disappear.

It'll be okay, we all die in the end, regardless.

Adverse Event said:

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Jaime Dimon and the other expert fintech derp quoting him claiming there's like 6 people who control bitcoin are absolutely misinforming everyone, whether purposefully or not. Multiple times in the past Dimon has said one thing and had JP Morgan act opposite to his public stance.

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I'm not familiar with Dimon's quote but is there any denying that a vast majority of BTC trading occurs on a few handfuls of exchanges? BTC ownership is concentrated in the hands of a few hundred wallets and trading occurs across only a few exchanges.

https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2023/01/04/binance-controlled-92-of-bitcoin-spot-trading-volume-at-end-of-2022-arcane-research/

Even Robinhood can't make any real money on retail access to cryptos and I'm not sure with the ****coin fallout BTC will become a profit center by itself. If it was profitable other brokers like Fidelity, TD, and Schwab would have already jumped in.
https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/11/02/robin-hoods-crypto-revenue-declined-12-to-51-million-in-q3/

I see you're grossly unaware of my home economics.

Fiat is necessary for some things.

Friends and acquaintances work for quite a bit, too. I can offer things they need, and they can do the same.

I posted it above, vid from Dimon in Davis. (Reposted here bc i know folk like being spoonfed on this site)

Jamie IS right.

There's nothing magic about 21 million coins. The source to bitcoin is controlled by six people. Who is to say they don't change it to 210 million coins?

What prevents (yet another) fork? Or another coin?

And without utility, scarcity is meaningless. https://t.co/nvMnzu0FhG

— W. Brennan Carley (@Fintech_Brennan) January 20, 2023

This isn't a thread about a speculative gambling course at tamu. It's about bitcoin protocol being taught at tamu.

Not a thread about making money OFF bitcoin, but understanding why bitcoin is better than any prior version of money by understanding its characteristics.

To respond about the profitability of exchanges, exchanges are a temporary solution masquerading as a permanent fixture. As more and more become intimately familiar with te responsibility of self-custody, person to person (without exchanges) will and already is becoming far more common. As this trend continues (hastened by exchanges blowing up and governments acting maliciously towards its people) fairly soon you won't be able to trade paper/bank IOUs for any amount of bitcoin, but only trade goods or work instead.

Fidelity jumped in like 6 months ago and has written exceptionally positively about bitcoin for around 3-5 years now. Where ya been?

Robinhood is a front-running scam on the public, bringing the casino gambling to the phone. I'm sure it'll fall off as we continue to see gambling legalization across the states.

TexasRebel said:

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I see you're grossly unaware of my home economics.

Fiat is necessary for some things.

Friends and acquaintances work for quite a bit, too. I can offer things they need, and they can do the same.

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You're in too deep, can't see the forest for the trees.

That tweet mentions nothing about the claims that like 6 people control bitcoin, but whatever.

This is a thread about TAMU making $$ from students on bitcoin. Will there be an economics/philosophical discussion as to "why bitcoin is better than any prior version of money by understanding its characteristics" on the syllabus or are you just projecting?

I would argue you're completely wrong about exchanges. Self-custody doesn't permit growth or extension of credit without adding significant risk to the system. Plus a vast majority of users still need on-ramps and off-ramps for local usage. Why do you deny this immutable truth?

A couple of Fidelity analysts being positive on BTC isn't the same thing as the firm being active in the product or asset class. Fidelity doesn't permit the trading of cryptos on its platform. Ever why would be? (hint: the above paragraph provides a clue) Robinhood does and yet you call that firm a front-running scam. Would that imply that all the other exchanges and mining operations are also a front-running scam? Are those places and actors totally legitimate and only Robinhood is scammer? Gambling via speculation is inherent in the BTC pricing mechanism because there is no intrinsic value. You see the gambling discussion all over the crypto-trading thread on B&I board. One could argue, you even promote gambling/speculation by other posters when you pump the most recent BTC prices.

tysker said:

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That tweet mentions nothing about the claims that like 6 people control bitcoin, but whatever.

