What is your take on Bitcoin Knotz? Bitcoin node and wallet by Luke Dashjr

[nutildah]

In the context of Bitcoin, if you do "censor" them through filters, what would that do? The filter boys will still get bypassed.

You're right, but I'm starting to think they're coming from a place of "everybody should do what we're doing." They want Core to become Knots, basically.

[Wind_FURY]

- for same reason why he's calling other people "idiots"

- no, both of those statements coming from same person is a contradiction.

- no, i'm not asking anyone to do what I want, false accusation again.

Those statements were made from the acceptance of the fact that Bitcoin is both censorship-resistant, and that, because of such a feature, it could be used for something stupid like dick picks and fart sounds. Do we have to like it? No, but it is the utility that some people have found in Bitcoin.

   ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[kano]

Replying to the actual topic header

Knots includes blacklisting/bias and thus I can't understand why people are OK with that.

Luke has done this twice before about 10 years ago and before that, and fortunately the places (like gentoo) that used his git stopped using it.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/2pfgjg/exposed_lukejr_plans_on_forcing_blacklists_on_all/

If you want some extra changes to bitcoin and don't like the clear and present arguments given in this thread about the OP_RETURN change, since it's already quite possible for anyone to do it even with knots ... then you need to look elsewhere.

Accepting a version of bitcoin that adds hard coded transaction blacklisting/bias is beyond my own understanding, but I guess it may be OK with the 17% of nodes out there ... who probably have absolutely no idea about it

--

And Yes Luke was the first spammer of bitcoin with all his thousands of religious comments he added to the blockchain.

As for comments about malware in the blockchain, well you can do that already with the 80 bytes available.
I'm one of the 2 main developers of cgminer (and the only current active one)
cgminer source code is considered malware by most if not all antivirus programs - so you can add a malware warning to your blockchain file with the current (unenforced) 80 byte limit

[nc50lc]

Knots includes blacklisting/bias and thus I can't understand why people are OK with that.

I'm not using Knots outside of testing but just to be fair, those filters are mostly toggleable options, even convenient for non-power-users because it's available in the GUI's settings.
Most notable, the controversial: not relaying non-bitcoin "token" transactions isn't toggled-on by default.

At least in the current latest build. (--rejecttokens default)

But yeah, two other "spam filters" are toggled-on by default. Other users can check it if they're interested.

[apogio]

I haven't spoken in this thread, because I lack some significant knowledge.

Knots commit history: https://github.com/bitcoinknots/bitcoin/commits/29.x-knots/
Core  commit history: https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/commits/master/

Isn't it a red flag for Knots that only Luke commits and approves the PRs? Without any technical expertise, wouldn't you feel better knowing that more people review code changes than just a single person? Not only because of being prone to bugs, but also because it's prone to malicious activity if one person has full control over the software.

[stwenhao]

Isn't it a red flag for Knots that only Luke commits and approves the PRs?

Note that a lot of changes are imported from Bitcoin Core. Which means, that many changes are first submitted into Core, and then copy-pasted by a lot of alternative clients, and also a lot of altcoins. So, if some change is non-controversial, then why submit it into Knots, if you can get it merged into Core, and have it in both clients?

Without any technical expertise, wouldn't you feel better knowing that more people review code changes than just a single person?

But you never know, if there are more people, or not. As long as everyone can properly protect its anonymity, then you can have a single person, using many different accounts, to push different changes. The same with bitcointalk: maybe you are talking only with theymos, and everyone else is his alt? You never know, because it is only a matter of skills. And you never know, how many alts Satoshi had.

Not only because of being prone to bugs, but also because it's prone to malicious activity if one person has full control over the software.

Of course. If you use Bitcoin, or any other cryptocurrency, then you always have a choice: check everything by yourself, or trust other people. The same with other kind of Open Source software: if you use Linux, then you have to check the code, or trust, that it is written correctly. And you can never check everything, because it takes time, and effort, to understand all of that.

