Perhaps Adam won't go into the rationale...but I think it is important we
clarify this.
For better or worse, the only "voting" system available to Bitcoin that cannot
be trivially attacked is hashing power. Soft forks are essentially
miner-enforced rule changes...rules they could have decided to enforce without
the consensus of anyone else. For instance, as far as old nodes are concerned,
a p2sh output can be redeemed by a simple preimage of the hash...with no
signatures. The point, however, is that as long as the majority of hashpower
enforces the new rule, such attempts to redeem the output will never end up on
the blockchain. Therefore, transactions that attempt to redeem the output with
a simple preimage are as good as invalid...and effectively have become invalid.
I concede that this mechanism has some issues. Moreover, I agree that it is
important that the Bitcoin community be aware of these things. I've been
proposing making these rule changes explicit in the BIPs
(https://github.com/CodeShark/bips/blob/BIP_Classification/bip-layers.mediawiki).
I believe it is important that people weigh in on such rule changes. However,
the above stated mechanism does not fall under the definition of "hard fork"
we've come to accept.
Go ahead and object to soft forks...but at least try not to make arguments
based on changing the definitions of terms we all generally agree upon.
- Eric
On September 28, 2015 4:40:35 AM PDT, Mike Hearn via bitcoin-dev
<bitcoin-dev@lists.linuxfoundation.org> wrote:
>>
>> The rationale for soft vs hard-forks is well known, so I wont go over
>them.
>>
>
>The rationale of "backwards compatibility" is well known, yet wrong.
>I've
>gone over the arguments here and explained why the concept makes no
>sense:
>
>https://medium.com/@octskyward/on-consensus-and-forks-c6a050c792e7
>
>Eric - no, it's not sophisticated humour. I've been objecting to soft
>forks
>since this idea first appeared.
>
>There is no consensus. Now pick. Lose the requirement that everyone
>agree
>for consensus changes, and tell people you've done it. Change the spec.
>Or
>do nothing.
>
>
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>
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