Can the inscriptions disappear? Just how big are Bitcoin Core developer rights?

On December 6, Bitcoin Core developer Luke Dashjr posted on social media that “Inscription” was using a bug in the Bitcoin Core client to send spam to the blockchain. Since 2013, Bitcoin Core has allowed users to set additional data size limits when forwarding or mining transactions. By obfuscating its data as program code, the inscriptions bypass this limitation.

Simply put, this experienced Bitcoin client developer believes that the inscribed circuit now represented by ORDI, which is in the top 50 by market capitalization, is a bug and can be fixed.

Luke Dashjr said, “This bug was recently fixed in Bitcoin Knots v25.1. Since my workflow was severely disrupted late last year (v24 was completely skipped), the fix took longer than usual. Bitcoin Core still has bugs in the upcoming v26 release. I can only hope it gets finally fixed before next year’s v27.”

Luke Dashjr made it clear in a message reply below the tweet that if this bug is fixed, the Ordinals inscription and BRC20 tokens will no longer exist.

As a Bitcoin OG, Luke Dashjr has always been an outspoken critic of the Ordinals protocol. In February of this year, Dashjr tweeted that “The Ordinals Agreement is an attack on Bitcoin.” In May, when the first wave of the inscription boom appeared, the opposition of Dashjr and Bitcoin Core was also viewed as an uncertain factor in the development of inscriptions for a while.

However, the previous scolding war did not trigger widespread discussion. After all, the Ordinals are still a product of market prejudice. However, ORDI, which has now increased 20,000 times, is already a national meme. Luke Dashjr once said, caused ORDI’s market value to evaporate 300 million US dollars within a few minutes.

The reason the market is afraid is obvious: does the Bitcoin core team really have the power to change the code at will?

Luke Dashjr: Early Developer Joined in 2011

Is Luke Dashjr qualified to evaluate Bitcoin? Of course he does. Luke Dashjr met Bitcoin in 2011 and soon joined the project as a developer. His programming knowledge quickly became a major Bitcoin developer, helping Bitcoin achieve its early construction. His early contributions to the Bitcoin software focused on troubleshooting Bitcoin Core’s security, performance, and advanced features.

As of now, Luke Dashjr is ranked 14th in the Bitcoin Core code contributor rankings, sorted by number of submissions.

As an early developer who joined, Luke Dashjr participated in almost all of Bitcoin’s early important events.

Dashjr was one of the first people to discover the Bitcoin hard fork in 2013 due to a software bug in Bitcoin Core. In 2014, Dashjr began to play a greater role in the Bitcoin ecosystem because it used a modified version of BFG Miner that allowed miners to work with higher performance than other miners at the time.

In 2016, Dashjr introduced BIP-2, a major improvement to the BIP format proposed by another Bitcoin developer and renowned cryptographer, Amir Taaki. During 2016 and 2017, Dashjr was also a key player in activating Segwit in Bitcoin. Dashjr’s other contributions to Bitcoin’s development include BIP-22 and BIP-23, which aim to optimize the block generation structure and improve efficiency within the mining pool, respectively.

Luke Dashjr; Source: Crypto Times

Going back to the previous article, Luke Dashjr mentioned in “This bug was recently fixed in Bitcoin Knots v25.1, and I hope it will be finally fixed before next year’s v27,” Bitcoin Knots is a complete Bitcoin client, and the original idea also came from Luke Dashjr.

Luke Dashjr is also a cybersecurity extremist. In fact, he believes that Bitcoin has security flaws in the current state of the network because its network is not fully decentralized. For this reason, it invites everyone who uses Bitcoin to install their own full node.

Why don’t you like the Ordinals?

Luke Dashjr’s dislike for the Ordinals stems from his firm belief in preserving Bitcoin fundamentalism.

