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Forks and altcoins: an illustration (self.Bitcoin)

luke-jrLuke Dashjr - Bitcoin Expert[🍰] が 投稿

I have made an illustration demonstrating the difference between the different kinds of forks and altcoins.

Hope this helps clarify the matter for everyone.

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[–]fatoshi 5ポイント6ポイント  (0子コメント)

Altcoins break from the consensus protocol, without agreement from the economic consensus.

This, I think is accurate. Two different widely used currencies would have different names.

I think you mean "BIP 101 as implemented in BitcoinXT" in your illustration, since the referred fork is the potential result of Gavin's implementation, and would still work even if nobody ran XT.

In that case, we don't know whether it will have economic consensus or not, before it forks. So I don't think calling it an altcoin is justified at the moment.

[–]d4d5c4e5 11ポイント12ポイント  (0子コメント)

There are two serious problems with this presentation that are obvious on their face: 1) the characterization of BitcoinXT as an altcoin per the definition on this very diagram is in contradiction to the necessary conditions for XT actually forking; and 2) the depiction of what really happened with Feathercoin is extremely misleading and clearly intended to support those false conclusions about XT.

[–]8yo90 3ポイント4ポイント  (1子コメント)

What time period is this diagram showing exactly? If it's showing the present, it's wrong because xt hasn't forked anything. If it's showing the future after xt has gotten 75% hash and the protocol fork has kicked in, no one knows for sure whether an economic consensus will follow it or not (and I find it unlikely that an economic consensus wouldn't follow it). So is this simply what /u/luke-jr hopes/thinks will happen? In which case it's not a helpful "explainer".

[–]luke-jrLuke Dashjr - Bitcoin Expert[S,🍰] -1ポイント0ポイント  (0子コメント)

It's not showing a time period really, it's showing changes to consensus protocols. Perhaps trying to mix it with blocks was a mistake, but necessary to include the stale block fork.

[–]dontcensormebro2 14ポイント15ポイント  (15子コメント)

So explain the difference between the hardfork and xt.

Is the only difference that you assume everyone abandons the old fork in the core SANCTIONED hard fork? You assume the economic majority is not in support of XT?

Bad assumptions IMHO.

[–]_rough23 5ポイント6ポイント  (4子コメント)

I'm not a fan of the XT fork, but I really don't like this "altcoin vs. hardfork" crap. I think it's wordplay. The reality is, Luke is calling XT an 'altcoin' when it hasn't even forked yet. We have no idea whether or not the old chain will be abandoned. I think it probably would be, but who knows. If it weren't, yes, it would be an altcoin.

Please don't insult Luke for this, it's a genuinely held opinion. I just think he's wrong here. Maybe he'll change his mind.

Another important point, "altcoin" shouldn't be an insult in this community anyway, but it is sadly. That's all of your fault, frankly.

[–]dontcensormebro2 5ポイント6ポイント  (3子コメント)

It's pretty obvious they have decided to call XT an altcoin in order to minimize it. It's pure propoganda and core devs stomping their feet crying how the community won't listen to them.

Please don't tell me you really believe that some economic minority would continue to use the old chain because they believe in it. That is pure fantasy.

[–]_rough23 1ポイント2ポイント  (2子コメント)

Please don't tell me you really believe that some economic minority would continue to use the old chain because they believe in it. That is pure fantasy.

I clearly don't, if you read my comment:

We have no idea whether or not the old chain will be abandoned. I think it probably would be, but who knows.

[–]dontcensormebro2 -2ポイント-1ポイント  (1子コメント)

Let me clarify..."Please dont tell me you really believe THERE IS A POSSIBILITY that some..."

[–]_rough23 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

In this particular example the infrastructure will likely converge on one of the forks quickly and the value of coins in the other chain would plummet; the change is too inconsequential. But I can't speak for every situation or every hardfork and nor can you. I mean, that's the point of a hardfork: we could hardfork even without the consent of miners, with only a fraction of the hashrate. Hardforks could be deliberate by both sides.

