First Bitcoiner to Go to Space Slams BIP-444: ‘A Bad Idea’

F2Pool co-founder Chun Wang has slammed a new Bitcoin Improvement Proposal (BIP-444), arguing that it is a “bad idea” in a recent social media post. 

Wang, who attracted significant media attention earlier this year after becoming the first Bitcoiner to travel to space, says that he feels “sad” that some developers are currently moving “further and further in the wrong direction.” 

BIP-444, explained 

The proposal, which aims to implement a temporary soft fork, has been put forward by extremely controversial developer Luke Dashjr. 

BIP-444 would prevent the inclusion of arbitrary data in Bitcoin transactions for one year. 

The main motivation behind the implementation is to eliminate potential legal risks associated with illegal content. 

Dashjr, who is known for having extremely conservative views on Bitcoin, has been an extremely vocal opponent of OP_RETURN, which makes it possible to embed arbitrary data in Bitcoin. 

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Apart from worrying about node operators being potentially liable for storing illegal content, Dashjr is also concerned about blockchain bloat that could potentially exacerbate Bitcoin’s scalability issues. Earlier, he also criticized Ordinals since they do not serve any monetary purpose. 

Major criticism 

Dashir’s proposal has received very little support from the Bitcoin community, with many critics accusing Dashir of attempting to censor the blockchain. 

Alex Thorn, head of firmware research at Galaxy, has described the proposal as “incredibly stupid,” but he also framed it as an “attack” on Bitcoin. 

Bitcoin analyst James Check argues that the proposed soft fork is “highly defective” and “antithetical” to Bitcoin.

 “I don’t think anyone serious can read that BIP and come out believing that is a good result for Bitcoin,” he said.