Along with the anticipated Bitcoin halving event, 4/20 has come and gone—but the famed meme number is already back in the BTC conversation amid an attempt to change Advocates of restoring a Satoshi-era command in Bitcoin’s programming language introduced new code Monday, outlining how “OP_CAT” could be used to bring more functionality to Bitcoin. One notable addition: including 420 as the change’s purported BIP number.As of this writing, OP_CAT hasn’t been assigned a so-called BIP number in the Instead, OP_CAT’s 420 figure is reflected in a standalone GitHub page that outlines the proposal and was shared by Taproot Wizards co-founder Udi Wertheimer on “OP_CAT aims to expand the toolbox of the [Bitcoin] developer with a simple, modular, and useful opcode,” the GitHub page shared by Wertheimer states, adding that “OP_CAT was available in early versions of Bitcoin.”OP_CAT’s approval would enable developers to create so-called covenants on Bitcoin, according to a In January, Wertheimer told Numbers with strong memetic roots such as 69 or 420 have been mainstays of internet culture for years—well enshrined back when memes often included top or bottom text. Today, the two numbers’ significance is reflected in crypto through token standards such as “It is generally frowned upon by the Bitcoin community for BIP authors to assign BIP numbers to themselves,” Wertheimer frequently asked questions about BIP-420yesterday, the proposed OP_CAT upgrade for bitcoin was assigned a BIP number: BIP-420!this is an important milestone and everyone is excited! we received many questions, so in this post we will try to explain what this all means!… pic.twitter.com/erf4jzGpXy— Udi | BIP-420 (@udiWertheimer) April 23, 2024Who else was calling for such a number in the Bitcoin community for OP_CAT was initially unclear. But as Wertheimer explains, the proposal was crafted by Botanix Labs’ lead software engineer Armin Sabouri and BastionZero’s Heilman. The two developers were approached by Taproot Wizards—eager to help—after OP_CAT was published, CoinDesk Wertheimer created Taproot Wizards alongside influencer Eric Wall early last year. As Ordinals grew in popularity, the firm’s collection of Bitcoin-based collectibles became an early standout—elevated by The group’s endeavors became associated with a movement inside the Bitcoin community to grow beyond the traditionalist vibes promulgated by so-called “laser eyes,” who often believe Bitcoin should stick to a pure focus on monetary transactions. Announcing it raised $7.5 million in a funding round led by the venture capital firm Standard Crypto last November, Wertheimer said the money would be used to “Taproot Wizards OP_CAT, originally crafted by Bitcoin’s pseudonymous creator Satoshi Nakamoto, was scrapped in 2010 due to concerns the so-called opcode could be used in a denial of service (DoS) attack on Bitcoin. Representing a basic command in Bitcoin’s programming language, OP_CAT allowed users to marry two data points together in a transaction’s code structure.Following Bitcoin’s Taproot upgrade in 2021, however, limits on how much data can be included in certain structures for Bitcoin transactions “nullified” historic concerns surrounding OP_CAT, according to Luxor Technology’s Harper.*workshopping a BIP*”What should we call it? It needs to appeal to lots of people.”*takes a drag*”How about OP CAT + BIP 420?” pic.twitter.com/OYjhls9XX0— Jameson Lopp (@lopp) April 22, 2024On Twitter, a Neither Wertheimer nor Taproot Wizards’ pseudonymous CTO Rijndael immediately responded to requests for comment from Edited by Andrew Hayward