[–]luke-jrLuke Dashjr - Bitcoin Expert[S,🍰] -2ポイント-1ポイント  (9子コメント)

I've updated the image to include Bitcoin Core's own altcoin (in 0.8.0), hopefully to be clear that "sanctioned" is not what is relevant here.

[–]_rough23 5ポイント6ポイント  (7子コメント)

I appreciate you trying to explain things, but how can you distinguish XT as an "altcoin" and not just a "hardfork" when it's impossible to know the outcome in advance? How do you know the old chain will not be abandoned?

This would help clear things up for everyone.

[–]muyuu 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

One must remember that above winning the mining majority this is about winning the economic majority (although the two are related, the loser would immediately be vulnerable to attacks from the bigger pools in the winner and money doesn't like that).

This effort to win the economic majority is mostly political, through social engineering. And this has started already and even officially so with the infamous blog post "Bitcoin has forked".

To a degree this is unprecedented so no name truly captures the reality of it. Because Feathercoin technically did the same, but they had the decency not to try to usurp the name and the business of Litecoin.

[–]luke-jrLuke Dashjr - Bitcoin Expert[S,🍰] 2ポイント3ポイント  (5子コメント)

XT exists already with the modified consensus protocol, and people have not abandoned the Core consensus protocol.

[–]_rough23 1ポイント2ポイント  (3子コメント)

XT doesn't really exist with a modified consensus protocol yet. Until it actually diverges it's still following Core's consensus model, is it not? In fact it is very possible that XT will never diverge at all and will always follow the same protocol as Core.

Unless you consider the "75% agree then we change" part of the consensus protocol. But if you define it that broadly, every hardfork produces a new altcoin, which is clearly not what you're advocating.

[–]luke-jrLuke Dashjr - Bitcoin Expert[S,🍰] 0ポイント1ポイント  (2子コメント)

Yes, I define it that broadly. But hardforks are not altcoins because the entire economy moves to the new protocol. As long as any significant part of the economy remains with the old protocol, the new one must be considered an altcoin.

[–]_rough23 1ポイント2ポイント  (1子コメント)

I understand that. However, how do you know the "entire economy" will not move to XT after it hardforks? How can we call it an altcoin in advance?

[–]luke-jrLuke Dashjr - Bitcoin Expert[S,🍰] -1ポイント0ポイント  (0子コメント)

Until the entire economy actually moves, it is an altcoin. If it does, at that point it becomes Bitcoin. Usually the entire economy states their intent to move before any code is deployed.

[–]purestvfx 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

your diagram shows a separate XT chain that does not currently exist.

[–]dontcensormebro2 4ポイント5ポイント  (0子コメント)

It's highly relevant. Look at your image next to the hardfork. You say "Everyone chooses to abandon old chain". Please explain to me why they chose to abandon the old chain? It's because they followed the majority. And the same thing would happen with XT if it kicks in, so those two examples are equivalent.

Thus your only distinction between the two is in your own mind. In your mind hard fork 0.8.1 was a sanctioned hardfork by core, and everyone magically switches over. You can't seem to accept the fact that the same would happen with XT and you are so so wrong.

[–]btcfun 10ポイント11ポイント  (2子コメント)

Took me a moment, I was trying to read it top down instead of bottom up.

If the majority move to xt, I think they will think of it as "bitcoin proper" and not as an alt-coin. They will redefine the move as a "fork" rather than the birth of a new coin.

This highlights the political nature of what is going on.

[–]luke-jrLuke Dashjr - Bitcoin Expert[S,🍰] 1ポイント2ポイント  (1子コメント)

Updated it to be left-to-right - is that better?

[–]btcfun 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Definitely. It's a nice diagram and I think very useful to the people who don't quite know the differences between the terms often used around here. Good work!

[–]purestvfx 4ポイント5ポイント  (9子コメント)

I like the diagram, and get the point - but it is misleading. XT has already 'got blocks', and they are part of the main bitcoin blockchain. Am I misunderstanding?

[–]bitsko 3ポイント4ポイント  (0子コメント)

altcoins break from the consensus protocol, without agreement from the economic consensus

the economic consensus is a future event for bitcoinXT. By your illustration, bitcoinXT is not yet an altcoin and is contingent upon a lack of agreement from the economic consensus.

