Without Op_Cat, Bruce Liu says that Bitcoin is as “useful as a jumbo without wings” capable of much more than it is allowed to do so, but stuck on the ground while Ethereum and Solana sink.
Liu, the founder of OPCAT_Labs, says that a single OPCODE, OP_CAT, could transform the bitcoin of static digital gold into programmable silver that competes with other layer 1 chains.
OP_CAT is a long -term OPCODE in the Bitcoin code which, in the event of responsiveness, would allow developers to concatenate data in scripts and to unlock a range of new possibilities, vaults and alliances with decentralized exchanges and evidence of zero knowledge.
The Bitcoin blockchain, if OP_Cat was reactivated, would be as programmable as Ethereum or Solana, said Liu.
“Op_cat is not a new code. It has never been deleted, just commented and disabled. We do not add my Opcode or someone else. It’s Satoshi,” Liu in Coindesk told an interview on the BTC Asia key in Hong Kong.
But the push for Op_Cat does not come without friction.
Satoshi disabled it in 2010 for concerns that he could allow denial service attacks. The opponents argue that any new Opcode introduces “unknown unknown”, threatening Bitcoin’s hard stability. Others adopt a philosophical position: Bitcoin must remain digital gold, rather than chasing the programmability of Ethereum.
Liu repels by calling on the design of Satoshi Nakamoto.
“If Bitcoin was only for payments, why did Satoshi include the script?” He asked. “Op_cat is not my invention, it is the Satoshi code. It has never been deleted, only deactivated.”
Liu says that OP_Cat would give life to the script – the basic programming language integrated into the Bitcoin blockchain – allowing Bitcoin to make more than simple payments and activate features such as vaults or even the basic challenge.
OP_CAT, he said, would unlock more from this potential, allowing developers to build things like vaults, alliances or even simple challenge applications on Bitcoin.
To strengthen the point, it dates back to Nakamoto’s own explanation on the reasons why the script existed in the first place.
In a 2010 BitcoinTalk post, Nakamoto wrote that Bitcoin’s design was actually “adjusted in the stone” of his first version, so he wanted him to welcome all the types of transactions he could imagine.
Everyone’s hard coding would have created without endless special cases, explained Satoshi, so instead, the Bitcoin creator introduced the script as a general solution which allowed users to define their own conditions while the nodes should not verify that if these conditions were met.
Already, the company has launched a bitcoin fork in a virtual machine with OP_CAT activated to demonstrate its potential, with SDK, API and a JavaScript type programming language designed to make construction on Bitcoin accessible to web2 developers.
The OP_CAT hall
The other half of Liu’s plan is political. Alongside Mate Tokay, a first Bitcoin entrepreneur, who co -founded Bitcoin.com with Roger Ver, OPCAT_Labs is the spearhead of what they describe as an “alliance” of the OP_CAT supporters.
The objective is to coordinate otherly dispersed efforts of groups such as Tapoot wizards, Stark software and independent developers.
“Previously, the OP_CAT advocacy was without leader,” said Liu. “Eighty percent of the people we are talking about are in favor, but the strongest voices are against. We want to organize support in something visible, semi-official and coordinated. ”
Tokay has done so as an education campaign for influential stakeholders, fund managers, institutions and even legislators, who, according to him, are too focused on BTC vouchers to notice the programmability debate.
“If they knew what Op_Cat unlocked, they would be even more excited by the future of Bitcoin,” he said.
During the Bitcoin Asia conference next year, Liu hopes to show DEFI applications worked on Bitcoin and progress to an organized lobbying front.
He supervised it as a unlocking potential that has always been there. “We don’t change Bitcoin,” he said. “We unfold its wings.”
