Let’s take a look at two issues that Bitcoin Knots customers declare to be proponents of and champions for of their campaign in opposition to Bitcoin Core:
Mining decentralization Bitcoin’s use as cash
They declare to combat for mining decentralization, with OCEAN mining pool held out as a major instance of this. OCEAN’s DATUM protocol is ostensibly designed to additional mining decentralization, particularly the precise template development course of that decides what transactions go right into a block.
Additionally they declare to combat for Bitcoin’s use as a financial community, i.e. a community that facilitates the transmission of bitcoin in economics transactions, making certain safety for these transactions.
These are each extremely essential objectives. Bitcoin’s mining community remaining decentralized is totally essential with a view to preserve its censorship resistance. A transparent majority of miners should exist and function in a state free from the potential of coercion from the state (or some other social gathering) to have interaction in censorship. With out present on this state, a easy majority of miners coerced in such a trend could be able to perpetually stopping any transaction from confirming within the blockchain, utterly undermining Bitcoin’s core worth proposition.
Scaling Bitcoin’s use as cash can also be extremely essential. The one mechanisms to transact with bitcoin in a censorship resistant trend are ones which are actually anchored to the blockchain itself in a fashion the place the tip consumer can on their very own implement possession of their present stability of bitcoin.
Each of these items are completely crucial for Bitcoin to meaningfully contribute to any optimistic change on the planet.
So let’s take a look at what they declare to face for versus what they’re truly doing.
Actions Versus Phrases
So firstly, builders have been engaged on a protocol referred to as Stratum v2, a substitute for the present Stratum v1 protocol miners use to work together with mining swimming pools. This has been a large undertaking, all utterly open supply, to permit particular person miners to pick out transactions which are included in blocks themselves versus the pool operator (the pool nonetheless controls payouts).
Block’s new Proto mining rig helps Stratum v2, Braiins Pool and DMND Pool have built-in assist.
What did OCEAN (run by the biggest Knots supporters) do to assist Stratum v2? Nothing. They created their very own proprietary various DATUM (they’ve pledged to open supply every part in future however haven’t but achieved so). In each options the pool operator is able to rejecting proposed blocks from particular person miners, which would depart the miner persevering with to do work they don’t seem to be getting paid for. Stratum v2 helps instantly switching to a different pool in such a case to make sure the miner continues getting paid, OCEAN doesn’t. It merely defaults to solomining.
On condition that it isn’t even open sourced but, no different pool can undertake it. It’s primarily a vendor lockin for OCEAN pool, who can nonetheless reject any template a miner proposes, with no technique to trivially decide out if a miner’s block template is rejected and change to a different pool.
To high it off, the observe of filtering transactions slows down the propagation of blocks throughout the community. When a miner finds a block, they don’t relay the entire block, they relay the header with a compressed “checklist” of all of the transactions in it for a node to reconstruct and confirm the block with the transactions of their mempool. When nodes shouldn’t have these transactions, it takes longer for them to fetch them from friends, validate the block, and relay it onward.
This disproportionately hurts smaller miners. If a big pool has a block orphaned due to this, i.e. one other miner finds a block earlier than the opposite one propagates throughout the community, that bigger miner has a really excessive probability of discovering the subsequent block constructing on their orphan, thus “saving it” to be included within the blockchain.
Smaller miners shouldn’t have these excessive odds of discovering the subsequent block on this scenario. This disadvantages them, making the very best payment paying transactions one thing that might truly lose them cash, versus bigger miners who will doubtless discover the subsequent block and never have their first one orphaned.
In a number of methods OCEAN (and Knots supporters) are actively harming mining decentralization whereas proclaiming themselves defenders of it.
Now let’s take a look at the usage of Bitcoin as cash. Ephemeral anchors are an optimization to make Lightning operate extra effectively, for a deeper clarification of them you possibly can learn this, however the essential level is they permit Lightning customers to be rather more environment friendly with charges they pay to shut channels on-chain.
The newest launch of Knots by default filters these transactions, and won’t relay them throughout the community. When a Lightning consumer has to non-cooperatively shut, they’re doing so with a view to defend their funds. Lightning implementations are all in several phases of shifting over to utilizing them. Knots actively makes an attempt to forestall these transactions relaying to miners.
How does that assist advance the usage of Bitcoin as cash? Once more, similar to with mining decentralization, they act in a exact opposite method than what they are saying. Citrea is one more instance, a Bitcoin Layer 2 designed to scale monetary transactions. The Knots OP_RETURN filter is not going to relay the transactions wanted to implement appropriate operation of the Layer 2.
What They Do Issues, Not What They Say
Knots supporters proclaim themselves defenders of Bitcoin, right here to make sure it stays a decentralized censorship resistant cash. However their actions push in direction of the precise reverse purpose.
The issues they do to “champion” mining decentralization truly create dynamics that worsen its centralization.
Whereas proclaiming Bitcoin is cash, and defending its use as such their chief purpose, the software program they launch and run actively undermines a number of Layer 2s whose whole objective is to scale Bitcoin’s use as cash.
They’re actually absolutely engaged in a marketing campaign with the tip purpose of stopping sure sorts of Bitcoin transactions from being made, whereas proclaiming themselves defenders of Bitcoin.
On the finish of the day, that is an open community, and other people can run no matter software program they need to work together with that open community. That could be a essential and essential facet of Bitcoin. This isn’t about software program, that is about individuals.
That is concerning the acknowledged objectives, the acknowledged values of individuals on this house, being the exact opposite of the actions they have interaction in. I hope that Bitcoiners are sensible sufficient to ultimately see the Orwellian newspeak that has been dominating your complete dispute round Bitcoin Core and Knots over the previous couple of years.
“The social gathering informed you to reject the proof of your eyes and ears. It was their last, most important command.”
