I wonder if this is solely accounting for migration and not currency fluctuations creating and removing millionaire status. The pound has been quite strong recently while the dollar has lost 10% this year. That the stronger currency has seen the greatest loss of millionaires while the weaker one has seen the most growth is something I would expect to see regardless of migration patterns. I guess "millionaire" here is qualified against USD so maybe I'm overthinking it.

Yes, a bitcoiner friend's kid described to me step-by-step how to build a CPU from scratch. Complete with a program counter, 8 bit memory, addition, subtraction, multiplication and several other essential operations all starting from discrete logic gates - not even flip-flops were taken for granted. From my EE101 experience, it seemed to check out but honestly I could only barely keep up with his pace. I think he's 12. Oh, and there was no pencil or paper involved, just from his memory of previously trying to build one in simulation.

This graph appears to show a decrease in the avoiders and an increase of allergy in the consumers. 17.2% -> 15.4% versus 3.2% -> 4.4%

I made the pilgrimage on Friday and was met by a several other bitcoiners. Pretty cool experience and I'm glad to see like minded individuals supporting lightning as a medium of exchange. I'll definitely be going out of my way to give Steak n Shake some repeat business.

At the end of the day, we expect skin in the game. I would argue there are plenty of ways in which people have skin in the game simply by being alive and living in a state. There are separate ways in which taxpayers have skin in the game when it comes to laws authorizing spending. Still others in which parents and young people have skin in the game when it comes to legislation disproportionately impacting future generations.

I don't think it's a one-size fits all answer here, but it certainly seems like we could do better. It also doesn't help that we generally vote for politicians rather than individual measures/legislation.

It was fun hearing from people I know and respect on both sides make their case in person.

I think minimizing utxo set bloat and maximizing miner decentralization are both fairly critical to the bitcoin network, so I'm generally for removing the limit. It's unfortunate that people want to use the blockchain for cruft, so I'm sympathetic to the motivations of team filter as well. However, ultimately we have to follow consensus rules and the mempool cannot afford to diverge too much from what the consensus-valid market for block space bears - if it does our decentralization is toast. Ultimately I'm here for decentralized, censorship-resistant currency. Perhaps arbitrary data on the blockchain is just the price we have to bear.

CLBOSS has five different "FeeModders" which collectively adjust channel fees. Some are configurable and some not. The most relevant one here is probably FeeModderByBalance which I've tried tweaking, but it doesn't have publicly accessible config parameters. We've been discussing in the calls ways to make it more responsive.

The power failure scenario is definitely a concern. I have a script to replace an outdated db, but I'm not sure such a feature from within the plugin would be appropriate. Maybe the plugin could document a generic pre-start db restore script though.

Great tips and data, thank you! I had a couple notes after reading - hope you don't mind.

I would refer to Sjor's reasoning

I'm simplifying terribly, but I think the general issue is that putting the data in the witness makes syncing and validating the chain harder for future and current node operators. Validating each transaction requires checking it against all unspent transaction outputs from the entire blockchain (utxo set.) These have to be kept in memory by the nodes forever. If you can avoid having every node add to this with something that's in fact unspendable and only meant to record data, it makes validation quicker and nodes are cheaper to operate. It's a tragedy of the commons situation. Obviously the utxo set is going to grow regardless, but we might as well not encourage it to get worse by needlessly adding outputs that can never be removed.

Buying a ledger without having a P.O. Box. At least it taught me that all customer data really is toxic.

