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In answer to the question How is OP_RETURN used and why was it introduced in the first place?, theymos responds:
An important aspect of OP_RETURN is that outputs which use it in the standard way are provable unspendable. This means that nodes can immediately remove such outputs from their unspent outputs cache and potentially forget about them altogether (though Bitcoin Core doesn't do this yet). This makes OP_RETURN transactions much less expensive for the network than other ways of stuffing data into the block chain.
If this is the case, what's the debate around filtering and limits? If the outputs can be forgotten about, then why would someone spamming be an issue?
51 sats \ 0 replies \ @nout 16h
Yeah, the argument is that your node still has to download those txs before being able to throw the data. And yes, this is why practically speaking Knots is not a major difference from Core and the argument is overblown.
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You still need the data to validate the block. During initial block download a node still needs to download the OP_RETURN data from somewhere. But it is true that OP_RETURN does not touch the UTXO set.
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why would someone spamming be an issue?
Are you okay?
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