The Blocksize War: The Battle For Control Over Bitcoin's Protocol Rules

Description

Bier is a small-blocker.

Luke, [22/07/25 19:23]
Ver's history is mostly bad, actually. I wouldn't trust anything in his books.

Caterino Tommaso, T.O.P., [22/07/25 20:04]
Is there a better history that you'd recommend?

ShitCoinCasino, [22/07/25 21:49]
BLOCKSIZE WAR: The Battle Over who Controls Bitcoin's Protocol Rules
Book by Jonathan Bier

audiobook 🧲🔗

Luke Dashjr seems to be the hero (ref:8.5):

A Florida-based Bitcoin developer called Luke Dashjr had figured out a hack, which made SegWit possible as a compatible (softfork) Bitcoin upgrade. Luke was regarded as one of the most extreme small blockers and was another hate figure in the large block community, alongside Gregory Maxwell. Luke was not at all scared of standing out from the crowd with his non-consensus opinions. To some extent, the committed Catholic and father-of-seven was the Cassandra of the technical community; exceptionally strident. However, Luke clearly had a very strong technical understanding of Bitcoin, and his apparent non-linear thinking, which made him see things differently from others, may have helped him conceive of this hack that the other developers couldn’t quite work out.

This book covers Bitcoin's blocksize war, which was waged from August 2015 to November 2017. On the surface the battle was about the amount of data allowed in each Bitcoin block, however it exposed much deeper issues, such as who controls Bitcoin's protocol rules. It is not possible to cover every twist and turn in the labyrinthine conflict or all the arguments, but I have provided a chronology of the most significant events. This book explores some of the major characters in the conflict and includes coverage, from both the front lines and behind the scenes, during some of the most acute phases of the struggle. The account in this book includes discussions with the key players from both sides during the war, exploring their motivations, strategy and thought processes as the exhausting campaign progressed and developed.

17 User - Activated Softfork

07/24/2517 User - Activated Softfork : 197

spy-mining.

I think it means mining empty blocks.

21 Victory

07/24/2521 Victory : 263

Some people cannot fathom the idea of a system which has global consensus, but lacks a leader.

Is this even possible? It reminds me of Darwins idea that life can spontaneously arise without a Creator.