Strategy executive chairman Michael Saylor and Blockstream CEO Adam Back have publicly criticized BIP-110, a proposed temporary fork that would limit non-financial transactions on the Bitcoin network. The dispute centers on whether the network should interfere with how people use the Bitcoin blockchain at all, even when it comes to Ordinals inscriptions that part of the community views as spam.
What does BIP-110 actually propose?
Bitcoin Improvement Proposal-110 appeared in December 2025. It was put forward by a developer under the pseudonym Dathon Ohm, with support from Luke Dashjr, a longtime Bitcoin Core contributor. The identity of the proposal's author is still unknown, which alone has raised questions within the community.
The document proposes temporarily stopping the flow of Ordinals inscriptions and other arbitrary data that, according to its authors, clog the network with extra load and pull Bitcoin away from its original role as peer-to-peer cash. Ordinals let users attach images, text, or other data to individual satoshis, the smallest units of Bitcoin.
Since the protocol launched in 2022, daily inscription counts have repeatedly spiked to record levels and dropped just as sharply. According to data from analytics platform Dune, Ordinals activity has noticeably declined over the past two years compared to peak months. Supporters of BIP-110 argue the temporary limit would ease network load and lower fees for regular payments. Critics see it as a threat to Bitcoin's core purpose.
The fight over BIP-110 extends an older argument about what Bitcoin is supposed to be: a payment network for transfers, or a general-purpose store for arbitrary data. Both camps agree the network should stay decentralized, they just disagree on what that means in practice.
How would this proposal actually activate?
BIP-110 will not activate automatically. Activation relies on a vote among nodes that verify blocks: the rule takes effect only once at least 55% of validating nodes support it over a separate counting period.
The last completed period, number 475 (blocks 955,584 through 957,599), showed only 1% support among nodes. The overwhelming majority of network participants are not yet ready to change the rules to fight Ordinals.
That high bar is deliberate. Bitcoin developers traditionally avoid changes that could split the network, so activation needs something close to unanimous support rather than a simple majority.
- Key point: activation requires near-total network consensus, not a simple majority.
- If the 55% threshold isn't met within a period's window, the proposal loses its chance to activate in that cycle.
- Authors can resubmit an updated version of BIP-110 with different parameters later.
- No centralized entity can force the update through. The decision always rests with node operators.
Why is this being compared to the 2015-2017 dispute?
Analysts call BIP-110 the loudest protocol-level dispute in the Bitcoin community since the so-called Blocksize Wars of 2015-2017. Back then, network participants argued for years over whether it was worth risking a chain split to raise the block size limit and speed up transactions.
That earlier fight ended in a split. Part of the community went on to launch Bitcoin Cash, while the main Bitcoin chain kept its original block size. Both cases boil down to the same question: who ultimately sets the network's rules, developers, miners, or node operators?
The scale differs this time. Back then the fight was about payment speed. Now it's about whether Bitcoin should have the right to filter data types inside its own blocks. Opinions are split.
The dispute has already split more than just its public leaders. It runs through the wider developer community too, with some backing a temporary curb on Ordinals and others joining Saylor and Back's criticism.
What exactly are Saylor and Back saying?
Saylor made his position public in a post on X, playing on the proposal's own name.
"There are 110 things more dangerous to Bitcoin than spam."
- Michael Saylor, executive chairman of Strategy, in a post on X
Adam Back went further, calling the idea behind BIP-110 an attempt to impose one group's view of how the network should be used on everyone else. In his own post on X, he described the proposal as a quest to police other people's actions rather than a genuine technical improvement.
Both men carry particular weight in this fight given their standing in the industry. Strategy remains the largest publicly known corporate holder of Bitcoin, while Back's Blockstream has spent years building network-scaling infrastructure, including the Liquid Network.
Both men agree that Ordinals activity irritates part of the community. But by their logic, Bitcoin's decentralization means no one gets the right to impose their own restrictions on how the network is used, even with good intentions.
What does this mean for an ordinary Bitcoin holder?
BIP-110 is nowhere near activation for now: support in the last period was just 1% against the required 55%. The rules for Bitcoin payments and storage will not change anytime soon, no matter how loud the public dispute gets.
For traders and crypto holders, the fight over BIP-110 isn't affecting Bitcoin's price or liquidity yet. Anyone looking to exchange Bitcoin for dollars can check current rates on the Bitcoin page and ignore this technical dispute until it produces real consequences for the network.
Watch the next counting periods going forward. If node support starts climbing past a few percent, that would be the first sign part of the community is willing to experiment with limiting Ordinals. For now, most node operators, judging by the numbers, are staying neutral. Bitcoin has weathered disputes like this before, and none of them have stopped the network from remaining the most liquid crypto asset on the cash and stablecoin exchange market.
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