[–]kuui1 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

I assume you wrote this. I notice the claim that tonal Bitcoin is the first "altcoin."

I disagree because I define altcoin differently, as do others. IMO a distinguishing aspect of an altcoin compared to other coins is that it has its own blockchain along with genesis block.

Time will sort out the semantics, but until then you should know there's no full agreement on Bitcoin jargon and not everyone accepts the way you choose to use certain words.

[–]aaaaaaaarrrrrgh 3ポイント4ポイント  (2子コメント)

Spot the difference, even in your illustration, between altcoins and XT. (Spoiler: The genesis block)

[–]immibis 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

That's why he included Feathercoin, so he could justify calling them altcoins...

[–]belcher_ 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Feathercoin and Litecoin share a genesis block

[–]8yo90 3ポイント4ポイント  (17子コメント)

[REDACTED] is, at the moment, neither a hard fork nor an altcoin. [REDACTED] hasn't broken from the consensus protocol, and won't unless 75% of the hashing power is behind it, making it highly likely that, when/if it does make the protocol change, [REDACTED] will bring with it an economic consensus. In which case [REDACTED] would meet your definition of a true hard fork, and not an altcoin (Bitcoin Core would become the altcoin).

[–]belcher_ 0ポイント1ポイント  (4子コメント)

75% of hashing power does not make an economic consensus.

Imagine if 75% of mining power agreed to raise the 21 million limit. Would that mean such a blockchain would be accepted? Of course not.

[–]8yo90 3ポイント4ポイント  (0子コメント)

I didn't say 75% of hashing power makes an economic consensus, but that if xt gets that, it will most likely also get he economic consensus. Luke-jr saying that xt will fork the protocol without taking an economic consensus is just speculation about the future, and speculation that I think is unlikely.

[–]immibis 1ポイント2ポイント  (2子コメント)

75% of mining power would not do such a thing unless a large amount of users agreed with them, since they'd be wasting their block rewards.

[–]belcher_ -1ポイント0ポイント  (1子コメント)

I agree. It's odd that BitcoinXT is programmed to do just that. It only checks for the 75% hashing power threshold before forking.

[–]immibis 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Because it's about the only thing it's possible to check. What would you have done instead?

[–]bitmegalomaniac -4ポイント-3ポイント  (6子コメント)

[REDACTED]

You know that is fooling no one right? If mods are looking for posts that 'break the rules' you are making it even easier for them.

It also makes you seem like a petulant teenager.

[–]8yo90 7ポイント8ポイント  (2子コメント)

Using "[REDACTED]" is a way to point out that the rules themselves are "like a petulant teenager." In any event, using "[REDACTED]" isn't the main point of my comment, respond to that.

[–]_rough23 -5ポイント-4ポイント  (1子コメント)

The mods aren't deleting your comments if you say "XT." They're just banning idiots (like you) who make the discussions here awful. Turns out that's a lot of XT proponents.

[–]dontcensormebro2 5ポイント6ポイント  (0子コメント)

Sorry man, we call bullshit where we see it. The censoring is really what did it, people don't react well to censoring.

[–]dontcensormebro2 3ポイント4ポイント  (2子コメント)

LOL so luke can make posts about how XT is an altcoin (utter bullshit) this guy can't respond with the letters XT? This sub has become complete shit where core feeds you guys propoganda.

[–]luke-jrLuke Dashjr - Bitcoin Expert[S,🍰] 1ポイント2ポイント  (1子コメント)

Pretty sure /u/8yo90 is self-censoring there...

[–]8yo90 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Yes, I put "[REDACTED]" in, not mods.

[–]muyuu -3ポイント-2ポイント  (4子コメント)

The code of redacted specifies a fork pretty much like these are done every time they don't happen by accident: setting up a trigger to activate the differing code in a future block.

The nature of this "altfork" (Feathercoin is another) is unprecedented in that nobody tried to brazenly appropriate the brand and the community of the original project. This makes it certainly more hostile and despicable than Feathercoin, and certainly much worse than an altcoin which are a legitimate thing when the differences in philosophy are big enough. If they had any shame they'd launch theirs.