At the end of 2022, software engineer Casey Rodarmor created the “Ordinals” protocol, which numbers the smallest unit in Bitcoin, “Satoshi,” and stores file metadata through a taproot to create a unique NFT. Next, domo released the BRC-20 protocol, which can create an alternative token standard on top of the Ordinals protocol. It then set off a boom in inscriptions this year, which also led to the explosion of the Bitcoin ecosystem.

On February 1, Bitcoin mining company Luxor said it had mined the largest Bitcoin block ever. The block size was 3.96MB, slightly below Bitcoin’s 4MB limit. The block contains an NFT based on the original “magic internet money” meme called Taproot Wizards.

Bitcoin ecosystem developers such as Luke Dashjr believe this will cause the size of the Bitcoin blockchain to expand rapidly, and the equipment requirements for running all nodes will increase dramatically, leading to a decrease in the number of nodes on the entire network, and a decrease in censorship resistance. At the same time, huge transactions and huge blocks that exceed expectations will impact ecological facilities such as wallets, mining pools, and browsers, causing abnormalities in some facilities. For example, some transactions cannot be analyzed properly. Furthermore, in order to reduce the time required to synchronize and verify huge transactions and blocks, mining pools or miners may choose not to download and generate blocks without verifying such transactions and blocks, posing a security risk.

They even harshly criticized Taproot Wizard’s behavior, saying, “This is an attack on Bitcoin. The Bitcoin block has a 1M limit. The Taproot Wizard’s 4M data is on the chain in a witness. Blocks and transactions have all circumvented the 1M limit. 4M is OK, 400M is OK! In this sense, it’s not an innovation; it’s an attack on a bug!”

On February 28 of this year, Luke Dashjr stated on social media that there are auction sites using his name and code to create and sell “misleading” NFTs without his consent. The screenshot shows that the NFT contains an image of a code he wrote and is being sold for 0.41 bitcoins on an auction site.

“I’m not involved in the creation and sale of this or any other NFT, and I don’t agree to my code or my name being used for this purpose.” Luke Dashjr clarified and worsened criticism on Twitter, “Due to the misrepresentation involved and the confusion of actual buyers, I strongly demand that 100% of the auction proceeds be returned to the buyers.”

It can be seen that Luke Dashjr is a developer with high requirements that are almost obsessed with the Bitcoin health ecosystem. Dashjr believes that Ordinals are not just spam blocking the web; they are also attacks on Bitcoin’s fungibility, and that accepting their existence would destroy Lightning Network and CoinJoin.

And this is the most unacceptable outcome for Bitcoin maximalists. In May, Luke Dashjr wrote on his Github account that he was very annoyed by the BRC-20 and meme coin hype, “Immediate corrective action is needed to resolve the Ordinals, and these measures should have been provided long ago.”

Luke Dashjr GitHub interface; Photo source: Community

In an email to other Bitcoin developers and miners, Dashjr proposed integrating a “spam filtering” mechanism into taproot transactions in order to stop the spread of Ordinals and BRC-20 tokens in the Bitcoin network. He said, “Action should have been taken a few months ago. Spam filtering has always been a standard part of Bitcoin Core. It was a mistake that the existing filters weren’t extended to the Taproot deal because this is a bug fix, and there’s actually no need to wait for a major release.”

According to Dashjr, people can own NFTs and collectibles on Bitcoin without sending spam or attacking the network, “Taproot actually makes this easier.” On the Bitcointalk forum, many people discussed adopting a soft fork to “enforce strict taproot verification script size,” and how the protocol filters content they consider “spam,” and even a hard fork to revoke taproot. But how easy is it to talk about a Bitcoin hard fork?

Do developers have the final say in the development of Bitcoin?

In describing “Who would need to nod for a piece of code to be merged into the Bitcoin codebase?” and “Who controls Bitcoin’s core codebase?” Before these two questions, one thing to be clear about is how to control a GitHub repository.

For the GitHub repositories of open source projects, developers with these two types of permissions have the greatest “power”, respectively, permission to merge code and permission to submit.

