<div dir="ltr"><div>The current ten-minute block time was chosen by Satoshi as a tradeoff between confirmation time and the amount of work wasted due to chain splits. Is there not room for optimization in this number from:<br><br>A. Advances in technology in the last 8-9 years</div><div>B. A lack of any rigorous formula being used to determine what's the optimal rate</div><div>C. The existence of similar chains that work at a much lower block times</div><div><br></div>Whilst I think we can all agree that 10 second block times would result in a lot of chain splits due to Bitcoins 12-13 second propagation time (to 95% of nodes), I think we'll find that we can go lower than 10 minutes without much issue. Is this something that should be looked at or am I an idiot who needs to read more? If I'm an idiot, I apologize; kindly point me in the right direction.<div><br></div><div>Things I've read on the subject:</div><div><a href="https://medium.facilelogin.com/the-mystery-behind-block-time-63351e35603a">https://medium.facilelogin.com/the-mystery-behind-block-time-63351e35603a</a> (section header "Why Bitcoin Block Time Is 10 Minutes ?")<br></div><div><a href="https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=176108.0">https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=176108.0</a></div><div><a href="https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/1863/why-was-the-target-block-time-chosen-to-be-10-minutes">https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/1863/why-was-the-target-block-time-chosen-to-be-10-minutes</a><br></div><div><br></div><div><div class="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr">Kind Regards,<div><br></div><div>Jonathan Sterling</div></div></div>
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