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@ Andrey Arapov
2025-05-25 16:12:39
"Working to Rule" meets the timechain.
The issue isn't whether graffiti "destroys" Bitcoin — it's about who gets to decide what the timechain is for.
Like in that old Soviet allegory, workers were told to produce 16 tons of nails — so they made one 16-ton nail. Technically fulfilled the quota, utterly useless in reality. That’s *working to rule*. Today, some miners do the same: exploiting ambiguity in the “contract” (consensus rules) to pad blocks with junk that pays well short-term but degrades the network’s long-term utility.
The Core policy change removing the 80-byte OP_RETURN relay limit doesn't break consensus. But it does signal a shift — one that aligns relay behavior with miner incentives and weakens node-level filtering.
If nodes are the boss, as nostr:nprofile1qqs8fl79rnpsz5x00xmvkvtd8g2u7ve2k2dr3lkfadyy4v24r4k3s4sppemhxue69uhkummn9ekx7mp0qy08wumn8ghj7mn0wd68yttsw43zuam9d3kx7unyv4ezumn9wshscy566r laid out in https://youtu.be/vz46-6K6_U8 then policy matters. What nodes don’t relay, rarely gets mined. Mempool policy is a soft expression of intent — like saying: “We want a monetary network. We expect you not to abuse blockspace for rent-seeking graffiti.”
And if MARA or any other miner “works to rule,” including what users don’t want relayed, then they’ve stopped cooperating — and we should stop routing their blocks.
Bitcoin doesn’t need perfection. But it needs communication between nodes and miners — not silent contracts abused in bad faith.