Having permission to merge code means their keys are added to the “Trusted Keys List” on GitHub, giving them specific permissions. For the Bitcoin Core project, when a developer’s key is added to this list, they gain the ability to merge code. This means they can incorporate code changes that have already been reviewed and approved into the Bitcoin Core codebase.

Therefore, having the ability to merge codes means they can directly influence the final version of the Bitcoin Core software. It’s a recognition of the trust and responsibility of developers, as their ability to merge code allows them to directly influence the final version of Bitcoin’s software. Developers with this permission are usually experienced and reputable contributors who are subject to strict quality control and review processes when merging code.

The difference between code submission rights and merging code rights is that merge permissions enable developers to decide which code will eventually be included in the main branch of the project. Thus, while submission permissions are an important milestone, merging permissions play a more critical role in project decision-making and final product formation. Both are important, but in terms of impact and responsibility, combined powers are generally viewed as the most advanced powers.

Who controls Bitcoin’s core code

Can anyone merge the code into Bitcoin Core’s GitHub repository?

Among Bitcoin Core developers, developers who have direct permission to merge and modify the Bitcoin codebase are usually maintainers or long-term contributors to the project. For example, Wladimir J. van der Laan, as one of the main maintainers of the project, has permission to merge the code.

Among the five previous developers with the highest authority on the Bitcoin codebase, Pieter Wuille and Marco Falke left on July 8, 2022 and February 23, 2023, respectively, relinquished their maintenance rights, and removed their keys from the trusted key set via a Bitcoin GitHub request.

After Pieter Wuille and Marco Falke left, currently only three Bitcoin Core developers, Wladimir J. van der Laan, Michael Ford, and Hennadii Stepanov, have permission to modify the Bitcoin Core code.

However, although these developers have permission to merge code, they generally follow a strict code review and community consensus process. Their work is more about coordinating and reviewing contributions rather than making changes unilaterally. The Bitcoin community places a high value on consensus and transparency, and any major code changes are widely discussed and reviewed within the community.

A piece of code has been merged into the Bitcoin codebase, who needs to “nod”?

For a piece of code to be incorporated into Bitcoin’s codebase, it is necessary to go through a strict and detailed process that ensures the quality of the proposal and community consensus. Here are the main steps in this process:

1. Writing proposals and code: First, developers need to write a detailed proposal document. This document should clearly describe the motivation for the proposal, technical details, impact assessments, and any potential issues or challenges.

2. Community discussions: Once code proposals are submitted to the Bitcoin community, community members (including developers, miners, investors, and users) discuss and review them. This stage is critical to ensure the viability of the proposal and gathering feedback.

3. Revisions and improvements: Based on feedback from the community, the authors of the code may need to revise and improve the proposal.

4. Vote to reach consensus: Some important improvements (especially those involving changes to the Bitcoin protocol itself) require some degree of consensus among community members. This usually involves support from miners, who need to show that they support the proposal by including specific signals in the blocks they mine.

5. Code implementation: Once consensus has been reached, the code will be reviewed by the Bitcoin Core developer team. This step requires ensuring the quality and security of the code.

6. Merge into the codebase: Once reviewed, the code will be merged into Bitcoin’s official codebase.

7. Deployment and activation: Finally, the new code needs to be deployed by miners and node operators into their systems. For changes at the protocol level, there is usually an activation threshold, and the improvements will only take effect if enough network participants upgrade to the new version.

Judging from past block size wars, there is no single person or entity that can directly confirm and decide whether a BIP has reached consensus or can be merged into the codebase. Instead, it’s a process involving the Bitcoin community, which includes, in addition to developers and reviewers, the collaboration and consensus of several key groups:

Miners in particular, for BIP proposals involving protocol changes, miner support can be said to be decisive. Miners express their support for BIP by including specific signals in the blocks they mine. If miners at a particular threshold don’t choose to support the proposal, this generally won’t be considered a consensus.

