Prominent Bitcoin figures Adam Back and Michael Saylor have publicly voiced opposition to BIP 110, a proposed Bitcoin upgrade that would temporarily restrict certain types of data stored on the network.
The proposal, known as the Reduced Data Temporary Softfork, has sparked intense debate within the Bitcoin community over issues of censorship, network usage, and the future direction of the blockchain.
Blockstream co-founder Adam Back criticized the proposal, arguing that it attempts to control how other users choose to use Bitcoin. According to Back, restricting transactions that comply with existing network rules goes against Bitcoin’s core principles of decentralization, openness, and permissionless access.
He also warned that if supporters of the proposal attempt to enforce the new rules without broad community agreement, it could lead to a split in the network, creating a separate chain and increasing fragmentation within the ecosystem.
Strategy founder Michael Saylor expressed similar concerns. In a public statement, he argued that BIP 110 transforms a disagreement over network usage into a consensus-level rule change that would reject transactions currently considered valid under Bitcoin’s existing protocol.
Saylor described that precedent as potentially dangerous, saying developers should focus on more significant challenges facing Bitcoin rather than changing consensus rules to settle disputes over transaction content.
At the center of the debate is BIP 110 itself.
The proposal would introduce temporary consensus rules lasting approximately one year. During that period, large data fields within Bitcoin transactions would be restricted, including certain Taproot-related functions and methods commonly used to store images, digital artifacts, and other non-financial data on the blockchain.
Under the proposal, OP_RETURN outputs would remain limited to 83 bytes, while several other transaction payloads would be capped at 256 bytes.
Supporters argue that these restrictions would reduce blockchain bloat, lower storage requirements for node operators, and help keep Bitcoin focused primarily on its role as a monetary network.
Importantly, the proposal would not affect previously created outputs. Any unspent transaction outputs (UTXOs) generated before activation would remain fully spendable under the current rules.
Critics, however, argue that users who pay transaction fees should be free to use block space as they choose. They believe market forces, rather than protocol restrictions, should determine how Bitcoin’s limited block space is allocated.
One of the strongest supporters of BIP 110 remains Bitcoin developer Luke Dashjr. He has repeatedly defended the proposal and rejected calls to withdraw it, arguing that projects such as Ordinals and Runes are filling Bitcoin blocks with non-financial data and increasing long-term costs for network participants.
Despite the ongoing debate, support for the proposal remains extremely limited.
BIP 110 requires miners to signal approval in 55% of blocks during a designated activation period. Specifically, the proposal needs support in 1,109 out of 2,016 blocks before it can be locked in for activation.
Current signaling levels remain far below that threshold. Recent reports indicate that miner support is effectively at zero during the current signaling period and has never risen above approximately 1% in previous periods.
No major Bitcoin mining pool has publicly backed the proposal, making activation highly unlikely under current conditions.
Without significant support from miners, exchanges, wallet providers, node operators, and other ecosystem participants, BIP 110 faces a difficult path forward.
As the Bitcoin community approaches the proposal’s key signaling deadlines, stakeholders will need to decide which software versions and network rules they intend to support. Ultimately, the fate of BIP 110 will depend not on any single developer or company, but on whether the broader Bitcoin ecosystem chooses to adopt the proposed changes.
For now, the debate continues to highlight a long-running question within Bitcoin: should the network strictly focus on financial transactions, or should users be free to utilize block space for a wider range of applications as long as they follow the protocol’s rules?
