Luke de Wolf

What exactly is censorship on Bitcoin? Here's my answer: certain addresses being blocked on consensus level. Changes to policy to limit specific forms of transaction is not censorship, it's discrimination. I'll explain what I mean by that. Bitcoin has always discriminated in terms of what can go into a transaction. It has never been possible to put whatever you want into a transaction, just like it's never been possible to double spend a UTXO. I'm glossing over a ton of minutiae here, for simplicity. The previously agreed amount of data that is allowed in a transaction has been set to a reasonable level, through OP_RETURN. There have been disagreements as to that level, but even the most permissive amount was 80 bytes of data in practice. This has been more than enough, and it has been enforced by policy, not consensus. Since SegWit and Taproot, more ways to put arbitrary data (spam) on chain have been discovered. That is to say, the ability to do these things was right there, as unintended consequences of development changes. Uncaught bugs, or a lack of forethought about human behavior. Filters on the policy level have been ineffective in containing spam. However, they have provided individuals who are against spam with tools to control their own nodes and mined blocks. Individual policy choices are a form of discrimination, not censorship. Discriminating against certain types of consensus-valid transactions is perfectly fine. I even go so far as to say that discriminating against transactions from certain address is also completely fine. These are all individual choices. Every individual on the network is free to make those choices. Anything short of that is coercion. Consensus rules, on the other hand, are where censorship is possible. This is where it would be possible to block certain addresses from moving their UTXOs. As I understand it, this is usually termed confiscation. In practice, this would likely be the result of making some technical type of coin unspendable. In theory, some list of addresses could be drawn up that says they can never move their coins. Good luck getting that adopted. Consensus changes that do not prevent certain addresses from moving their UTXOs are not censorship. Making it so that transactions containing arbitrary data invalid is not censorship. Making those transactions more expensive is not censorship. Private key holders will still be perfectly able to move their UTXOs. They can even add some arbitrary data through OP_RETURN, or jump hoops (and pay fees) to encode their data some other way. This is discrimination against certain types of transactions. Those which have no intention of using Bitcoin as money, or which misuse the network for their own purposes (I use the word misuse here to mean that they are using exploits which were not intentional developments). If the majority of the network decides to eliminate the possibility of those transactions in the future, that is not censorship. And, as previously mentioned, that has not been effective on a policy level. The consensus level is all that is left. I'm not going to discuss the currently proposed soft fork in extensive detail, except to say that I think the proposal is technically extremely reasonable in my understanding. Compromises have been made to allow for other specific potentially useful data types by consensus. The language about legal consequences is completely unnecessary, and I hope it is removed. I hope this proposal or a similar one passes. Bitcoin is money, not data storage. To hammer these points further: I might morally object to some miner rejecting transactions from specific addresses, but I can't do anything to force them to include those transactions in blocks they mine. I can put public pressure on them to change their view, but I can't force them to do so. This would still not be censorship. All individuals on the network are free to do what they want, including rejecting transactions they disagree with. Here's the beautiful thing: we're not all the same! One miner might reject some transactions. Another one almost certainly will include those transactions. This is primarily why filters don't "work" - someone will always mine valid transactions. I still support filters on the node level. Nobody can force me to include transactions I don't want in my mempool. In other words: as long as the consensus is not making it impossible for certain addresses to move their coins, it's not censorship. Discriminating against certain types of transactions or certain arrangements of arbitrary data is not censorship. Everyone on the network is still free to move their UTXOs. Bitcoin is useful as money. The best money. That's the important thing. What do you think?

