I like the idea of only having 21 million bitcoins.
Bitcoins get lost all the time, lost private keys.
In time we will have fewer and fewer bitcoins, currently it is thought 3-4 million bitcoins are already lost. This makes me sad.
I propose a redistribution method:
>If an address did not have any activity in let's say the last 100 years the address is considered lost and the bitcoins are free to be mined in the next block.
To prevent losing your bitcoins you make sure to transfer them to a new address every 100 years (I am not aware of any other method of "proving" you still have access to an address).
P.S. This would be a change in the consensus mechanism, I know
P.S.S. I am aware of Satoshi's view on this "lost coins are a donation to everyone". Yes, but 4 million is a lot, do we want Bitcoin to still be used 1000 years from now? If this trend continues most if not all bitcoins would have been lost by then.
Bitcoins get lost all the time, lost private keys.
In time we will have fewer and fewer bitcoins, currently it is thought 3-4 million bitcoins are already lost. This makes me sad.
I propose a redistribution method:
>If an address did not have any activity in let's say the last 100 years the address is considered lost and the bitcoins are free to be mined in the next block.
To prevent losing your bitcoins you make sure to transfer them to a new address every 100 years (I am not aware of any other method of "proving" you still have access to an address).
P.S. This would be a change in the consensus mechanism, I know
P.S.S. I am aware of Satoshi's view on this "lost coins are a donation to everyone". Yes, but 4 million is a lot, do we want Bitcoin to still be used 1000 years from now? If this trend continues most if not all bitcoins would have been lost by then.
The difficulty with this is that whilst what you propose is altruistic, there are people out there who will wait and pounce on any recycled Bitcoins.
Whether it be 100 years or seconds, some people are greedy and entitled and think that they should have all the nice 'shiny shiny'.
Also, who will be in charge of redistributing? Are we going to put these Bitcoins through washers and mixers? Won't they have lost significant value anyway?
Consider this as well:
Dodgy Dave on the Dark Web offers me a Wallet with (supposedly) 1.2 BTC and asks me for 0.12 BTC - Dodgy Dave explains that the Bitcoins have lost their value and he is therefore re-selling them at a marked-down price.
Now, Dodgy Dave could be in possession of 1.2 BTC or indeed zero Bitcoins and just be bluffing - in case of the latter he's now 0.1 BTC richer.
Look at the Wallet.dat thread - loads of Wallets on there, but how many of them really do have any BTC in them?
Call me a sceptic, but a Wallet with 5000 BTC inside it can be mine if I crack the password... okay, BigJohn and Hashcat are real enough but is the amount of BTC stated real? It's a 50/50 chance.
The TLDR basically is whilst your actions and thinking may be honest, there are loads of chancers out there who are anything but and they will wish to take as much 'shiny shiny' as they can. These people care nothing for wealth or Crypto redistribution, they only look out for number one.