A proposal to ‘clean up’ non-financial data from the Bitcoin blockchain is racing toward an early August deadline - and the support it has garnered from miners so far sits at less than 1 percent. Such a minuscule figure is not merely a lack of interest: it represents a clear signal of rejection, even amid heated debate surrounding the issue on social media.
The Battle Over ‘What Bitcoin Block Space Is For’
The proposal is officially named BIP 110, or the Reduced Data Temporary Soft Fork. At its core lies an age-old question: what is Bitcoin block space actually for? Bitcoin transactions can transfer value, but they can also carry additional data - through the OP_RETURN field or raw data insertions inside scripts and witness data. It is through these pathways that Ordinals, inscriptions, and various token schemes embed images, text, and metadata directly onto the Bitcoin chain.
BIP 110 aims to restrict all of these avenues for roughly one year. OP_RETURN would be locked back to its legacy limit (83 bytes), most random data chunks exceeding 256 bytes would be blocked, and several Taproot features commonly used for data storage would be restricted. Proponents argue these rules keep Bitcoin focused as a medium of exchange and ease the burden on node operators. Opponents counter: if users pay the required transaction fees, why should the network dictate which transactions are ‘worthy’?
Two Heavyweights Weigh In
On Saturday, two of the Bitcoin ecosystem’s most influential figures joined forces in opposition. Michael Saylor, founder of Strategy, wrote that ‘there are 110 things more dangerous to Bitcoin than spam.’ In his view, BIP 110 ‘turns a fight over spam into a consensus rule change’ that would invalidate currently valid, fee-paying transactions. That precedent, Saylor noted, is the real danger.
Adam Back, co-founder of Blockstream and the inventor of hashcash cited in the Bitcoin whitepaper, echoed similar sentiments in a longer post - addressing newcomers backing the proposal. ‘Bitcoin respectfully says no to what you want,’ he stated. If they are dissatisfied, Back added, the path forward is to organize and fork away - ‘but Bitcoin will not be joining.’
On the other side of the debate, developer Luke Dashjr continues to defend BIP 110, rejecting calls to withdraw it. ‘It is too late to cancel BIP 110,’ he said. His argument: Ordinals, Runes, and similar protocols accumulate non-financial data, driving up the long-term cost of storing and serving the blockchain.
Why the Outcome May Just Be an Isolated Minor Chain
BIP 110 does not follow the traditional miner-approval path. It uses a user-activated soft fork mechanism - where nodes enforce the rules whether miners agree or not - with a signaling threshold of 55 percent, significantly lower than the customary 95 percent. The problem is that miner signaling has never surpassed around 1 percent and is currently at zero, with not a single major mining pool backing it. Node adoption also lingers in the low single digits, almost entirely through Bitcoin Knots.
The deadline approaches regardless. The signaling period runs until around block 961,542, with activation projected around September. Yet a rule enforced by only a tiny percentage of nodes and virtually no miners will not alter Bitcoin for everyone - instead, it risks splitting off into a minority chain. Here lies the familiar lesson: Bitcoin does not change because a few prominent figures shout, but because thousands of independent operators collectively choose to run those changes. Concerns over spam may be legitimate, but based on current evidence, the network is unlikely to adopt this one. Reported by CoinDesk.
Disclaimer: This article is for informational and educational purposes only, not financial advice. Cryptocurrency assets are highly volatile and carry significant risk. Always do your own research (DYOR) and never invest more than you can afford to lose.