Full node operators also played an important role in the consensus building process. They expressed support by upgrading to a software version that supports the new BIP. The increase in the number of nodes indicates the broad acceptance of the proposal by the community. Additionally, although Bitcoin users and community members are not directly involved in code merger decisions, their opinions and discussions are critical to consensus building, and they can post their opinions through community forums, mailing lists, and social media platforms.

Is Bitcoin back in time for the 2017 fork?

Of course, as mentioned before, the most influential of these are miners.

Although miners don’t have permission to manage the Bitcoin Core code, they own the mining rigs, and miners decide which version of the Bitcoin software their miners run. Moreover, the miner community is getting bigger and bigger, and they already have the ability to compete with developers. In 2015, some Bitcoin Core developers proposed to change the block size limit from 1M to 2M, but this proposal was rejected by Chinese miners because China’s bandwidth was insufficient to support 2M blocks. Miners are service providers in this system. They package every Bitcoin transfer so that the Bitcoin system can operate normally. It can be said that they occupy a very important position.

And of course, the day it went down in history, the Bitcoin community’s most famous hard fork. At 8 p.m. on August 1, 2017, the fork led by BCH miners began. They implemented a hard fork starting with a block with a height of 478558. Six hours later, the ViaBTC microbit mining pool mined the first BCH block, and Bitcoin Cash was officially born.

Even if there is a hard fork, then everyone will use their real money to vote for Bitcoin that meets everyone’s expectations. Therefore, although Bitcoin Core developers have the right to manage the code, because of the open source nature of Bitcoin software and the decentralization of Bitcoin, no team or person can fully control Bitcoin.

Related Reading: “Can Bitcoin Core Developers (Bitcoin Core) Destroy Bitcoin?”

Can’t touch the miner’s money bag

To put it bluntly, it’s impossible for miners to make the inscriptions disappear.

As the third-largest mining pool operator, the voice of Kamiyu, the co-founder of Fish Pond, has always been regarded as representing the miner’s position. After Luke Dashjr claimed that the inscription used the Bitcoin Core vulnerability to send spam to the blockchain, Shenyu made several comments in the community: “Bitcoin is not Ethereum; developers don’t mind it.”

According to reports, in the Bitcoin mining pool computing power ranking, Foundry USA, which is ranked first, is a supporter of Luke Dashjr, but AntPool, which is in second place, and ViaBTC, which is fourth, have always opposed Luke Dashjr, so the position of F2Pool, which is in third place, seems very important.

In the previous bull market, there was absolutely nothing to worry about for miners to earn. However, in a bear market, miner earnings seem a bit bleak.

In June 2022, the average daily income of Bitcoin miners was only 27.19 million US dollars. Compared with the average daily income of miners of about 62 million US dollars in November 2021, the current average daily income of Bitcoin miners has dropped 56%. Due to the poor income of miners, the level of computing power on the entire Bitcoin network was also affected. At that time, BTC’s computing power fell by more than 10%, and the number of blocks generated per hour also decreased to 5.85 BTC.

What’s more, with Bitcoin block rewards being halved in 2024, if the BTC price trend is not good, then Bitcoin miners will face potential profit problems.

However, with the advent of BRC-20 and the boom in inscription transactions, miner earnings have increased considerably in handling fees in the context of an uncertain bear market, and mining machines have also sold better. They are direct beneficiaries.

On-chain data shows that the average transaction fee per BTC transaction began to increase significantly in May due to BRC-20, rising from an initial $2 to a high of $31. According to The Block Pro data, Bitcoin miner revenue increased 30.1% to $1.15 billion in November. Additionally, according to Blockworks Research data, a record 8.34 million Ordinals-related transactions occurred in November, generating approximately $38.7 million in revenue for Bitcoin miners.

