Why are Empty Blocks Happening with OrangeSurf from mempool.space (SLP588)

Why are some bitcoin blocks empty? Orange Surf from the mempool.space team joins me to explain his recent research report on this topic. We discuss:

• Why do empty blocks happen?

• Comparing empty block rates across mining pools

• Firmware and config differences

Timestamps:

(00:00) - Intro

(00:44) - Orange Surf’s research report on empty blocks

(02:02) - Block interval data sets

(06:25) - What is an empty block?

(08:09) - What causes an empty block to occur?

(11:35) - Nuances of a working of a miner; switching from empty to full block templates

(14:05) - Differences in the empty block performance

(19:01) - Antpool’s internal miner firmware

(21:30) - Sponsors

(25:00) - Effective management of block templates by mining pools

(34:54) - Ocean's empty blocks

(36:08) - Mining decentralisation and proxy pools

(41:07) - Sponsors

(42:14) - Mining templates & pool payouts

(44:57) - Upcoming mempool features

(49:06) - Outro

Links:

• Empty Block Report: https://research.mempool.space/empty-block-report/

• Pool Reserve: https://orange.surf/pool-reserves/

• Enterprise: mempool.space/enterprise

• Community Sponsors: mempool.space/sponsor

Sponsors:

• Swan.com (code LIVERA)

• CoinKite.com (code LIVERA)

• Mempool.space

Stephan Livera links:

• Follow me on X: @stephanlivera

• Subscribe to the podcast

• Subscribe to Substack