Bitcoin developer fails to earn support for Ordinal-ending bug fix

Bitcoin developer Luke Dashjr faces various setbacks as his attempt to rally support for a proposed bug fix fell short.

In a recent Bitcoin Core developer meeting, Dashjr proposed a bug fix to address congestion by removing Ordinals and BRC-20 tokens on the Bitcoin network. The high popularity of the two has led to the enlargement of the mempool and delayed transaction confirmations, raising concerns about the scalability and efficiency of the Bitcoin network.

BREAKING: BITCOIN DEVS REJECT CAT-EATER @LUKEDASHJR’S “BUG FIX” TO BAN ORDINALS; SAY HIS ATTEMPT “HAS NO HOPE” pic.twitter.com/Aeb8PivcUV

— Udi Wertheimer (@udiWertheimer) January 6, 2024

However, the lack of consensus and the controversial nature of the proposed change led to Dashjr’s failure to gather sufficient support.

Core developer Ava Chow eventually ended the meeting. She said that the debate had reached a “stalemate” and the proposed change had “no hope of reaching a conclusion that is acceptable to everyone.”

Without any majority consensus, any code changes are not likely due to the decentralized nature of the blockchain.

Long-time Ordinals and Inscriptions anti

Dashjr’s recent bug fix proposal sought to address “spam filtration” in the Taproot transactions by blocking Ordinals and BRC-20 tokens. These tokens, according to Dashjr, are exploitative vulnerabilities in Bitcoin Core.

As a prominent Bitcoin figure, Dashjr has long been known for his controversial stance on Ordinals, a system for ordering satoshis in a non-fungible way.

“Ordinals never existed to begin with,” he said. “It’s all fraud.”

Dashjr has also previously criticized the Ordinals project as spam and an attack on Bitcoin, which, if allowed, “would break at least Lightning and CoinJoin.”

Last year, Dashjr shared on Twitter how he believes Inscriptions exploit a vulnerability in Bitcoin’s core.

“Since 2013, Bitcoin Core has allowed users to set a limit on the size of additional data in transactions they relay or mine (-datacarriersize),” he wrote. “By obfuscating their data as program code, Inscriptions bypass this limit.”

He mentioned that this bug was recently addressed in Bitcoin Knots v25.1, though the resolution took longer than usual due to disruptions in his workflow at the end of last year, resulting in the entire skip of v24.

The attempt to implement the fix in Bitcoin Knots v25.1, a derivative Dashjr maintains, saw no adoption in the forthcoming v26 release of Bitcoin Core. There are hopes that it will be included in v27 next year.

Community is torn

Despite concerns for network integrity, Dashjr’s proposal has ignited a broader discourse on Bitcoin’s decentralized governance. There is still an ongoing debate over the impact of Ordinals on the ecosystem, sparking an ongoing debate.

Advocates, including MicroStrategy co-founder Michael Saylor, argue that Inscriptions and Ordinals bring innovation that renews interest in Bitcoin. They contend that the rising fees indicate a clear market demand for Ordinals and Inscriptions.

Proponents see Ordinals as an ideal means to beta-test the Bitcoin blockchain for mass adoption, creating a new revenue stream for miners beyond the last Bitcoin mining.

Contrarily, critics view Ordinals as an attack on Bitcoin, potentially undermining its credibility as “digital gold.” They point to the tokens causing spam and congestion on the blockchain, urging a disconnect from Bitcoin.

Developer Jimmy Song goes further by labeling Ordinals as the new altcoin “pump and dump scam.” He asserts scammers exploit Bitcoin’s reputation to attract investors to new scam coins, like Ordinals, as investors become more discerning about the distinctions between Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.