Bitcoin miner fees in 2023; Source: bitLNFOcharts

Bitcoin OG, former eToro executive and founder of Quantum Economics, Mati Greenspan, said in an interview with the media: “I spoke with a miner yesterday and he said his earnings had doubled, which is great, especially before it was cut in half, so it’s good for miners.” Obviously, as the biggest beneficiaries after the Bitcoin ecosystem exploded, miners clutched their own money bags and definitely won’t let the inscriptions disappear from the Bitcoin ecosystem.

What are the voices of the community in defending the inscriptions?

A quote from Luke Dashjr sparked a flurry of discussion in the community.

The mainstream opinion in the Chinese community is that the explosion of the Bitcoin ecosystem has caused miner earnings to soar, while miners dominate in the BTC ecosystem. “Asian inscriptions are hot, American miners are making a lot of money, European and American developers are not allowed to fight,” and most people are watching the next developments with a theatrical mindset.

@evilcos认为没必要修补这个 Bug, founder of SlowMist Technology, said, “Due to the introduction of Taproot (a good thing), the impact of this magic box that was accidentally opened was not just a bunch of spam, but also the activity of the Bitcoin ecosystem. There is more than just a set of serial numbers/inscriptions in this ecosystem. Of course, if this is fixed, there can be a compatible solution to better open up the Bitcoin ecosystem, so long pain is not as good as short pain.”

Crypto analyst @thecryptoskanda said in Luke Dashjr’s tweet comments, “We don’t see Satoshi Nakamoto’s vision here. All that is seen is an awake developer trying to place their morbid Walkerist values, good or bad, above Satoshi Nakamoto’s original consensus. After that, how can you still call Bitcoin the most decentralized currency?”

Influenced by recent inscriptional frenzy, the Chinese community’s views on Luke Dashjr are more of a disapproval attitude. Crypto KOL @11dizhu stated, “No one can represent Bitcoin. You have your thoughts, and other people have other people’s thoughts, so hard forking is really not a good idea.”

However, in the English-speaking community, many people claim that the Bitcoin network is seriously congested today and that users need to pay very high gas fees, saying bluntly, “I hope developers can find a way to fix the bugs that are being exploited.” Cryptographer @Elder24601 says “inscriptions” are some kind of dust attack that can be fixed by increasing the default threshold (currently 546 sats).

More crypto users have commented that they support Luke Dashjr’s censorship system because they missed the entire BRC-20 outbreak.

As mentioned earlier, this is not the first time that the crypto community has disputed the existence of Ordinals NFT and BRC-20, and opponents at the time believed that if the Ordinals continued to have a huge impact on the Bitcoin network, they could choose to fork Bitcoin to modify or remove the taproot option.

In May of this year, DeFi Watch founder Chris Blec said that if enough participants in the Bitcoin ecosystem (users, node operators, miners) agree that Bitcoin should be forked in a way that reduces spam transactions, then it’s not a censorship system. “You can still dig and use your current fork and mint your stupid jpg there.”

Behind these debates, there are not only differences over technology, but more deeply about the purpose of Bitcoin and the philosophy behind it. Governance of decentralized open source projects remains a challenge.

We all know that Bitcoin does not have a single entity. Bitcoin’s governance structure consists of users who pay transaction fees, miners who build the Bitcoin blockchain, and node operators that verify transaction ledgers. This decentralized structure guarantees the security and decentralization of Bitcoin to some extent, but it also poses a challenge to governance. Needless to say, the miner’s position starts from the incentive level. They choose to agree on the future of Bitcoin based on the incentives they receive.

Despite Luke Dashjr’s clear position, it’s clear that the Bitcoin community has a different voice about the future of inscriptions, and the power of Bitcoin Core developers cannot make the inscription disappear.

Even in the worst case scenario, the Bitcoin community could once again face a fork like 2017. However, compared to that year, community members have now gained valuable experience and insight. This time, everyone will bring a deeper understanding and more mature strategies to meet the challenges that may arise.

“Defend” or “Sacrifice” inscriptions? The Bitcoin story is far from over.

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