Miners are up in the air against it. What is Vitalik Buterin's reason for supporting EIP-1559?
Source: Explore the blockchain
Why Vitalik is sticking with EIP-1559 in the face of miners' opposition
Tan Guopeng is the founder of Ownbit
A number of articles have been written about EIP-1559 recently, but they are generally obscure. Let me explain my understanding of EIP-1559 in plain language.
EIP-1559 is a proposal to improve Ethereum's handling fee mechanism. It was proposed by Vitalik et al., in April 2019, and has been discussed and optimized for nearly 2 years. Although it is only an Ethereum optimization proposal, the corresponding mechanism has already been implemented. Filecoin Adopted. Therefore, it has certain persuasiveness both in theory and in practice.
However, the objections and doubts to EIP-1559 are as clear and strong as those in favor of it. It is therefore controversial, and there are some risks to its implementation (forking, boycotts, etc.).
The simplest principle of EIP-1559
The current Ethereum commission mechanism is: Fee = GasUsed gasPrice *. Because the GasUsed used for a particular transaction is generally unchanged, the core element of the overall commission is GasPrice. Adjust & have spent gasPrice The size of the transaction determines how much you can charge and how quickly your transaction can be confirmed.
EIP-1559 splits the GasPrice parameter into two parameters: BaseFee + Tip. BaseFee is determined by the system and does not need to be specified by the user. Tip (also called GasPremium) is the extra Tip, which determines the priority of sorting in the same BaseFee case.
BaseFee
BaseFee is calculated by the system, and you can skip the logic completely without affecting your understanding of EIP-1559. Here is a brief explanation of its calculation logic:
The average point of the total GasUsed set for each block is: 12.5 million, with a ceiling of: 25 million;
BaseFee is increased when the total gas used by the actual block exceeds the average, and decreased when it falls below the average.
So BaseFee fluctuates up and down depending on the amount of network traffic. To get some sense, take a look at Filecoin's Basefee chart:
Fiecoin BaseFee
In the EIP-1559 design, the BaseFee portion of the handling fee is destroyed directly (only the TIP portion is awarded to the miners) to combat the inflation of the Ethereum system. It is also a key point that miners are likely to resist, with some arguing that it would significantly reduce their earnings. The design of this point is independent and we will not discuss it.
What's the EIP-1559 for?
What's the use of the EIP-1559? That's what we're going to talk about today. First of all, let me make my point: it doesn't do much, but it does some small things. Let me explain them separately:
EIP-1559 doesn't have a "big" role
Not much means it doesn't reduce network congestion, that is, it's not designed to increase capacity. So after the implementation of EIP-1559, Ethereum is still congested. (You may think I'm wrong, but the EIP-1559 may have some capacity expansion because it has a hard top of 25 million, which is twice the current size, so it may have twice the capacity expansion. This is true, I didn't say that, because this expansion effect doesn't need to be achieved by EIP-1559, it can be achieved simply by raising the upper limit of the total gas volume of the block, so I won't discuss it).
In addition, it doesn't do much, which also means it doesn't significantly reduce user miners' fees. The nature of user miners' fees is determined by supply and demand. In the case of Ethereum's inability to effectively expand capacity and excessive demand, any measures to change the handling fee mechanism will be futile for the goal of reducing the handling fee!
The EIP-1559 has some "small" uses
First of all, I'm talking about small, which is for the above two big goals (reducing congestion and reducing fees). So small here is not a derogatory sense, but to a degree.
Generally, the transactions issued by users can be divided into three situations:
Scenario A: The transaction must be confirmed on the next block, for example, some hijacked transactions to participate in A 1CO transaction. Users make it fast at all costs;
Scenario B: The user expects the transaction to be confirmed quickly, for example within 5 minutes. It doesn't have to be the next block, but you don't want to wait too long, for example, users recharge the exchange, to buy and sell digital currency;
Scenario C: The user wants to confirm a transaction for a lower miner's fee and doesn't care about waiting hours or even days.
For case A, EIP-1559 is of little use. In the case of EIP-1559, in order to achieve the goal of case A, we need to calculate the appropriate TIP, which is no different from the calculation of the appropriate GASPrice now.
EIP-1559 also has no advantage in case C, and we set a GASFEECAP to achieve this goal, which is the same as our current fixed smaller GASPRICE.
However, for Case B, the EIP-1559 has a significant advantage.From the perspective of the user or the wallet developer, there is very little to do to achieve this goal. Within the GasFeeCap range set, your transactions will always enter the block at the current BaseFee price. In the case of a fixed TIP, the miner fee you spend is determined by the system.
So it's the easiest and most user-friendly. Prior to EIP-1559, we would have needed to send a number of replace-by-fee transactions in order to reach our goal in Case B.
The essence of the EIP-1559 to achieve this goal is a mechanism for deferral of fee determination. Prior to EIP-1559, the user generated transaction determined the size of the fee. EIP-1559 split the fee into two parts, and the BaseFee part was determined in real time at the time of packaging. This is similar to the concepts of lazy loading, loading on demand and so on that are commonly used in programming environments.
Case B above is also the most common case, so the implementation of EIP-1559 is of considerable benefit to the user. It will reduce the need for users to intervene in transactions, and it will also be more economical (the system's BaseFee is always more economical than the user's self-selected fee).
conclusion
From the perspective of client and wallet development, the role and significance of EIP-1559 cannot be minimized. While it won't solve the congestion problem, nor will it significantly reduce transaction fees, it could make the Ethereum system smoother and more user-friendly. So I think this is the main reason why the technology-oriented Vitalik is sticking with the EIP-1559 despite a lot of controversy.
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