This is an incredibly lazy argument, and this self-righteous moral high ground is a complete nonstarter for me. Are we for a free market or not? How about a free and open protocol anyone can use? Yes, I'm sure most of us would love it if the bitcoin network was only used for actual bitcoin transactions. But guess what, it's not. It turns out people love to use bitcoin in ways that may seem irrational to us. Whether that's messages memorializing life events, Merkle tree roots of timestamped data, or meme jpegs, it doesn't really matter. There are ways to embed this data in bitcoin transactions, and the worst offenders will bloat the utxo set in such a way that it makes running and syncing a node harder for everyone joining the network. OP_RETURN was always a pragmatic solution here. Furthermore, the relay policy has increasingly little bearing on what makes it into blocks, much less what's allowable by consensus. All limiting mempool relay does is encourage third party, out-of-band tx relay, which further incentivizes mining centralization. Is there anyone who really thinks mining pools aren't already centralized enough? Next they're going to explain to us how no speak easies existed during American prohibition because alcohol was outlawed.

The icing on the cake is that filling blocks with 700KB of OP_RETURN data would actually go a long way towards Luke's goal of 300KB blocks to validate. (An argument that was interesting and thought provoking.) Most of the time to sync a new node is in validating transactions and mapping the UTXO set, to which OP_RETURN doesn't contribute as it's unspendable. It doesn't even get a witness discount!

I'm so tired of this debate. I get that you're morally superior, but at least develop a coherent argument I can entertain before throwing ad hominems and then claiming victimhood at the hands of the cabal.

I appreciate your contributions Murch! Zero moderation is not practically feasible without a tragedy of the commons situation. I'm sorry that the alternative inevitably puts every action under a microscope for public airing of the grievances. We're all just passionate about the project.

This is interesting, and somehow I don't doubt the results. Much like assuming absolute responsibility for your place in life is beneficial on an individual level yet can lead to problems when applied to society at large, perhaps the existence of smartphones and social media is anxiety inducing for society as a whole, yet the rational individual choice is still to participate, so as not to get ostracized and miss out on social engagement. We can't compare results with a counterfactual society, but maybe polling students at schools with no phone policies vs students elsewhere could provide some insight.

Exactly this. But I would also assign a rebuttal (could be brief), and even the counter-argument to the rebuttal. Get comfortable with the process of reasoning and laying out an argument. Logical reasoning shouldn't stop because your agenda is satisfied. After all, empathy and an understand your opposing view's perspective should help you refine your case, or even your position if you have an open mind.

We recently did one of these with my son on fracking. While the initial stance was "not worth the risks," there were several compelling counter arguments, especially when taking second order effects into account. It's clearly not a cut and dry issue, but one that depends heavily on context.

As an engineer and someone who has filed several patents, I like the idea of incentivizing creativity with a temporary monopoly on your own work, and then opening it up to the commons with full documentation. In practice, I think the system is abused and does more harm than good in this day and age. Patents are now mostly used as defense in high cost, high stakes lawfare.

The patent system needs major reform and the USPTO needs much better help vetting submissions. The duration is too long on fast developing fields and claims are being accepted that should never be patentable in the first place. There's a whole cottage industry of patent trolls who have never created anything of their own, but can theorize someone else might try to make a product that does X and they file an overly broad patent for it. If these sort of abuses can't be corrected, I think we'd be better off without IP rights entirely.

I worked in one for many years as an engineer. Granted, I did mostly design work, but I had a great time automating some of our more tedious manual processes. Creating custom tools for the technicians and the real time feedback of improving designs for manufacturability was rewarding as well.

Czar of the universe answer is to fix this in an elegant way early with a decade or so to move the coins before anything consequential happened. In the real world, you would never build consensus for such a thing. Even if you did, the process would be so contentious that a vocal contingent could cause a substantial loss of faith in the immutability of bitcoin. It might even be preferable to let the chaos play out. Unless there's overwhelming consensus, any solution becomes a poisoned chalice - even if it's technically elegant.

Literally pay a mining fee? Because then once you brute force a private key you just buy some mining hardware and sit on the tx until you can mine a single block, right?

I'm pretty sure St. Anne's in Zimbabwe has been doing this for like 5 years at this point. There have been several @anita posch podcasts with the school's principal, Ms. Aurra. When your local currency is garbage it kind of becomes a necessity. Good for Lomond School though!