Quote:

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Jamie IS right.

There's nothing magic about 21 million coins. The source to bitcoin is controlled by six people. Who is to say they don't change it to 210 million coins?

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truly don't understand how one could miss this without willfully blinding
This is a thread about TAMU making $$ from students on bitcoin. Will there be an economics/philosophical discussion as to "why bitcoin is better than any prior version of money by understanding its characteristics" on the syllabus or are you just projecting?
bitcoin has been taught for at least 3-5 years at Tamu within other courses, this is the first one specifically based on bitcoin and its protocol. Yes I'd imagine there will be future classes teaching low time preference and successful case studies on bitcoin businesses and ones that transitioned exceptionally well. Learning about the prior versions of money leading to bitcoin, one doesnt need to be told the best version, its quite clear the characteristics stomp every other form into dust.

I would argue you're completely wrong about exchanges. Self-custody doesn't permit growth or extension of credit without adding significant risk to the system. Plus a vast majority of users still need on-ramps and off-ramps for local usage. Why do you deny this immutable truth?
assuming success, there will be zero reason to on and off ramp into a regional currency, and as education and experience in self-custody ramp up, there's far less reason for speculators to exist. Right now there's a large information and experience gap whether we are talking tradfi vs retail (robinhood maliciously front-running, High frequency trading, for examples)
There is nothing about our historic exchanges that lead me to believe you'd ever be on the same page as me. Credit and debt are such abused concepts in the current machine that you cannot imagine a scenario where they are minimized in value. After a few more blowup of banks and exchanges in the coming months/years for being massively overleveraged, maybe you'll be able to see the error of your beliefs.

A couple of Fidelity analysts being positive on BTC isn't the same thing as the firm being active in the product or asset class. Fidelity doesn't permit the trading of cryptos on its platform. Ever why would be? (hint: the above paragraph proves a clue) you're the one who brought up Fidelity, and I said they do use bitcoin and have been one of the bigger proponents in tradfi.

Robinhood does and yet you call that firm a front-running scam. Would that imply that all the other exchanges and mining operations are also a front-running scam?
robinhood has been fined about 65M for front-running market making selling order flows to HFT'ers. That's the entire point of the venture. There have and are a number of exchanges doing the same thing including FTX.

I dont know how you can qualify miners in the same category, but we don't have the same thought processes.

Are those places and actors totally legitimate and only Robinhood is scammer? Gambling via speculation is inherent in the BTC pricing mechanism because there is no intrinsic value. You see the gambling discussion all over the crypto-trading thread on B&I board. One could argue, you even promote gambling/speculation by other posters when you pump the most recent BTC prices.

one could argue that any instance of HFT is front-running and a scam against all others.

There is no such thing as inherent value, except in the eyes of fiat adherents and gold bugs who believe that the minority use of gold in electronics justifies its use for hoarding. Inherent value is a lie to put sweet babies to sleep as they wonder why eggs keep appreciating relative to their inherently valuable money.

Feel free to look through my posts on that thread, you'll see me chide people over gambling and to follow through the hard work of learning self-custody and the like, minimally discussing price and when I do it's to discuss the 4year cyclical nature of bitcoins price and supply constraints.

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In all of our discussions the only topic you bring to the table is USD price, there's no attempt to understand the technical aspects of bitcoin's programming, and clearly only a cursory awareness. This would probably be a great course for you, maybe just read the book "programming bitcoin" and get back to me afterwards.

Quote:

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In all of our discussions the only topic you bring to the table is USD price, there's no attempt to understand the technical aspects of bitcoin's programming, and clearly only a cursory awareness. This would probably be a great course for you, maybe just read the book "programming bitcoin" and get back to me afterwards.

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I would challenge that statement a misunderstanding of the entire value proposition of BTC and cryptos generally. I dont care about the price except as a measure of value. But others do care about price as you see on posts such as these :

Quote:

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[Price doesn't matter]
21k bitcoin!

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and

Quote:

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This is the only thread where I'll reference price changes, but seems the normal 4 year cycle is still in effect!