You can debate that "altforks" are distinct enough from the remaining altcoins as to merit a category.

Core devs should have a meeting about how to protect the system from what basically is an organised attack with nodes and miners pretending to be legitimate but having malicious code in them. Not taking action is costing the whole project a lot of credibility. A basic first step would be to specifically orphan BIP 101 versioned blocks and stop propagating them as well (a simple change in the block rules). I wouldn't bother with addressing nodes since at the moment are nothing but a propaganda tool that has zero legitimacy anyway since anyone can run a number of them at almost no cost (with pseudonode you don't even need much disk space or bandwidth).

Earlier or later than this, at their own judgement, Gavin Andresen should be stripped from any affiliation with the remainder of the "official" dev team (privileges in the repo included, of course). Whether we like it or not, providing personal platforms to developers makes them points of failure to the whole project. There should be some funding effort so devs don't need to go on talks and celebrity campaigns to whore themselves out and make some money. This promotes behaviour that is entirely toxic to Bitcoin as it personalises the project. Devs having self-promotion platforms in relation to Bitcoin should be a no-no, even if it's just blogs with their mug all over the place and airbrushed pictures of themselves looking pensive. Bitcoin should be as faceless as possible and "followers" should solve their daddy issues and get behind the values of Bitcoin that matter. Running in datacenters or being filtered and controlled by financial corporations are not among them.

[–]bitsko 2ポイント3ポイント  (1子コメント)

hahahahahha.

Yeah, you should hardfork to block a hardfork.

[–]muyuu 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Uh? It would be a very simple softfork actually.

[–]immibis 1ポイント2ポイント  (1子コメント)

A basic first step would be to specifically orphan BIP 101 versioned blocks and stop propagating them as well

So basically, you suggest declaring war. Right now, XT will fork if people want it to, and it won't if they don't. You are trying to make it so that even if most people want it to fork, it won't - that is actively blocking consensus (and decentralization of decision making).

This kind of thing could easily destroy Bitcoin, and I don't mean BIP 101.

Imagine this with any other less-controversial proposal. Miners refuse to build on blocks that use OP_CHECKLOCKTIMEVERIFY? Nodes re-write all signatures to non-DER encodings to block BIP66?

[–]muyuu -1ポイント0ポイント  (0子コメント)

The war is declared, maybe you haven't been paying attention.

"Votes" are a farce. Currently there is no proper credible consensus mechanism other than orphaning invalid blocks. Not even something moderately credible that could be made with PoS. There's nothing right now, just setting a version that doesn't even mean that your miner runs that particular untested version of the protocol.

So currently only "consensus" happens after a fork. Whether that's a problem, I'm not entirely sure. Orphaning blocks is just that, declaring that you vote against. I believe there were other ideas to introduce governance mechanisms that have a semblance of credibility but AFAIK there's nothing implemented.

The ignorance of this reality is killing Bitcoin.

[–]Lejitz 1ポイント2ポイント  (2子コメント)

With Feathercoin, what percentage agreed? Practically none. There was no attempt to takeover litecoin. The idea was to start an altcoin. However, suppose Feathercoin was adopted by practically all litecoin users, would it then have just been a hard fork of Litecoin?

If not, why not?

If so, then if a small percentage of litecoin users started running the litecoin nodes and miners again, are they now the altcoin?

If XT garners a 95% agreement, is it a hard fork, or must it have 100% to not be an altcoin. If it must have 100%, then in what time frame? What time frames were previous Bitcoin hard forks completed in. Was there ever a time when Bitcoin was actually an altcoin because the hard fork had not yet been completed (e.g. In Spring of 2013 when a hard fork was needed to repair Hearn's fuck up, was that temporarily a hard fork?)? Is it possible that XT becomes a hard fork, then Core becomes the altcoin.

Do you see what I'm getting at. Altcoin, even your attempt to make it black and white, is a term of degree (not the type thing programmers tend to have an affinity for). While you are trying desperately to give it a technical definition, it's really a term of general intent (I.e. Is this intended to be different?). The reason it's so important for you to do so is because you think it's a persuasive argument, but it's not. Everyone just thinks that if XT gets a large enough percentage then technically it's no different from a hard fork, because again, it's a term of degree.