And of course, there are many ways, to break things, and make them in a way, where they could be exploited only by the creator. But then, if you don't like something, then it is a matter of skills, to make a better replacement. If you don't have such skills, then you have to trust some coders, whoever that will be. And unless you write the code by yourself, you can never be sure, that it is "safe".

[takuma sato]

I haven't spoken in this thread, because I lack some significant knowledge.

Knots commit history: https://github.com/bitcoinknots/bitcoin/commits/29.x-knots/
Core  commit history: https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/commits/master/

Isn't it a red flag for Knots that only Luke commits and approves the PRs? Without any technical expertise, wouldn't you feel better knowing that more people review code changes than just a single person? Not only because of being prone to bugs, but also because it's prone to malicious activity if one person has full control over the software.

Well how about we get more developers in Knots? no one is stopping people from becoming devs. Plus the code is open source and signed by several parties, so anything you install has been peer reviewed.

What is clear is that this spam dogshit is making it hell to sync a full node from scratch. It is now almost impossible for computers that aren't backdoored (computers which allow you to install an open source bios, which means older computers) to sync a node because whenever this ordinal crap started the blockchain starts becoming slower and slower to sync, and without this then Bitcoin is done for, since only modern powerful computers (backdoored computers) and eventually datacenters will be able to process these increasingly complex blocks.

Btw, Core-enabled ordinal spammer Leonidas and his "army" of dogshit pump and dumpers are now threatening to fork Bitcoin Core if they "dare to do something about this"

https://x.com/LeonidasNFT/status/1964225563725291732

And here he is admitting he is threatening to spam the network:

https://x.com/_Hugo_Ramos_/status/1965701210662752567

These NFTards only care about pumping and dumping shitcoins, they couldn't care less about how making it impossible to sync nodes with Coreboot-capable computers basically means BTC is hijacked, let alone hosting illegal contents permanently on your computer (and no, pruning is just dumb, you are supposed to host the entire blockchain, plus you already had to delete it anyway and your computer now contains traces of illegal contents even encrypted). If everyone prunes the blockchain, and this is a clear incentive to do so, you are lowering the amount of full copies of the blockchain hosted. I shouldn't need to explain why this is a problem.

You may think this or that about Luke but at least he is trying Something, and he is forcing nothing, he is giving people the tools to do what they want.
What is Core doing? enabling this crap to happen. Wouldn't be surprised some of the people involved in all of this are getting paid by assorted VC's which make a living from pump and dumping tokens.

[apogio]

@takuma sato
@stwenhao

I appreciate the answers, but I'd like to explain the purpose of my question.

The thing that kinda tickles me and makes me wonder why there's such a love for Knots, is that I've seen some other completely alternative Bitcoin clients, like btcd.

Why do you think people go for Knots like crazy and they don't try something that's not related to Core at all?

I'm following takuma sato's thoughts with respect, but I don't understand if this transition to Knots is happening because "you like Knots a lot", or because "you don't like Core anymore".

[stwenhao]

Why do you think people go for Knots like crazy

Because they heard about "stopping the spam", and they don't have tools or skills, to really check, what is going on. I think this OP_RETURN change is more political, than it should be. To make it clear: lifting next limits is unavoidable. And more of them will be lifted in the future. People are tired of hearing all the time, that "Core decided about this or that", so quite soon, a lot of things will be left to the nodes, and then, there will be nobody to complain to, if more and more settings could be tweaked by each node operator.

We no longer have fully centralized alert system. And other centrally controlled things will be also gone soon. Then, people will make their own decisions, and face the consequences. Your coins, your choices. One consequence of making things more decentralized, is that the choice to filter things or not, will be left completely to the users. And that means allowing everything by default, because it is easier to filter the traffic, than to bring back things, which were censored by previously executed code.

and they don't try something that's not related to Core at all?

