Falcon is a novel, fast relay network for disseminating Bitcoin blocks. It connects miners and full nodes and ferries blocks using a novel technique to reduce orphans, which in turn helps miners get the most for their effort, and helps the network efficiently convert the spent energy into security. And ultimately, Falcon helps Bitcoin scale.
Falcon gains its benefits from a novel technique called application-level cut-through routing. This technique effectively decouples the speed of disseminating blocks from the size of the network.
Falcon is 10X to 1000X faster than alternatives. By reducing the latency between the miners, it helps even out the playing field between miners and aids miner decentralization.
These slides describe how Falcon works and its advantages.
This presentation discusses Falcon's operation.
