I want to put a big thank-you out to Pindar, Warren, and others in the organizing committee who I know must have put in a lot of hours to make this happen. I will be attending, and I hope to see many of you there too. It is my sincere hope that the academic structure of a workshop will help break down some of the communication walls that have arisen in this debate, and help us all work towards finding a compromise towards scaling bitcoin, something we all want to see happen.
On Tue, Aug 11, 2015 at 1:45 AM, Pindar Wong via bitcoin-dev < bitcoin-dev@lists.linuxfoundation.org> wrote: > Bitcoin Scalability Workshops > > In recent months the Bitcoin development community has faced difficult > discussions of how to safely improve the scalability and decentralized > nature of the Bitcoin network. To aid the technical consensus building > process we are organizing a pair of workshops to collect technical > criteria, present proposals and evaluate technical materials and data with > academic discipline and analysis that fully considers the complex tradeoffs > between decentralization, utility, security and operational realities. This > may be considered as similar in intent and process to the NIST-SHA3 design > process where performance and security were in a tradeoff for a security > critical application. > > Since Bitcoin is a P2P currency with many stakeholders, it is important to > collect requirements as broadly as possible, and through the process > enhance everyone’s understanding of the technical properties of Bitcoin to > help foster an inclusive, transparent, and informed process. > > Those with technical interest are invited to participate in this pair of > workshops with the following intent: > > Phase 1: Scene setting, evaluation criteria, and tradeoff analysis. > > Montreal, Canada: September 12th-13th, 2015 > > Scalability is not a single parameter; there are many opportunities to > make the Bitcoin protocol more efficient and better able to service the > needs of its growing userbase. Each approach to further scaling the Bitcoin > blockchain involves implicit trade offs of desired properties of the whole > system. As a community we need to raise awareness of the complex and subtle > issues involved, facilitate deeper research and testing of existing > proposals, and motivate future work in this area. > > The purpose of this workshop is to discuss the general tradeoffs and > requirements of any proposal to scale Bitcoin beyond its present limits. > Session topics are to include the presentation of experimental data > relating to known bottlenecks of Bitcoin’s continued growth and analysis of > implicit tradeoffs involved in general strategies for enabling future > growth. > > This event will not host sessions on the topic of any specific proposals > involving changes to the Bitcoin protocol. Such proposals would be the > topic of a 2nd, follow-on Phase 2 workshop described below; this event is > intended to “set the stage” for work on and evaluation of specific > proposals in the time between the workshops. > > Phase 2 will be planned out further as part of Phase 1 with input from the > participants. > > Phase 2: Presentation and review of technical proposals, with simulation, > benchmark results. > > Hong Kong, SAR, China: TBD Nov/Dec 2015 > > Hopefully to be easier for the Chinese miners to attend, the second > workshop pertaining to actual block size proposals is to be planned for > Hong Kong roughly in the late November to December timeframe. > > The purpose of this workshop is to present and review actual proposals for > scaling Bitcoin against the requirements gathered in Phase 1. Multiple > competing proposals will be presented, with experimental data, and compared > against each other. The goal is to raise awareness of scalability issues > and build a pathway toward consensus for increasing Bitcoin’s transaction > processing capacity or, barring that, identify key areas of further > required research and next steps for moving forward. > > Preliminarily, Phase 2 will be a time to share results from experiments > performed as a result of Phase 1 and an opportunity to discuss new > developments. > > How do the Workshops work? > > - > > Both events will be live-streamed with remote participation > facilitated via IRC for parallel online discussion and passing questions to > the event. > - > > These workshops aim to facilitate the existing Bitcoin Improvement > Proposals (BIP)[1] process. Most work will be done outside of the workshops > in the intervening months. The workshops serve to be additive to the design > and review process by raising awareness of diverse points of view, studies, > simulations, and proposals. > - > > Travel, venue details, and accommodation recommendation are available > at scalingbitcoin.org. Registration begins August 12th at an > early-bird ticket price of $150 USD until September 3rd. The ticket prices > do not come close to covering the venue expense and travel subsidies, hence > the need for corporate sponsors. > - > > Please see the FAQ at scalingbitcoin.org which should answer most > other questions. > > > Travel Subsidies for Independent/Academic Researchers > > There will be an application process for independent or academic > researchers to apply for travel assistance to help cover the expense of > airfare and hotel fees up to $1,000 per qualified presenter who intends to > give a presentation. The four underwriters of this event have agreed to > jointly review applications and cover the travel subsidies for qualified > presenters. See scalingbitcoin.org for details. > > Sponsors of the Montreal Workshop > > The first workshop is hosted and with logistics handled by the Montreal > consultancy CryptoMechanics <http://cryptomechanics.com>. > > The Underwriters jointly responsible for venue expenses and researcher > travel subsidies are currently the MIT Digital Currency Initiative, > Chaincode Labs, Blockstream, and Chain.com. > > Current sponsors include: Cryptsy, BitcoinTalk, Final Hash, Blockstream, > MIT DCI, Chaincode Labs, IDEO Futures, Kraken, and Chain.com. > > Additional sponsors are needed. Please see scalingbitcoin.org for > sponsorship details or contact me directly via < pindar dot wong at > gmail.com > > > Online Workshop Resources > > - > > Bitcoin-Workshops-Announce list > > > https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/bitcoin-workshops-announce > - > > Bitcoin-Workshops discussion list > https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/bitcoin-workshops > - > > #bitcoin-workshops chat on the Freenode IRC network > http://webchat.freenode.net/?channels=bitcoin-workshops > > > Call for Proposals/Papers/Presentations > > If you have any research relevant to issues surrounding Bitcoin > scalability, your proposal for a presentation at the Montreal workshop > would be most welcome. Please see scalingbitcoin.org for submission > details. > > Pindar Wong > > Chair, Montreal Workshop Planning Committee > > Chairman, VeriFi (Hong Kong) Ltd. > > [1] https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Bitcoin_Improvement_Proposals > > _______________________________________________ > bitcoin-dev mailing list > bitcoin-dev@lists.linuxfoundation.org > https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/bitcoin-dev > >
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