Because of "bugward compatibility". Anyone can use any client. But if you are in a minority, then your client can reject a valid chain, and then it is your problem, if the rest of the world is using something else. It is far from obvious, how to implement some things, and sometimes, even mining pools make mistakes. Do you know, how to move coins from OP_TRUE? And from OP_CHECKSIG? And what about OP_CHECKSIG OP_NOT? What about a lot of different edge cases, like OP_CODESEPARATOR? There are many different things to implement, and all of that should be correct. If there are many different clients in use, and all of them are Open Source, then you may be able to halt some of them, by convincing them, that someone produced an invalid block, while the rest of the network will be unaffected, and continue mining on top of it.

Also, some people think, that OP_RETURN always invalidates a given coin. Then what about "OP_IF OP_RETURN OP_ENDIF"? I guess some clients can be forked, by doing things like that, or they can start enforcing weird limits, even if there are no data pushes, and if someone uses OP_RETURN as "OP_FALSE OP_VERIFY".

if this transition to Knots is happening because "you like Knots a lot", or because "you don't like Core anymore"

It is more likely, that people don't like Core's relay policy, and they think, that spam should be actively censored. Also, I guess a lot of people, who are "against spam", don't really run any node in practice, because if they would, then they would also know some facts. For example: OP_RETURNs make the blocks smaller, because they are placed in legacy space, so if someone is producing 1 MB OP_RETURNs, instead of 4 MB TapScript inputs, then blocks are smaller, because of that (unless someone tries to pretend, that Segwit does not exist). Another truth is that checking OP_RETURN or some "OP_FALSE OP_IF ... OP_ENDIF" is actually faster, than validating some OP_CHECKSIG, or OP_CHECKMULTISIG, with fake keys or signatures.

I don't think people suddenly started to "like Knots a lot", because the actual code is very similar. If someone wants to run a full node, then picking that client, or another, is a matter of personal taste. Using Knots is not that much different, than building Core from the source code, and adding your own tweaks here and there. If you download the Core, change some lines of code here and there, compile it, and start using your own version, which would be 99% compatible with the original, then most of the time, nobody would even notice, that you are running your own version (some people will see, that your client will show "99" as version number, but you will be hidden in a crowd of other developers, who also have their own not-yet-merged tweaks, or simply built the unmodified version from the source code).

[nutildah]

Btw, Core-enabled ordinal spammer Leonidas and his "army" of dogshit pump and dumpers are now threatening to fork Bitcoin Core if they "dare to do something about this"

https://x.com/LeonidasNFT/status/1964225563725291732

Interesting, and we should hope he does it -- I for one would be completely happy if he ejected himself from the Bitcoin ecosystem. However, he's not gonna do it. He's just good at crafting call-to-action tweets that motivate his holders (aka suckers). The reason he won't do it is because the whole prestige of his DOG token, and other runes and ordinals, lies in the fact that they are on top of Bitcoin.

Leonidas will do or say anything to make a buck. He is an example of how far you can make it when you're driven and have no conscience. To have him and his whole band of merry grifters removed from Bitcoin would actually be confidence-restoring to certain groups of Bitcoiners, and bode well for the overall ethical climate of the space. But if he leaves it will only be because he found a new grift to latch on to.

[DaveF]

Dave's opinion.
Anyone running any code by Luke Jr. is pro censorship / anti crypto.
He has attacked and killed coins he does not like: https://asktom.cf/index.php?topic=56675.0

Dave's opinion.
Anyone running code by Luke Jr. is risking their funds and computer security since he has proven he has poor OpSec:
https://asktom.cf/index.php?topic=5432665.0

If you read how it seems to have happened, and how long it took him to notice you would not ever trust him with software that you run.

What is clear is that this spam dogshit is making it hell to sync a full node from scratch. It is now almost impossible for computers that aren't backdoored (computers which allow you to install an open source bios, which means older computers) to sync a node because whenever this ordinal crap started the blockchain starts becoming slower and slower to sync, and without this then Bitcoin is done for, since only modern powerful computers (backdoored computers) and eventually datacenters will be able to process these increasingly complex blocks......

