Bitcoin Ordinals and the mystery of the ‘cursed Inscriptions’

• The new upgrade would make ‘cursed Inscriptions’ blessed and tradable.
• The increase in the Inscriptions count has been mild.

 Bitcoin [BTC] Ordinals developers implemented the “first steps” in addressing the challenges associated with ‘cursed Inscriptions’ on the network. The name cursed Inscriptions refers to the unrecognized assets incorrectly created due to the misuse of opcodes to inscribe assets on satoshis.

A fix could be underway

According to the version 0.6.0 upgrade, the rollout would ensure the authentication of a Bitcoin username and password. In addition, the upgrade would allow zero-sat transactions to be unbonded from Inscriptions. 

In April, Ordinals creator Casey Rodarmor proposed to make the cursed assets tradable. But Rodarmor has since stepped down. And the released upgrade added that Raphjaph, one of the developers, has been promoted to lead maintainer.

Leonidas.og, who is the builder of the ord.io project on Bitcoin Ordinals, as well as a BRC-20 token, also shared some insights on the development.

Version 0.6.0 of the Ordinals Protocol just went live!

Here is everything you need to know about this major update:

Many previously unrecognized inscriptions are now indexed by the Ordinals Protocol as “Cursed Inscriptions”. This is important because over 70k existing but… pic.twitter.com/Mh1pArg2p9

— Leonidas.og (@LeonidasNFT) June 4, 2023

According to the creator, the transformation of the over 70,000 cursed Inscriptions into blessed ones would tow towards positive Inscription numbers. He pointed out:

“If a new edge case is found and a new type of Cursed Inscription is added, the existing Cursed Inscriptions will be reindexed and the new Cursed Inscriptions will be inserted which will shift around the negative inscription numbers. Everyone holding Cursed Inscriptions should expect the negative inscription numbers to be shifted.”

Over the last few months, the emergence of Bitcoin Ordinals took the crypto community by storm. Recently, the number of Inscriptions crossed the 10 million market. This confirmed rising interest in the digital artifacts created on the Bitcoin network.

Loosening momentum

However, information from Dune Analytics showed that the growth of Inscriptions has been relatively stunted since the 10 million mark. 

Although the total number of Inscriptions rose to 10.91 million, the crypto-query data platforms showed that the Inscriptions only increased by 133,000 on 4 June. An explanation of this data points to restraint in increasing minting assets on the network. 

Source: Dune Analytics

Launched in January, the creation of Bitcoin Ordinals led to controversy in the crypto space. For some, it was unnecessary to add functions that didn’t align with the blockchain’s fundamentals. 

How much are 1,10,100 BTCs worth today?

Others, however, thought that it was not a bad idea to experiment on the network. Meanwhile, the outcome of the test, including BRC20, has ended in a positive, and vice versa. 

At some point, the rapid increase in Ordinals transactions caused delays in transactions on the network. On the other hand, miners could register an increase in fees and revenues.