Bitcoin has failed to activate every proposed soft fork since Taproot went live in November 2021, and Drivechain creator Paul Sztorc believes the network cannot approve any consensus upgrade for the foreseeable future.
“All soft forks since Taproot have failed to activate, and this was no exception,” Sztorc, CEO of LayerTwo Labs, told crypto.news, referring to the collapse of BIP-110 as evidence of a problem extending far beyond a single disputed upgrade.
## How BIP-110 died
BIP-110, formally titled the Reduced Data Temporary Softfork, sought to restrict some forms of non-financial data stored in Bitcoin transactions. The proposal attracted just 51 supporting blocks during its 2,016-block difficulty period, leaving miner signaling at a dismal 2.53%, far below the 55% threshold its voluntary activation process required. By Aug. 2, the target had become mathematically unreachable, with only 28 of the first 1,108 blocks signaling support.
The aftermath was even more stark. Enforcing nodes running BIP-110 software split from the dominant Bitcoin network at block 961,632 on Aug. 8, rejecting blocks that did not signal support. The breakaway branch produced exactly two blocks before stalling permanently, inheriting Bitcoin’s mining difficulty of 127.48 trillion without the hash power to clear it. OCEAN’s BIP-110 endpoint showed roughly 257 petahashes per second assigned to the stranded branch, while Strategy Executive Chairman Michael Saylor estimated that about 99.85% of Bitcoin’s hash power had remained with the dominant chain.
The proposal itself would have imposed seven consensus restrictions lasting 52,416 blocks, approximately one year, including an 83-byte cap on OP_RETURN outputs, a 256-byte limit on certain data pushes, and curbs affecting some Taproot functions. Supporters, including Bitcoin Knots maintainer Luke Dashjr, argued the rules would curb arbitrary data storage linked to inscriptions and keep Bitcoin focused on monetary transactions. Critics, among them Saylor and Blockstream co-founder Adam Back, warned the fork could undermine Bitcoin’s neutrality by rejecting transaction structures the network currently accepts.
## Not even OP_CAT can get through
Sztorc’s broader point is that BIP-110 is not an outlier but the norm. He cited OP_CAT, a proposal to restore an operation that existed in Bitcoin’s original software and was disabled by Satoshi Nakamoto in 2010 over security concerns, as proof of the paralysis.
“Nothing can — not even OP_CAT, which is just 13 lines of code and was in the original software and had lots of support,” he said when asked how his BIP 300 Drivechain proposal could overcome resistance to consensus changes. “Bitcoin cannot activate any soft forks, for the foreseeable future.”
OP_CAT would allow Bitcoin scripts to join two data elements, enabling developers to build covenants, vaults, bridges and other programmable spending conditions. It enjoys genuine developer enthusiasm, yet remains stuck at the discussion stage, dependent on agreement among developers, miners, node operators and users, a coalition that has not coalesced for any proposal since Taproot activated at block 709,632 on Nov. 14, 2021 via the Speedy Trial signaling process.
Other ambitious proposals face the same wall. BIP-360, which would introduce a new output type supporting post-quantum signatures, is frequently cited in quantum-threat analyses, but it too requires the soft fork activation path that has produced nothing but failures for five years.
## Why Drivechains are stuck in the same trap
The critique carries particular weight coming from Sztorc, whose Drivechain proposals, BIP 300 and BIP 301, would let experimental rule sets run on sidechains pegged to Bitcoin, theoretically allowing innovation without touching the mainchain. The catch is that Drivechains themselves require a Bitcoin consensus change to enable two-way pegs, placing them squarely behind the same activation barrier that has defeated every fork since Taproot.
Sztorc also addressed the security economics of his design, arguing that sidechain fee revenue would itself influence miners’ incentive to protect Drivechain withdrawals, aligning hash power security with the value flowing through the peg.
## A network that can no longer change?
The Taproot comparison is instructive because it worked. Speedy Trial was designed to fast-track activation with miner coordination, and miners signaled, activated, and shipped the upgrade in under a year. In the years since, miner signaling participation has collapsed, community trust in coordinated activation has eroded, and every proposed change, however modest, has become a referendum on Bitcoin’s identity rather than a technical review.
The result, on Sztorc’s telling, is a network whose consensus rules have effectively frozen. Whether that reads as resilience, the inability of any faction to seize control of the protocol, or stagnation, the inability to ship even 13 lines of code, depends on where you stand. But the empirical record is unambiguous: five years, zero soft forks, and no activation path on the horizon for anything, from data restrictions to covenants to quantum-safe signatures.
2.53% miner signaling on BIP-110 against a 55% threshold. that gap isnt disagreement, its total indifference
51 blocks out of 2016 lol. sztorc saying this was no exception is sadly accurate
Bitcoin activated Taproot with overwhelming signaling and has not moved since 2021. Sztorc has a point about consensus being stuck.
it wasnt indifference, miners just saw zero fee upside in restricting data storage. follow the incentives not the ideology
this is the real answer. BIP-110 asked miners to give up fee revenue from data carrying txs, of course signaling sat at 2.53%
the breakaway branch mined exactly two blocks before dying at height 961,632. pretty vivid demonstration of how little support existed
Sztorc has pitched drivechain for a decade and the network cannot even pass a data restriction fork. follow the fee incentives, the ideology lost a long time ago
2.53% miner signaling on BIP-110 is brutal. hard to argue with sztorc here, nothing activates without a motivated coalition and there isnt one
agreed, and the 55% voluntary threshold made it dead on arrival. nobody was ever going to campaign door to door for a restriction fork
its worse than that, 51 supporting blocks out of 2016. miners cant even be bothered to signal anymore lol
Sztorc has been saying this for years. Taproot barely made it through in 2021 and that was considered the easy one.
Barely made it through is generous. Most miners activated Taproot without reading what it actually did.