Not sure where you are in the world, but here in the US you can get an Optiplex 3050 Micro PC Core with a i7-6700T & 32GB of RAM for under $150 and a decent 2TB drive for under $125. Will sync a node from scratch in a minimal amount of time. As in fire it up in the office when you leave work Friday and it's done when you come in Monday morning. Picked the 6th gen 3050 since you can get on open source BIOS and disable IME very simply on that unit. You can get other machines that are newer / faster but takes more "know how" to put in an open source BIOS


-Dave

[stwenhao]

He has attacked and killed coins he does not like

Of course. If some coin is poorly protected, then it obviously will be attacked. And it is much better to show everyone, that there are bugs, than to let it exist, let it grow to more serious traffic, and see it attacked then. For the same reason, it is good, that Value Overflow Incident happened in the past, and not today. Because then, we got protections from having any UTXO above 21 million coins. And we also got an alert system, it worked for years, and then became deactivated.

If some altcoin is launched without any testnet, and is trivially attacked a day after launching, then it is just poorly designed. Satoshi published the whitepaper months before launching the mainnet, and there were some tests in prenet, with 20 leading zero bits in block headers. If you were on IRC at that time, then you could potentially reorg the whole prenet with just a CPU.

And altcoins with OP_EVAL taught us, that P2SH is much safer, than letting people execute anything they want. Imagine, how bad P2SH could be, if instead of "OP_HASH160 <fixedHash> OP_EQUAL", you could have "OP_TOALTSTACK OP_HASH160 OP_FROMALTSTACK OP_EQUAL" instead, and some buggy clients would interpret it as a valid P2SH, where anyone could push any Script on the stack, and see it executed. Also, what about scripts, like "OP_EVAL" alone? What about OP_EVAL wrapped inside OP_EVAL?

Another important lesson is that Merged Mining should trace the heaviest chain of Proof of Work headers, to calculate the difficulty properly. Then, attacking such altcoins wouldn't be possible, if you wouldn't 51% attack Bitcoin. For that reason, P2Pool can still work, even today, as long as you can mine blocks with enough difficulty.

When someone with a lot of hash power mines a cryptocurrency are they prohibited from turning off and leaving the difficulty sky high?

See? The same could happen in testnets. Which is why there was "20 minutes rule", to let people mine the chain on CPUs, even if some ASIC will mine a lot of blocks, and leave the high difficulty. However, Gavin also made a mistake, by setting this rule as "mandatory", instead of making it "optional". If CPU blocks on testnets would work just like shares in P2Pool, and if they would be always reorged later, then we would have a nice, clean chain of block headers, with a proper difficulty, that could work, and be resistant to bumping the difficulty.

By the way: if blocks would be always produced every 10 minutes, but if coin amounts would be proportional to the global SHA-256 difficulty, then there would be no problem with halting the chain. Then, instead of getting 50 coins every 10 minutes, people could produce 5k satoshis, by making million times weaker blocks.

So, as you can see: it is not a problem, that Luke attacked some altcoins. The bigger problem is that such altcoins were poorly designed, so that anyone could easily destroy them. And there were a lot of red flags, when it comes to this specific altcoin.

Anyone running code by Luke Jr. is risking their funds and computer security since he has proven he has poor OpSec

The risk is similar, if you download the official Core client, and tweak it here and there, so you will use your own implementation. It is just Luke's implementation. If someone is "against spam", then that person can still use Core, with a different settings, or a tweaked code. People picked Luke's version, because they were told to do so, but they don't have to do that.

Another thing is that you never know, how many clients are telling you the truth. Tor client also tells everyone, that the user is running Firefox on Windows, but it is quite often a lie, which allows to hide in the crowd of other users of the most popular browser and OS. Which means, that many clients can run "Foobar software", but it can send "Satoshi" as the client's name, and you have no way of knowing, if someone is really running the official version or not.

So, I can also run Core, and set it in a way, where other nodes would think, that I am using Knots. Changing "User Agent" is trivial in browsers, and it is also trivial in Bitcoin clients.

