Bryan Bishop confirmed the removal on the Bitcoin Development Mailing List at 20:52 UTC on August 10, and Dashjr posted an OCEAN sabbatical announcement two minutes later.
Bitcoin’s BIP editors removed Luke Dashjr from the role on August 10, revoking his GitHub permissions and deleting his name from the document that lists the editors.
Removal Confirmed on the Developer Mailing List
Bishop, one of the five remaining editors, wrote to the Bitcoin Development Mailing List at 20:52 UTC on August 10 that the individual known as Luke Dashjr is no longer a permissioned user on the BIP content repository. He signed the message with a link to his X account.
Jon Atack merged pull request #2248, a one-line deletion striking Dashjr’s name and email address from BIP 3, and wrote that he had verified Dashjr no longer holds editor or admin privileges in the repository. Bishop, Atack, Mark Erhardt, Olaoluwa Osuntokun, and Ruben Somsen remain listed as editors.
Mark “Murch” Erhardt filed the motion at 18:53:50 UTC on August 9, according to the message header in the mailing list archive. The interval between the filing and Bishop’s confirmation is 25 hours and 58 minutes.
BIP 3 Sets Out No Removal Procedure
BIP 3, the document governing the proposal process, lists the current editors and their duties. It contains no text describing how editors are appointed or dismissed.
The vote on the pull request was recorded through GitHub reactions rather than a defined process. More than a dozen accounts left thumbs-up reactions, and three comments read “ACK,” the repository’s shorthand for approval. Erhardt wrote afterwards that the ayes had it.
Erhardt Listed Four Grounds
Erhardt’s message set out four grounds for removal. He wrote that Dashjr was heavily involved in the creation and implementation of BIP-110, the proposal that led to the fork, and that during the process Dashjr exercised his authority as a BIP editor inconsistently with the established editorial process, unfairly favoring the proposal he was involved in.
He cited two specific actions: an attempt to assign a BIP number to the draft publicly on Twitter before the proposal had been discussed on the mailing list and the merging of a pull request updating the BIP within minutes of it being opened. Erhardt wrote that Dashjr had left fewer than 1% of BIP editor comments in the repository since additional editors began serving in April 2024 and that the disputed merge was his first merge action since May 2024.
The remaining two grounds concerned Dashjr’s championing of a contentious fork and what Erhardt described as a breakdown in trust, communication, and coordination with the other editors. The Crypto Times reported the filing of the motion on August 10, when it stood as a recommendation rather than a completed action.
Dashjr Replied in Five Sentences
Dashjr answered at 19:43:06 UTC on August 9, 49 minutes after the motion was filed. He wrote that the accusations are false, that he has followed the BIP process consistently for years, and that novice opinions alone do not establish new processes.
He wrote that Erhardt was the one who stopped communicating and that Erhardt is the one who should be removed. He had not addressed the removal itself on the mailing list as of publication.
Riard Asked for Two Weeks and a Neutrality Clause
Bitcoin protocol developer Antoine Riard backed the outcome and objected to the pace. He proposed that all existing editors state their positions publicly, that repository contributors be given a say, and that Dashjr receive at least two weeks or a full month to answer the charges point by point, with a temporary suspension in the interim.
Riard also noted the calendar, writing that the thread ran in mid-August, when people can be on vacation. He asked that BIP 3 be amended to state that editors hold an explicit duty of neutrality and should not engage in the promotion of a contentious fork under any of their other roles.
Michael Tidwell, who supported the removal, wrote to Dashjr that stepping down would be preferable to being forced out through an informal process and thanked him for years of work.
OCEAN Sabbatical Posted Two Minutes Later
Dashjr posted at 20:54 UTC on August 10 that he is taking a sabbatical from OCEAN as chairman and CTO and will turn his immediate focus to working on Bitcoin and open-source projects. He wrote that he believes this is the best use of his time and is in the best interests of Bitcoin and Bitcoin’s long-term health.
The post carries no stated duration and names no successor. OCEAN’s site lists Dashjr as chairman and chief technology officer, and the pool has published no statement on the sabbatical. OCEAN did not respond to a request for comment.
Dashjr remains the lead maintainer of Bitcoin Knots, the node implementation that shipped the BIP-110 rules. The removal does not affect that role.
BIP-110 Signaling Reached 2.53%
BIP-110, formally the Reduced Data Temporary Softfork, required 55% of blocks in a difficulty period to signal for activation. Signaling peaked at 2.53% in the period that ended at height 961,632, according to the bip110monitor.com dashboard.
The chain enforcing the rules has produced no block since August 8. The Crypto Times covered the signaling deadline on August 6 and Michael Saylor’s comments on the stall on August 10.
