Luke Dashjr removed as Bitcoin BIP editor over editorial misconduct

Luke Dashjr was removed from his position as editor of Bitcoin improvement proposals (BIPs) after accusations that he abused editorial authority during the BIP-110 fork attempt, according to CoinDesk reporting. Bitcoin developer Mark Erhardt wrote a motion for Dashjr's removal on August 9, which was acted upon.

Dashjr was accused of assigning a BIP number to BIP-110 before it had undergone community discussion and of merging updates into the BIP repository without following due process, per CoinDesk. His removal action was his first merge since May 2024, and he left fewer than 1% of BIP Editor comments in the repository since additional editors began serving in April 2024, according to the same reporting.

BIP-110 was an attempt to set up a breakaway Bitcoin chain that would restrict non-financial data such as images and text. The proposal was triggered by the popularity of the Ordinals protocol starting in 2023. BIP-110 required a 55% miner support threshold to succeed but acquired support from only around 2.6% of miners, according to CoinDesk. The forked chain mined only two blocks before activity ceased.

Dashjr characterized his removal as an abuse of power in a post on X, per CoinDesk reporting. He is taking a sabbatical from his role as chair and chief technology officer of mining pool Ocean.

The removal raises questions about how power is checked in Bitcoin's open governance structure. The BIP Editors group operates without clearly documented formal charter or enforcement authority, and sources do not specify whether Dashjr's removal is permanent, subject to appeal, or how successor editors are chosen. Dashjr's minimal recent activity in the role also complicates the narrative: he left fewer than 1% of comments in nearly 16 months under the expanded editor structure, raising questions about whether the removal was performance-based or retaliatory.