$23k

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and

Quote:

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₿REAKING: #Bitcoin continues its trend up to infinity pic.twitter.com/svFgICZdR7

— Documenting ₿itcoin 📄 (@DocumentingBTC) January 20, 2023

More important than $ value:

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Quote:

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There is no such thing as inherent value

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literately and figuratively a bold statement.

If there is no value, all you're left with is price. So which is it?

This reply crafted by chatgpt in an attempt to be less.... provocative... was pretty lame.
Deleted

Here's the stlouisfed answering this for you
https://www.stlouisfed.org/open-vault/2018/april/three-ways-bitcoin-regular-currency

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no 1. No Intrinsic Value
Economists Aleksander Berentsen and Fabian Schr explained in a recent St. Louis Fed Review article that bitcoin units have no intrinsic value. In economic terms, something lacking intrinsic value means it has no value of its own. But as the authors noted, "state monopoly currencies, such as the U.S. dollar, the euro, and the Swiss franc, have no intrinsic value either."

Let's unpack that.

Digital currencies exist as data. The cash in your wallet exists as a blend of 75 percent cotton and 25 percent linen. Neither is inherently valuable.

Compare that with commodity money, like gold or silver. Or representative money, a certificate or token that can be exchanged for an underlying commodity such as gold. Since the U.S. left the gold standard, the paper money in your wallet doesn't represent gold, yet you are still able to purchase goods and services with it.

Our government has declared the dollar to be legal tender. Federal Reserve notes, then, are fiat currency.

There is ongoing debate about how to characterize bitcoin: Currency? Asset? Investment? No matter how you view it, bitcoin units have no intrinsic value.

2. There's a Limited Supply
The Fed does not print money. It can, however, increase or decrease the monetary base. Essentially, the monetary base is made up of the reserve balances that depository institutions (like banks) hold with the Fed, plus currency in circulation.

That $20 you forget in your coat pocket? Technically, it's in circulation.

How much U.S. currency is out there? According to the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, approximately $1.63 trillion as of March 21. Of that, $1.59 trillion was in Federal Reserve notes.

While it's hard to call a trillion-plus dollars scarce, scarcity is one of money's core characteristics: To maintain its value, money must be in limited supply. The Fed, as our nation's central bank, carefully calibrates the supply of dollars to promote stable prices and maximum employment.

No central bank controls the supply of bitcoin. Its price fluctuates, sometimes wildly. Yet there is an upper limit to its volume. As Berentsen and Schr note, its creation is scheduled so that the number of units can ultimately converge to a cap of 21 million.

3. No Middle Man
Berentsen and Schr explain that bitcoin's origins stem from a whitepaper published under the name Satoshi Nakamoto. In that document, the author (or authors) describe a vision: "A purely peer-to-peer version of electronic cash would allow online payments to be sent directly from one party to another without going through a financial institution."

In that way, bitcoin was designed to be a lot like cash.

Cash requires no intermediary to process a transaction. Unlike paying with a credit card or an app, no third party adjusts your account.

Furthermore, wrote Berentsen and Schr, "No credit relationship arises between the buyer and the seller. This is why it is possible for the parties involved to remain anonymous."

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Breaking it down:
1. There is no intrinsic value of dollars nor bitcoin, and while bitcoin data is backed by the network and the energy/compute that it consumes meaning its 1's and 0's cannot be assailed or inflated, the USD properties can be altered on a whim by unelected officials to "manage the economy better."

I dont think intrinsic value is anything but a red herring designed to give a quick digestible soundbite to the ignorant fiat enthusiast and send them on their merry way.

I think many people confuse historic value for intrinsic value, like LoyalAg and his belief that the Navy's historical defense of free trade is why the US dollar will continue to have intrinsic value, when its actually historic value that's being discussed.

Well. I'm wearing cotton right now.

Are you wearing bits? …ew.

Students after leaving class talking to the average texagger:

#Bitcoin pic.twitter.com/yDiJTFrIwL

— Dylan LeClair 🟠 (@DylanLeClair_) January 28, 2023