delvingbitcoin
On consensus changes in bitcoin 2024
Posted on: February 14, 2024 22:52 UTC
The conversation pivots around the critical observation that certain technical proposals, such as ephemeral anchors or cluster mempool proposals, have not progressed beyond developmental discussions.
The reason for this stagnation is attributed to their negligible effect on the everyday user of Bitcoin. This situation underscores a broader issue within the Bitcoin community, where changes that could significantly impact the user experience struggle to gain traction. Such updates tend to go unnoticed because they do not disrupt the status quo, thereby avoiding getting caught in the process of achieving "rough consensus" among stakeholders.
Moreover, the discussion highlights a problematic aspect of the current system: the lack of activation clients does not necessarily hinder the implementation of changes. Instead, it perpetuates the existing state of affairs by limiting the avenues through which users can express their preferences or influence developments. This dynamic effectively stifles user input, ensuring that only changes with minimal direct impact on the end-user are smoothly integrated, while more substantial updates face significant hurdles. This scenario suggests an inherent resistance within the system against shifts that could democratize influence or alter the user experience in meaningful ways.