If you read how it seems to have happened, and how long it took him to notice you would not ever trust him with software that you run.

Why? Garlo Nicon's account was also compromised some time ago, and it didn't affect the quality of his posts. Being hacked is one thing, and being right about things is another thing. If someone liked pizza, and his account was compromised, then it doesn't mean, that "pizza is bad".

And, as usual, anyone's account can be compromised at any time. Domains where Core's binaries are hosted, were also hacked in the past, and many people downloaded malware, because of that. Does it mean, that everything they produced since then, is compromised? I don't think so.

By the way, bitcointalk was also hacked in the past, but we are still using it today. Should we move somewhere else, just because of the past hacks?

Will sync a node from scratch in a minimal amount of time.

I rent a VPS, and it took me a week, to sync it from scratch. And it was running 24/7. For many people, it takes longer than two weeks, to sync everything, as you can read here: https://asktom.cf/index.php?topic=5480200 (and it is not surprising, if it took me around 7 days, and it was running 24/7, then someone running it from home for 8 hours would do the same in 21 days or so)

[DaveF]

.......

Not going to respond to all that drivel that you posted since it's just not worth my time but picking a few points from the bottom up.

1) You are talking about renting a VPS the post I was responding to was about the fact that you can't get a secure machine (open source BIOS and no IME or equivalent) to sync in a reasonable amount of time. Since you are on a rented VPS all your data is not secure since it's running on someone server and they can do what they like.

2) Luke's account was not hacked his PC and server were. And he did not notice for a long time. His PGP key was compromised and he did not notice for a long time. They got away with a lot of his BTC and he still did not notice. If you want someone who is that lackadaisical compiling code for you be my guest.

3) If you don't understand the fact that he was running a pool and took hashes from that pool and attacked a coin without telling pool users about it then fine. Hope you don't mind but can you leave your car windows open with the keys on the front seat, since you don't care that people do whatever they want with your stuff you should be fine in having someone just take your car for a spin.

Either way, respond or don't you are now on ignore.

-Dave

[takuma sato]

Dave's opinion.
Anyone running any code by Luke Jr. is pro censorship / anti crypto.
He has attacked and killed coins he does not like: https://asktom.cf/index.php?topic=56675.0

If a coin can be 51%'d then sooner or later someone would do it. That sends a message and proves BTC value, which we should protect.

Dave's opinion.
Anyone running code by Luke Jr. is risking their funds and computer security since he has proven he has poor OpSec:
https://asktom.cf/index.php?topic=5432665.0

If you read how it seems to have happened, and how long it took him to notice you would not ever trust him with software that you run.

No way you believe he was actually hacked. That was an obvious "boating incident" exit. In any case, the code is open source. If you are trusting Bitcoin Knots, you are trusting Bitcoin Core since a lot of it is forked, with interesting features added. Again, open source software, plus peer reviewed with gpg signatures of people putting their reputation on the line.

Not sure where you are in the world, but here in the US you can get an Optiplex 3050 Micro PC Core with a i7-6700T & 32GB of RAM for under $150 and a decent 2TB drive for under $125. Will sync a node from scratch in a minimal amount of time. As in fire it up in the office when you leave work Friday and it's done when you come in Monday morning. Picked the 6th gen 3050 since you can get on open source BIOS and disable IME very simply on that unit. You can get other machines that are newer / faster but takes more "know how" to put in an open source BIOS


-Dave

A lot of people depend on laptops and a lot of them are older hardware. If you had an old thinkpad laying around, you could turn it into a hardened node and if you had 2 you could have a good airgap device as well. Well the point is, most of this software is old, but it had no problem dealing with the initial block download, not anymore. Is dog coins in the bitcoin blockchain worth this result? exactly.