GM Nostr! I'm back after a bit of a self-enforced social media hiatus. It was Nostr, Twitter, everything. I was more than a little burnt out after BTC HEL. I didn't really get a proper break after the conference, since I went straight back to my fiat job the next day. All I had energy for was keeping the lights on at nostr:nprofile1qys8wue69uhkummnw3ezu6r0d4jkuet5wahhy6mc9ehx2ap6xsurgwqpzamhxw309aex2mrp0yh8xmn0wf6zuum0vd5kzmqqyzletcdyt027ch9q6ss0fa2u6qtyt3uynatlm5fm33d0a38tmnyyswdk3zk . I was also more than a little shaken up by Charlie Kirk's death. I won't say much more about that here, but the TLDR is I did a lot of thinking about the risks of being public and saying controversial things. I was strongly considering taking a big step back from the space. Nope! I'm back, and ready to get started on new things! I got out to a couple of fantastic conferences, first BTC Balkans in Sofia, Bulgaria, then the Plan B Forum in Lugano. My Bitcoin batteries are fully recharged, even if I was pretty exhausted after a week of conferencing. Reconnecting with old friends and making new connections is what this is all about. I especially enjoyed the Rockamoto in Lugano - I can't believe I get to do all this cool stuff! Thanks nostr:nprofile1qy28wumn8ghj7et0wd6xzemjv9kjucm0d5hsz8thwden5te0dehhxarj95crztnev94kj6r0dehx2tnrdakj7qpqjt97tpsul3fp8hvf7zn0vzzysmu9umcrel4hpgflg4vnsytyxwuqxt3hw8 , nostr:nprofile1qyxhwumn8ghj7mn0wvhxcmmvqy28wumn8ghj7un9d3shjtnyv9kh2uewd9hsqgz9ywl935u4kxced2dceq4s8zmgjh9s9d5r6rp98224q6xm58av6qehgud9 , and nostr:nprofile1qyx8wumn8ghj7cnjvghxjmcpz4mhxue69uhk2er9dchxummnw3ezumrpdejqqgxfkx0le4p7df0j8v7jwyrvux0y45kl3xapqvwagctlrdv3uyyfv5lgpykq for just being awesome! Looking forward to next time! As for me, it's full speed ahead with the Bitcoin Infinity Show and the Bitcoin Infinity Academy! You may have noticed that I took a step back from the Bitcoin Infinity Show - it's just Knut now, at least in front of the camera. I'm still behind the scenes doing all the editing, but I couldn't keep my schedule flexible enough to join the recordings. I miss it, and I plan to change that. And of course, I'm involved in the planning for next year's nostr:nprofile1qyv8wumn8ghj7mrfva58gmnfdenhyetvv9ujucm0d5qs6amnwvaz7tmwdaejumr0dsqzqu4j3jh2tp5lsfj98eh3kps9v7ddhwy4tmyqsyjgj8cs6nltk9a88cnzfe - stay tuned for all the details about next year's conference, and don't hesitate to reach out if you want to speak! Thanks everyone for making this community amazing. I'm full of gratitude, and I can't wait for what's in store ahead.

Just before I went to sleep last night, I saw that Charlie Kirk had been shot, and that it didn't look good. I hoped for the best, but didn't have a good feeling. I woke up to the terrible news that he had died. This is hitting me harder than I expected. I hadn't followed his work closely. From what I saw, he had reasonable conversations with US college students, he supported his views calmly, and tried to change minds through persuasion and reasoning. It was admirable, even though I doubt I agreed with him on every issue (probably most, though). And someone killed him for that. Whats hitting me hardest is that he was not only younger than me by a few months, but that he had young kids close to the age of my son. Supposedly his wife and kids were in the audience. This is just awful. Then there are people all over social media absolutely celebrating. It's sickening. Cheering for someone's death because you disagree with them. A young father. This feels like an inflection point. I hope the world starts to see the difference between people who admired him and people who are cheering about his death. There is a good side and a bad side here. RIP Charlie Kirk.

GM Nostr! Back in the gym after a few months off. First day deadlifting again. Feels great!

I can't believe how anyone can suggest without a hint of irony or sarcasm that you have to contribute to a specific open source project in order to have an opinion about Bitcoin. This is simultaneously elitist and mind-bogglingly stupid. It's correct that Bitcoin Core is an important part of the Bitcoin technology stack, but it isn't the only client available, which is a good thing. Being able to understand the code of Bitcoin Core gives you the ability to do exactly one thing: understand the code of Bitcoin Core. It says absolutely nothing about your ability to understand the implications of changes to the system, of what users want, or the purpose of Bitcoin itself, for that matter. Bitcoin Core developers are developing a product, and their customers are the users of the Bitcoin network. The Core developers don't get to dictate what the users are supposed to think. It's entirely the other way around. If the users don't like something Core plans to do, Core shouldn't make the change. Core ignored its users, so now they're getting fired, by users switching to an alternate client.