📅 Original date posted:2014-04-24
📝 Original message:Actually Peter, coinbase confiscations are a much worse mechanism for
enforcement of widespread censorship rules than simple orphaning. They
lose their power when the transaction miners are punished for can
build up over time without losing their usefulness:
Assume a world where 75% of the hashpower is coerced into
stealing/burning the coinbases of miners who allow transactions to and
from a particular set of addresses (the actual rule isn't that
important). Then the following would be a rational behaviour from the
remaining 25%:
- Mine according to the enforced rules most of the time.
- Accept banned transactions paying you with an output (no real
miners' fees) and keep them in an ever-accumulating pool.
- When there's so much of those to make it worth your while, mine a
block filled with them.
If miners don't orphan your block, you made money. They can't
retaliate further, because you can publish the block anonymously, not
tying it to your previous identity. Hell, some of the 75% might be
able to do the same right under the authorities' noses (it would be
really hard to spot by an external observer).
Note that I, banned user, can submit to all these non-enforcing miners
at once (with a different fee txout for each). I get a severe
degradation of service, especially if I'm part of an extremely small
minority, but ultimately as long as a single miner can accumulate
enough transactions with enough fees, I'll eventually get through.
Of course, in such a dystopian future, orphaning would be the
enforcement mechanism. It would be stupid to rely on coinbase
reallocation/burning to do this task when the existing tools work so
much better.
What's interesting is that this mechanism is especially tailored to
blocking time sensitive transactions (that need to be confirmed
now/soon, or are worthless), such that their total out-of-band fees
can't build up over time. Double spending is one such category. I'm at
a loss to come up with something else, but maybe someone has a good
example?
On Thu, Apr 24, 2014 at 10:09 AM, Mike Hearn <mike at plan99.net> wrote:
>> Like I said before, that leads to the obvious next step of
>> deleting/stealing their coinbases if they don't identify themselves.
>
>
> And as I said before, that's a huge leap. A majority of miners deciding
> double spending needs tougher enforcement doesn't imply they also think all
> miners should identify themselves. Those are unrelated things.
>
> This kind of totally unsupported "obvious next step" argument can be applied
> to any proposal in any walk of life. We developed SPV clients? The obvious
> next step is that miners have to stop being anonymous. We developed floating
> fees? The obvious next step is that miners have to stop being anonymous. The
> prior arguments sound absurd exactly because they're not obvious or even
> logical - same as this.
>
>
>
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Christophe Biocca [ARCHIVE] /
npub1mt…9g5zm
2023-06-07 15:19:53
in reply to nevent1q…czds
Author Public Key
npub1mtxs7jztn027d9cylej99hltqq9vq84uxm80zl4naxafd9hpxqwsj9g5zmPublished at
2023-06-07 15:19:53Event JSON
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"content": "📅 Original date posted:2014-04-24\n📝 Original message:Actually Peter, coinbase confiscations are a much worse mechanism for\nenforcement of widespread censorship rules than simple orphaning. They\nlose their power when the transaction miners are punished for can\nbuild up over time without losing their usefulness:\n\nAssume a world where 75% of the hashpower is coerced into\nstealing/burning the coinbases of miners who allow transactions to and\nfrom a particular set of addresses (the actual rule isn't that\nimportant). Then the following would be a rational behaviour from the\nremaining 25%:\n\n- Mine according to the enforced rules most of the time.\n- Accept banned transactions paying you with an output (no real\nminers' fees) and keep them in an ever-accumulating pool.\n- When there's so much of those to make it worth your while, mine a\nblock filled with them.\n\nIf miners don't orphan your block, you made money. They can't\nretaliate further, because you can publish the block anonymously, not\ntying it to your previous identity. Hell, some of the 75% might be\nable to do the same right under the authorities' noses (it would be\nreally hard to spot by an external observer).\n\nNote that I, banned user, can submit to all these non-enforcing miners\nat once (with a different fee txout for each). I get a severe\ndegradation of service, especially if I'm part of an extremely small\nminority, but ultimately as long as a single miner can accumulate\nenough transactions with enough fees, I'll eventually get through.\n\nOf course, in such a dystopian future, orphaning would be the\nenforcement mechanism. It would be stupid to rely on coinbase\nreallocation/burning to do this task when the existing tools work so\nmuch better.\n\nWhat's interesting is that this mechanism is especially tailored to\nblocking time sensitive transactions (that need to be confirmed\nnow/soon, or are worthless), such that their total out-of-band fees\ncan't build up over time. Double spending is one such category. I'm at\na loss to come up with something else, but maybe someone has a good\nexample?\n\nOn Thu, Apr 24, 2014 at 10:09 AM, Mike Hearn \u003cmike at plan99.net\u003e wrote:\n\u003e\u003e Like I said before, that leads to the obvious next step of\n\u003e\u003e deleting/stealing their coinbases if they don't identify themselves.\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e And as I said before, that's a huge leap. A majority of miners deciding\n\u003e double spending needs tougher enforcement doesn't imply they also think all\n\u003e miners should identify themselves. Those are unrelated things.\n\u003e\n\u003e This kind of totally unsupported \"obvious next step\" argument can be applied\n\u003e to any proposal in any walk of life. We developed SPV clients? The obvious\n\u003e next step is that miners have to stop being anonymous. We developed floating\n\u003e fees? The obvious next step is that miners have to stop being anonymous. The\n\u003e prior arguments sound absurd exactly because they're not obvious or even\n\u003e logical - same as this.\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e ------------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\u003e Start Your Social Network Today - Download eXo Platform\n\u003e Build your Enterprise Intranet with eXo Platform Software\n\u003e Java Based Open Source Intranet - Social, Extensible, Cloud Ready\n\u003e Get Started Now And Turn Your Intranet Into A Collaboration Platform\n\u003e http://p.sf.net/sfu/ExoPlatform\n\u003e _______________________________________________\n\u003e Bitcoin-development mailing list\n\u003e Bitcoin-development at lists.sourceforge.net\n\u003e https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/bitcoin-development\n\u003e",
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