[Satofan44]

Dave's opinion.
Anyone running any code by Luke Jr. is pro censorship / anti crypto.
He has attacked and killed coins he does not like: https://asktom.cf/index.php?topic=56675.0

Dave's opinion.
Anyone running code by Luke Jr. is risking their funds and computer security since he has proven he has poor OpSec:
https://asktom.cf/index.php?topic=5432665.0

None of that matters. We can debate Luke Jr.'s personality, his behavior and past events but it is irrelevant to the point. We are only here because of the dismissive behavior of Bitcoin Core. Had they behaved better and communicated more properly, Knotz would have stayed irrelevant. Instead of learning their lesson from this, they are missing the point entirely (again).

I am certain that this will eventually be Bitcoin's next crisis, one akin to the fork wars. Many users will refuse some change and run alternative or forked clients, while Core will try to push the change on the network. The kind of elitist behavior that they have been presenting inevitably will lead to a conflict of this scale. It is just a question of when and what. If it comes to a point that a USAF is needed against Core itself, this will do massive damage to the stability/integrity of our network from the social side of things. There will be no external adversary to blame for this one.

Not sure where you are in the world, but here in the US you can get an Optiplex 3050 Micro PC Core with a i7-6700T & 32GB of RAM for under $150 and a decent 2TB drive for under $125. Will sync a node from scratch in a minimal amount of time. As in fire it up in the office when you leave work Friday and it's done when you come in Monday morning. Picked the 6th gen 3050 since you can get on open source BIOS and disable IME very simply on that unit. You can get other machines that are newer / faster but takes more "know how" to put in an open source BIOS

-Dave

If synchronization is easy and cheap, just increase the block size then.  

The thing that kinda tickles me and makes me wonder why there's such a love for Knots, is that I've seen some other completely alternative Bitcoin clients, like btcd.

Why do you think people go for Knots like crazy and they don't try something that's not related to Core at all?

In this case, it is probably too neutral and quiet. People want to know where others stand on these issues. Also the last major release was 1 year ago?

[d5000]

We are only here because of the dismissive behavior of Bitcoin Core. Had they behaved better and communicated more properly, Knotz would have stayed irrelevant.

Just to ask: what communication tips would you give to "Bitcoin Core"?

The issue was debated in the mailing list, and points were made in favour and against the change. The points against it were mostly misunderstandings and debunked. The aggressive behavior was mostly on the side of the opponents of the change.

The person who proposed the change first (Antoine Poinsot) wrote a blog post explaining his motivation for the change. Maybe he shouldn't have used the word "drama" at this stage, but in general the blog post stays in the technical realm so I don't think it's really "fueling the drama" in the debate.

For sure communication could be improved, but how? Should Core have a blog, for example? A YT/TikTok channel? Joke aside: I think the big problem is here "who should be in charge", i.e. who represents "Core".

What I think is that indeed someone could have written an ELI5 or so detailing really in layman's terms why this change does not open the door for more data because no cheaper nor more convenient data publication option is given, it only tries to nudge the spam into a less harmful method (Edit: and "closing the door" isn't possible without extreme changes which need much more than standardness policy changes).

(I agree with you that Luke's personality is not relevant here. His earlier blacklisting attempts however are a sign that his approach to "censorship resistance" could be considered a bit "unique", though.)

[mindrust]

Dave's opinion.
Anyone running code by Luke Jr. is risking their funds and computer security since he has proven he has poor OpSec:
https://asktom.cf/index.php?topic=5432665.0

If you read how it seems to have happened, and how long it took him to notice you would not ever trust him with software that you run.

No way you believe he was actually hacked. That was an obvious "boating incident" exit. In any case, the code is open source. If you are trusting Bitcoin Knots, you are trusting Bitcoin Core since a lot of it is forked, with interesting features added. Again, open source software, plus peer reviewed with gpg signatures of people putting their reputation on the line.

It might be a boating accident but it is not "obvious" unless you show us your proof. You can say it looks like a boating accident but you can't say "It is a boating accident", that's unless you show us your proof. What you or DaveF (or anyone else including me for that matter) believes is irrelevant. If the judge says he was hacked, then he was hacked. If you know something we don't, go inform the police so they can push charges on him for tax evasion which is the most serious crime in the US.