You should back off of this argument and make more persuasive arguments--there are plenty. This one pushes people to XT, because it's annoying.

[–]dontcensormebro2 2ポイント3ポイント  (1子コメント)

Yeah they can't seem to argue the merits so they switch to propoganda by calling it an altcoin which they know has a bad connotation.

[–]Lejitz -1ポイント0ポイント  (0子コメント)

They can argue the merits. Whether you understand them or not is a different question. Core devs' scaling solutions are far more elegant than clumsily raising the cap.

[–]ncsakira 1ポイント2ポイント  (1子コメント)

I don't agree. Altcoins have a different genesis block. Forks are when miners issue competing different new blocks. Then the one with more hash rate wins. And, then, for security, everybody must upgrade/ downgrade to that version. I say, for security, because the "multiple blockchain" scenario is not acceptable for exchanges and wallets; only a malicious exchange will let you trade both, a sane one will stop deposits until the uncertainity its resolved. Now, when there is consensus rules involved, the one with loose rules wins as it accept all kinds of blocks and keeps getting mined and validating.

[–]kuui1 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

I agree with your definition of "altcoin" and know more people who use that definition than the one luke-jr is pedaling.

[–]immibis 0ポイント1ポイント  (3子コメント)

Your illustration shows two forks where rules changed. If 25% of miners had not updated to the new consensus rules, would that have made the current chain an altcoin?

[–]luke-jrLuke Dashjr - Bitcoin Expert[S,🍰] -1ポイント0ポイント  (2子コメント)

If 25% of the economy did not update to the new consensus rules, the current chain would indeed be an altcoin. Miners are not relevant in this regard.

[–]immibis 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

How do you know what proportion of the economy wants the new rules?

(Realistically, I bet at least 70% of them are apathetic, and will go with whichever side has the most support from the people who do care, including miners)

[–]luke-jrLuke Dashjr - Bitcoin Expert[S,🍰] 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

There's a difference between wanting new rules, and willing new rules. Both BitPay and Coinbase (AFAIK together the economic majority) have stated they want larger blocks, but they have not yet stated they will be running code implementing larger blocks.

[–]sexibilia 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

There is no fact of the matter about whether an amended bitcoin "really" is bitcoin or "really" is an alt. The only issue that matters is: should the block limit be increased? The rest is just semantics.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus

The protocol is adjustable by design. The only issue is which adjustments should be made.

Call XT an alt if you wish. Now: should we adopt this alt as bitcoin? If it is better, why on earth not?

[–]e6M77kw 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Instead of making these childish pictures, wasn't the time better spent on something productive... Like preventing that we all have to switch to this "altcoin".

Being smart doesn't seem a guarantee for being mature.

[–]btc5000 -1ポイント0ポイント  (3子コメント)

Misleading because litecoin was a fork of another shitcoin, you make litecoin look prominent, when it's just a shitcoin of another shitcoin

[–]luke-jrLuke Dashjr - Bitcoin Expert[S,🍰] 0ポイント1ポイント  (2子コメント)

How would you suggest I improve it, without scamcoining up the image like crazy?

[–]btc5000 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

Drop litecoin, use namecoin, at least nmc deserves a mention not litecoin

[–]luke-jrLuke Dashjr - Bitcoin Expert[S,🍰] 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Namecoin doesn't have a precedent altcoin-with-same-genesis block AFAIK.

[–]luckdragon69 0ポイント1ポイント  (0子コメント)

Good work making the forking process easy to grasp

[–]muyuu -1ポイント0ポイント  (2子コメント)

Can I rehost this elsewhere to share around?

[–]luke-jrLuke Dashjr - Bitcoin Expert[S,🍰] 0ポイント1ポイント  (1子コメント)

Sure, but direct linking may be best in case I find something to update it with. (notably, stale-block chain forks are missing)

[–]muyuu -1ポイント0ポイント  (0子コメント)

Ok, will direct link to it then.

[–]peoplma -1ポイント0ポイント  (0子コメント)

sidechains