Hello Medium! Long time no write! The TBH is here with another book review. The reviews as of late have been slow to come by but hopefully I can pick it back up and publish more. I took some time away from the regular Bitcoin readings to read The Real Anthony Fauci by Robert Kennedy Jr. If you have the time I highly suggest you read that book for an alternative perspective about COVID-19. But enough of all that let’s get into this review.
HOW DID I FIND OUT ABOUT THIS BOOK?
I heard about the Blocksize war on the TFTC podcast a long time ago. I believe Marty had Jonathan Bier, the book’s author, on the podcast right around the time the book was released. It was always on my radar to read since I am the class of 2017 and I wanted to learn more about the Bitcoin Blockchain scaling war. Big blocks vs. small blocks and how the whole thing unfolded.
Book Details
Written by: Jonathan Bier
Pages: 223 with 21 chapters
Price: $21.99 paperback on amazon.com
The pages are small with medium size font. The direct quotes are often italicized and shifted to the middle of page. A motivated reader can complete this book in one sitting in a few hours. It is written very and easy to follow.
Summary
In the foreword the author gives a soft disclaimer about inaccuracies in the bool due to a lapse in his memory. This book is the account of the blocksize war between the small blockers versus the big blockers all from his memory. To keep readers on track the author explains the smaller blockers were developers who wanted to keep the bitcoin blocksize at 1 megabyte (MB) per block to maximize the decentralized nature of the protocol with considerations for internet bandwidth and hardware to store the history of the blockchain. While the big blockers wanted to increase the blocksize to at least 8MB and have it double every two years till 2036 where the blocksize would reach a mind-boggling 8,000 MB at the protocol level to advantage businesses and Bitcoin exchanges to keep transactions fees low to accommodate the growth of the network as more people are using it.
The author writes in a chronological order and the chapter labels are synonymous with major events in the blocksize war. The war kicked off on August 15, 2015. From this time on the author explains the forks that come about from the big blockers that tried to raise the blocksize and the pushback from the small blockers in each way. It is clear the small blockers have more technical acumen about the Bitcoin Protocol than the big blockers. The author goes into detail about the major meeting to scale bitcoin including
- Scaling I in Montreal
- 2. Scaling II in. Hong Kong
- 3. Scaling II in. Milan
- 4. The New York Agreement
As a reader you learn how much the bitcoin miners and the bitcoin businesses really tried to bully their way to change the protocol. But even with power, money, and influence the author does a really good job showcasing the resiliency of the small blockers and how one potential threat, a very technical solution (SegWit) caused shifted the whole power dynamics back to the small blockers.
In the end the small blockers won but the blockspace did increase. With the activation of SegWit the block space went up to 2MB with a max cap of 4MB.
The author does a decent job trying to be imparcial to either side of the war but as a reader it did feel he leaned more with the smaller blockers.
TBH: Main Takeaway
Since I am the class of 2017 I never knew why the Bitcoin maxis did not like Gavin Andersen so much. Someone who actually worked with Satoshi before he left the project one would think he would be highly respected in the space. But his downfall came when. Mike Hearn got into his mind and they released a new Bitcoin client called Bitcoin XT. Basically trying to developer capture the protocol. Then he further dug his grave when he gave Craig Wright credibility when he declared him self to be Satoshi Nakamoto.
A lot of the debate also was around the technical aspects of what a protocol upgrade can do. The author discussed how Etherum had a chain split when they upgraded their protocol and the small blockers were really concerned that if the big blockers had their way and caused a hard fork, legacy coins would not be able to transact on the new chain. Often in the space this is referred to the man in the coma who wants to spend his coins.
Having been in the space now for about 6 years I have heard the name Pieter Wuille quite often. I was shocked to read he was the one who developed Segregated Witness (SegWit) as a scaling solution. The big blockers and the miners specifically hated this idea. The big blockers felt this was way too complex and rejected the idea.
Luke Dashjr who I have seen in the space (like wearing a gas mask at the Bitcoin Conference to protect. himself from COVID-19) figured out a way to implement SegWit as a softfork and not a hard fork. One thing that surprised me about Dashjr is that he is a father of 7 kids.
I learned that Gregory Maxwell really burned the big blockers up. Hearing his name a few times in the space I see why he is well respected. He called out the ASICBOOST that Bitmain had covertly put into their mining hardware.
SegWit created the way for the lightning network and it solved an issue. to where. users can create transactions that couldn’t be altered by malicious third parties. Something I had zero clue about.
The CEO of Bitmain really tried to flex his muscles and have his way with the project. The User Activated Soft Fork really changed the dynamics of power and caused Jihan Wu to blink and not throw his hash to the big block chains.
RANKING AND RECOMMENDATION
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️(4/5)
The Blocksize War is a very nice read to learn about the history of. the efforts to scale the Bitcoin Protocol. You learn how people who were titans in the space like Roger Ver, and Galvin Andersen fell from hallowed graces of Bitcoin Influencers. It is a strong display of how man’s ego can really cloud judgement which leads to them trying to impose their will on to other to secure the future they want to see. The book does lean with the small blockers but does give the readers ideas on where the big blockers went wrong on their implementation of trying to scale the. Bitcoin Protocol. I strongly recommend any curious Bitcoiner to read this. It doesn’t take much time and the writing style of the author is very smooth and engaging. It is not a super page tuner but I do think readers will enjoy the perspective he takes in this battle as a bystander.
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Until the next book review Hobbyist out!