Since you are making up facts based on assumptions, here is another one:

Do you think Luke is dumb enough to risk life sentence over this? To avoid paying taxes? Which btw triggers only when he spends or sells his coins since there is no wealth tax in the US?

[takuma sato]

Dave's opinion.
Anyone running code by Luke Jr. is risking their funds and computer security since he has proven he has poor OpSec:
https://asktom.cf/index.php?topic=5432665.0

If you read how it seems to have happened, and how long it took him to notice you would not ever trust him with software that you run.

No way you believe he was actually hacked. That was an obvious "boating incident" exit. In any case, the code is open source. If you are trusting Bitcoin Knots, you are trusting Bitcoin Core since a lot of it is forked, with interesting features added. Again, open source software, plus peer reviewed with gpg signatures of people putting their reputation on the line.

It might be a boating accident but it is not "obvious" unless you show us your proof. You can say it looks like a boating accident but you can't say "It is a boating accident", that's unless you show us your proof. What you or DaveF (or anyone else including me for that matter) believes is irrelevant. If the judge says he was hacked, then he was hacked. If you know something we don't, go inform the police so they can push charges on him for tax evasion which is the most serious crime in the US.

Since you are making up facts based on assumptions, here is another one:

Do you think Luke is dumb enough to risk life sentence over this? To avoid paying taxes? Which btw triggers only when he spends or sells his coins since there is no wealth tax in the US?

I have not looked at the case in detail, im giving a personal opinion on a piece of news and im just saying as a general rule of thumb how it's hard to believe someone with the technical expertise of Luke would get hacked. I mean maybe he was actually hosting private keys in a public computer. In any case, who cares, it's none of my business. What we are discussing here is, how the blockchain will get spammed with trash.

[Satofan44]

We are only here because of the dismissive behavior of Bitcoin Core. Had they behaved better and communicated more properly, Knotz would have stayed irrelevant.

Just to ask: what communication tips would you give to "Bitcoin Core"?

The issue was debated in the mailing list, and points were made in favour and against the change. The points against it were mostly misunderstandings and debunked. The aggressive behavior was mostly on the side of the opponents of the change.

The person who proposed the change first (Antoine Poinsot) wrote a blog post explaining his motivation for the change. Maybe he shouldn't have used the word "drama" at this stage, but in general the blog post stays in the technical realm so I don't think it's really "fueling the drama" in the debate.

I am by no means the type of communicator that would be qualified for the type of communication/communication expertise that is necessary but I will give you my thoughts anyway. The mailing list is a place for developers and highly technical users. Many people who run nodes are neither which is the result of policies strongly encouraged by Core (and which is a good thing). Therefore, I do not consider the mailing list discussions as "communication". As the debate continued and kind of turned into "drama" I got more and more the impression that the other side is just being slandered. In a "you're just stupid" or "you're paid/malicious" actor way. Excellent communication tactic isn't it? Insult the people that keep the network safe and secure for free because they have concerns/fears about changes.

I understand getting tired explaining the basics or debunking some arguments with random users that I consider elementary school level at this point (such as Bitcoin has no intrinsic value/it is a bubble/it's a ponzi/pyramid scheme etc.). We're an old network and those debates are largely pointless now and a huge time loss for valuable contributors. That said, firstly it should be noted that node operators are neither random users nor are they getting any direct rewards for what they are doing. You can argue that the value appreciation of Bitcoin is their reward, but that is just a dismissive argument that is supposed to justify a lack of gratitude towards them. We always need more node operators, so treat them nicely.   Secondly, that we found ourselves in this situation at all (discussions/concerns turned into drama with increasing dismissal) is a sign of a failure of the initial communication.

For sure communication could be improved, but how? Should Core have a blog, for example? A YT/TikTok channel? Joke aside: I think the big problem is here "who should be in charge", i.e. who represents "Core".

