Subject: Re: [Bitcoin-development] Prenumbered BIP naming

From: Gregory Maxwell <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 12 May 2014 10:11:25 -0700

On Mon, May 12, 2014 at 10:01 AM, Matt Whitlock <[email-masked]> wrote:
> Why is there such a high bar to getting a number assigned to a BIP anyway? BIP 1 seems to suggest that getting a BIP number assigned is no big deal, but the reality seems to betray that casual notion. Even proposals with hours of work put into them are not getting BIP numbers. It's not exactly as though there's a shortage of integers. Are numbers assigned only to proposals that are well liked? Isn't the point of assigning numbers so that we can have organized discussions about all proposals, even ones we don't like?

It isn't a big deal, but according to the process numbers shouldn't be
assigned for things that haven't even been publically discussed. If
someone wants to create specifications that are purely the product of
they own work and not a public discussion— they should feel free to do
that, but BIP isn't the process for that.  So, since things need to be
discussed, it can be useful to have something to call a proposal
before other things happen— thats all. The same kind of issue arises
elsewhere.