S16 E30: Peter Rizun on Scaling Bitcoin with Hardware

Peter Rizun is the chief scientist at Bitcoin Unlimited: a software client that aims to scale Bitcoin with big blocks, while also empowering regular users to run nodes. In this episode, we talk about what went wrong during the block size wars & his research in scaling hardware. Time stamps: 00:01:15 — Introducing Peter Rizun 00:03:32 — Early Block Size Debates and Satoshi’s Vision 00:07:45 — Block Size Limit History and Miner Soft Limits 00:10:10 — Dan Kaminsky’s 2011 Scaling Predictions 00:12:01 — Scaling Philosophy: Zero, One, Infinity and Earth-Scale 00:15:09 — Block Size Wars, Chain Splits, and Altcoin Proliferation 00:16:43 — Stablecoins, Lightning, and Bitcoin’s Use Case 00:19:03 — Zcash, Ethereum, and Bitcoin’s Missed Opportunities 00:22:11 — Bitcoin’s Script Limitations and Smart Contract Innovation 00:25:10 — Scaling Limits: Hardware, Storage, and Bandwidth 00:35:31 — Node Software, Formal Specs, and Core’s Dominance 00:44:00 — Censorship, Reddit, and the Block Size Debate 00:48:04 — SPV Nodes, Custodial Wallets, and Decentralization 00:51:30 — Block Size, Internet Speed, and Global Node Access 00:57:26 — UTXO Model, Dust, and State Management 01:01:37 — Ethereum, Zcash, and Node Benchmarking 01:03:26 — Hardware Acceleration and Specialized Chips 01:07:00 — Sponsorship Break and Bitcoin Adoption via Debit Cards 01:14:59 — History of Block Size Proposals and Client Forks 01:21:07 — Consensus, Forks, and the Role of Exchanges 01:25:40 — SegWit, SegWit2x, and Political Compromises 01:33:04 — Bitcoin Cash, Market Dynamics, and Altcoin Competition 01:39:34 — Stablecoin Fees, Global Demand, and El Salvador 01:46:52 — Decline of Bitcoin Payments and Missed Opportunities 02:10:56 — Lightning Network: Promise vs. Reality 02:22:12 — Shitcoin vs. Bitcoin Maximalism and Open Source Innovation 03:05:52 — Spam, Miner Policy, and Transaction Filtering 03:17:05 — Hardware Scaling: M.2 Accelerator and Node Commoditization 03:29:11 — Nexa: Experimenting with Proof-of-Work and Node Bottlenecks 03:37:44 — Craig Wright, Satoshi Identity, and Big Block Movement Damage 04:02:03 — Fork Proliferation, Community Division, and Stablecoins 04:04:31 — Bitcoin’s Future, Experimentation, and Open Research