Talking about the Bitcoin Core transaction relay controversy and why we should support it

Author: 0xTodd, Partner of Nothing Research

The Core team released the latest statement, and the Bitcoin Core development circle was in an uproar. I don't see many discussions in Chinese, so let me analyze the background of the story and my personal strong opinions. First of all, yesterday Bitcoin Core released a statement called "Bitcoin Core Development and Transaction Relay Policy", which was denounced by opponents as notorious as the "New York Agreement".

So what does this statement say? Bitcoin Core is going to launch a built-in transaction relay. I think this transaction relay is paving the way for the previous cancellation of the OP-Return zone restrictions. Why does this thing arouse so much discussion?

Because there is another story background, which I have talked about before - that is, 2 years ago, inscriptions began to be popular, but these inscriptions and runes were stored in the OP-Return area of ​​the Bitcoin block in a form similar to "bugs", thus breaking the Bitcoin block limit in disguise.

As a result, Bitcoin is now divided into right-wingers and extreme right-wingers. Inscriptions aroused the disgust of the extreme right-wingers, 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 at the time. But the ordinary right-wingers, that is, the Bitcoin Core group, believed that since inscriptions can be bugged and put on the chain anyway, it is better to correct their names rather than let them continue to bug.

In recent months, the Core group has proposed a new PR, wanting to change the OP-Return from 80KB to unlimited, which is to directly cancel the restriction on inscriptions, so that they can be put 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, let's talk about what this "transaction relay" is. 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 approach, because the current network environment is quite safe, and there is no need to be so absolute.

So "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 benefits:

1. It is conducive to preventing DoS attacks. Those random 0-fee transactions will not blow up the miner's peer-to-peer server;

2. Speeding up the propagation of transaction blocks and reducing latency helps prevent large miners from gaining unfair advantages.

It's actually a good thing. In the past, transaction relays also had different strategies, some strictly filtered junk transactions, and some were completely free.

PS: I don't think this is transaction censorship, it is more about filtering junk transactions, and users can choose not to use these functions. In fact, both the right (Core group) and the extreme right (Luke and others) have the demand to filter junk transactions, but the core contradiction is that everyone has a completely different definition 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 used the term extreme right here, it does not mean that [extreme right] is a derogatory term. The former is radical junk filtering, and the latter is mild junk filtering.

In the past, these transaction relays were maintained by volunteers for love, especially the [radical junk filtering rules], because these volunteers had a strong belief - that is, they hated inscriptions. However, once the Core team personally adds [mild spam filtering rules] to the Bitcoin client, it may mean that the market share of those [aggressive spam filtering rules] in the past has been greatly reduced.

If you are a little confused when you see this, let me make an analogy - it feels like the official suddenly announced the CP, and the dimensionality was reduced to attack the CP of the fandom, that is, the official forced the fandom to death. Of course, although Core currently has a market share of more than 90%, Core does not consider itself to be the "official".

Because Bitcoin is a network defined by its users, users have the ultimate freedom to choose what software to use and implement any policies they wish. Bitcoin Core contributors have no right to enforce these contents, and in order to avoid suspicion, they even avoid automatic software updates.

Personally, I actually support the Core group's updates. 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 don't care about inscriptions, I don't think they are junk transactions. As long as they are paid normally, they are good transactions.

Inscriptions are also paid according to volume. There is no need to be hard on money. In addition, they bring additional income to miners, which helps keep Bitcoin's security strong after N halvings. And I firmly oppose transaction censorship. Bitcoin's semi-official Core takes the lead in discriminating against transactions that pay normal handling fees, because transaction discrimination will slowly turn into transaction censorship.

One ​​of the most proud attributes of Bitcoin is security and no transaction censorship. The use of mild spam filtering rules is beneficial to both of these features. Opponents criticized that this was a compromise by the Core group to miners (because of the miners' income) and abandoned 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 is not difficult for nodes, and Satoshi Nakamoto himself engraved the news of that year in the Chuanshi block. Bitcoin will never become a storage chain, but without cutting the bottom layer, what's 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 acquiesce to this. So I strongly support the proposal of the Core group.