Original author: 0xTodd , Partner at Nothing Research
The Core group released the latest statement, and the Bitcoin Core development circle was in an uproar. I don’t see many Chinese discussions, so I’ll analyze the background of the story and my personal strong opinions. First, yesterday Bitcoin Core released a statement called “Bitcoin Core Development and Transaction Relay Policy”, which was angrily denounced by opponents as infamous as the “New York Agreement”.
So what does this statement say? Bitcoin Core is going to launch its own built-in transaction relay. I think this transaction relay is paving the way for the previous removal of the OP-Return zone restrictions. Why does this thing arouse so much discussion?
Because there is another background to the story, which I have talked about before - 2 years ago, inscriptions began to become popular, but these inscriptions and runes used a form similar to bug to secretly store their contents in the OP-Return area of the Bitcoin block, thus breaking the Bitcoin block limit in disguise.
As a result, Bitcoin is now divided into the right and the extreme right. The inscriptions aroused the disgust of the extreme right, so at the call of Luke and others, Knots, the second-ranked Bitcoin client, launched a spam filter, which directly regarded these inscription transactions as spam transactions and refused to package them. If you still remember, this even caused Ordi to plummet. But the ordinary right, that is, the Bitcoin Core group, believes that since the inscriptions can be used to fix bugs and put them on the chain, it is better to correct their name rather than let them continue to fix bugs.
In recent months, the Core team has proposed a new PR to change the OP-Return from 80 KB to unlimited, which is to directly remove the restrictions on inscriptions and allow them to be on the chain openly. Although the inscriptions are basically given, I think this is more or less some extra subsidies for miners. After all, earning more can make the Bitcoin network safer.
After talking about the background, lets get back to what exactly is this transaction relay. In theory, Bitcoin is a P2P network, which means that all miners are connected to each other in a single line. However, this thing is theoretically the safest way, because the current network environment is quite safe, and there is no need to be so absolute.
Therefore, transaction relay came into being. You can send the transaction to the relay first (note that it is not mandatory, it is voluntary). This has two major advantages:
1. It is helpful to prevent DoS attacks. Those random 0-fee transactions will not blow up the miners peer-to-peer servers.
2. Speeding up the propagation of transaction blocks and reducing latency will help prevent large miners from gaining unfair advantages.
In fact, this is a very good thing. In the past, transaction relays also had different strategies, some strictly filtered out spam transactions, and some were completely free.
PS: I don’t think this is transaction censorship, it’s more about filtering junk transactions, and users can choose not to use these features. In fact, both the right wing (Core group) and the extreme right wing (Luke and others) have the desire to filter junk transactions, but the core contradiction is that everyone has completely different definitions of junk transactions.
The extreme right believes that inscriptions are junk transactions and should be eliminated, and Bitcoin should not be a storage chain. The right believes that we should not censor (inscriptions) and restrict certain transactions from being put on the chain. Filters should only filter those pure DoS attacks. PS: Although I use the word extreme right here, it does not mean that [extreme right] is a derogatory word. The former is radical junk filtering, and the latter is moderate junk filtering.
In the past, these transaction relays were maintained by volunteers for love, especially the [aggressive spam filtering rules], because these volunteers had a strong belief that they hated inscriptions. However, once the Core team personally added the [mild spam filtering rules] to the Bitcoin client, it may mean that the market share of the [aggressive spam filtering rules] in the past has been greatly reduced.
If you are a little confused after reading this, let me make an analogy - it feels like the official suddenly announced the CP and attacked the fan-made CP pairing, that is, the official forced the fan to death. Of course, although Cores current market share exceeds 90%, Core does not consider itself the official party.
Because Bitcoin is a network defined by its users, users have ultimate freedom to choose what software to use and implement whatever policies they wish. Bitcoin Core contributors have no power to enforce these rules, and they even avoid automatic software updates to avoid suspicion.
I personally support updates like the Core group. Again, if your fence is only 10 cm high and other people can come and go freely, you might as well tear it down to save trouble. Although I personally dont care about inscriptions, I dont think they are junk transactions. As long as the normal payment is made, it is a good transaction.
Inscriptions are also charged according to volume, so there is no need to be picky about money, and they bring extra income to miners, which helps keep Bitcoins security strong after N halvings. And I firmly oppose transaction censorship. Bitcoins semi-official Core takes the lead in discriminating against transactions that pay normal fees, because transaction discrimination will gradually turn into transaction censorship.
One of the most proud attributes of Bitcoin is security and non-transaction censorship. The adoption of mild spam filtering rules is beneficial to both of these features. Opponents criticized that this is a compromise by the Core group to miners (because of the miners income) and abandoning its users. I disagree with this view - Inscription users are also Bitcoin users.
Times have progressed, and the hardware environment is no longer the same as in 2008. If the Bitcoin blockchain in 2025 stores some text and pictures, it will not be difficult for the nodes, and Satoshi Nakamoto himself has engraved the news of that year in the Legendary Blockchain. Bitcoin will never become a storage chain, but without changing the underlying structure, whats wrong with storing some data as a part-time job?
Real physical gold can be used to carve and leave records, and our electronic gold should also allow this. So I strongly support the Core groups proposal.