What I think is that indeed someone could have written an ELI5 or so detailing really in layman's terms why this change does not open the door for more data because no cheaper nor more convenient data publication option is given, it only tries to nudge the spam into a less harmful method (Edit: and "closing the door" isn't possible without extreme changes which need much more than standardness policy changes).

Perhaps something like an official blog/newsletter with graphics could be nice and it would not even consume a lot of time for the writer/editor since it would only need to be used sporadically (compared to a blog that has weekly or even daily posts). A post that addresses this particular case should ignore all drama and actors. It should have a clear explanation of HOW things were BEFORE, WHAT actually CHANGES, and a FAQ-style analysis of common worries/concerns and perhaps even a section addressing worst case scenarios as potential outcomes of this change (technical, legal, node operators, etc.) - those that Bitcoin Core members consider possible.

For less controversial changes without so much drama it would be even easier to draft the posts. What is Core working on? What are the current thoughts on scalability? What concerns do we currently have regarding the network? What are the current or medium term priorities? We should not expect people to read mailing list discussions. How many users have the time for that or how many are able to accurately draw conclusions from the posts which they read there? It is a very tiny minority. An occasional post for a group consisting of laymen and low-to-medium technical people would go a long way! Engagement is what they call it these days since you mention YT/TikTok.  

(I agree with you that Luke's personality is not relevant here. His earlier blacklisting attempts however are a sign that his approach to "censorship resistance" could be considered a bit "unique", though.)

Sure, it does have some relevance if we want to strictly debate whether Knotz is the right thing to use. However, my observations here on the social side of things is that people will flock to any alternative if they are pushed into a corner. This kind of communication issues are essentially pushing people into a democrats vs. republicans split, where users will either entrench themselves behind their choices (and dismiss everything from the other side) or they will make radical switches out of desperation. Nothing is good about this and we should not foster more division, but instead look for ways to mitigate causes to encourage better cohesion and collaboration in the future.

(For the reference, I have never run anything other than Bitcoin Core as my node - yet).

[d5000]

As the debate continued and kind of turned into "drama" I got more and more the impression that the other side is just being slandered. In a "you're just stupid" or "you're paid/malicious" actor way. Excellent communication tactic isn't it? Insult the people that keep the network safe and secure for free because they have concerns/fears about changes.

I got the impression that the debate was peaceful until Peter Todd and Antoine Poinsot were accused of corruption because they cited examples like Citrea which could switch from the "fake public key" method (which is more harmful/costly to nodes!) to "OP_RETURN" with that change, but they were accused of getting paid by Citrea and others.

Devs are not communication professionals, and I can understand that if you're insulted that way, you will react accordingly and your posts will become a bit harsher.

Critics of the change who do understand the situation more in detail, like Luke-jr, should have intervened as they really should know better, I think, but they continued to fuel the drama, perhaps because they felt the "sentiment" was benefitting their position in the debate even with the "elementary school arguments" which came from random people on social media.

I think it was a clear concession and sign of goodwill to the node owners to keep the datacarriersize parameter in the code, even if this erased some of the advantages of the OP_RETURN limits changes (such as simpler/easier to maintain code, and less variance in the relay policies).

But anyway, I would also love such a blog like you proposed, with FAQs for every major proposed change. It's not clear to me if there's human resources for that. But perhaps this thread can serve as an inspiration? I think Core would definitely benefit.

However, my observations here on the social side of things is that people will flock to any alternative if they are pushed into a corner. This kind of communication issues are essentially pushing people into a democrats vs. republicans split, where users will either entrench themselves behind their choices (and dismiss everything from the other side) or they will make radical switches out of desperation. Nothing is good about this and we should not foster more division, but instead look for ways to mitigate causes to encourage better cohesion and collaboration in the future.

Agree here, but as I wrote above, the drama was fueled also by the opponents of the change, from quite early on. I know this drama isn't that new, it may have started already when OP_RETURN was introduced (2014?), but it's got much more heated since the Ordinals wave in 2023. That hasn't helped here, both sides already were a bit angered.