12 ms·

Bitcoin Cash: Why It's Forking the Blockchain and What That Means

170 points by nicpottier 9y ago

grabcocque 9y ago
Javascript developer: "We like to constantly replace all our frameworks every 18 months" Cryptocurrency developer: "Hold my beer"
- artursapek 9y ago
  Bitcoin actually rarely changes, which is why this is a big event. You're probably thinking of all of the shitcoins/ICOs that come out nearly every day - make no mistake, those are a cash grab.
  - woah 9y ago
    Only bitcoin is the one true religion
  - Taek 9y ago
    This is only a big event if you choose to run the BitcoinCash software. If you stick with Bitcoin-core you aren't even going to notice that a thing happened.
    - artursapek 9y ago
      It's still a big event in that all of the exchanges have had to take a stance on the fork. And there will be an initial competition between the two forks, like with Ethereum and "Ethereum Classic" (in that case, the new fork actually won over the unchanged version).
    - geofft 9y ago
      It matters for the ability to convert BTC to other currencies (like USD), right? If I'm understanding this right, an existing bitcoin is now valid in both the BTC chain and the BCC chain, and presumably the world isn't going to let you sell the resulting BTC for its previous value and the resulting BCC for its previous value (since the two sales would now be transactions on two different chains). So unless BCC fails completely, the market value of BTC will be reduced by the market value of BCC, which seems like a thing you'd notice.
      - deleted 9y ago
        [deleted]
      - fapjacks 9y ago
        Yes, this is right, but it appears that the value of the original coin and the forked coin don't correlate with one another too strongly after the fork. I mean here that it appears that the market value of BTC will not be reduced by the market value of GCC, in such a manner as you suggest. The less popular coin after the fork certainly is less valuable, but after the fork, the two values follow their own destinies, unrelated to one another.
hn_throwaway_99 9y ago
This is not surprising. The miners (or I guess I should say "some miners") want to retain their power by keeping all transactions on-chain in Bitcoin Cash, but I think at the end of the day a coin only has value if it has wide acceptance in the community, mainly including the people who actually use it for transactions. I think Bitcoin Cash will fail, but in the short term people will try to see how far "greater fool theory" will go by selling their Bitcoin Cash coins while still holding on to their bitcoins on the main blockchain.
- dcosson 9y ago
  Why is that greater fool theory?
  - Tyr42 9y ago
    That you'll buy it so you can sell it to the next, greater fool to come along. The bubble keeps expanding as long as people think there are "greater fools" to take it off their hands.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
  - hn_throwaway_99 9y ago
    Because I think there will be a lot of people who don't think that Bitcoin Cash has long term value, but will try to make a quick buck off it before it goes to 0.
- smokeyj 9y ago
  > want to retain their power by keeping all transactions on-chain in Bitcoin Cash Exactly what power is that? The power to collect smaller mining fees? Honest question - what's the status of Lightning? Core promotes it as the solution to scaling and it's essentially a page on github. Litecoin already has Segwit and no one is using Lightning. Am I missing something here?
simias 9y ago
Another difference is the project says it will support multiple implementations of its software, a move that's not surprising given the criticism that Bitcoin Core's software is too dominant on the bitcoin network. What does that mean exactly? Bitcoin being open source and anybody being able to connect to the network means that anybody can fork the client if they want to, doesn't it? After all that's exactly what this Bitcoin ABC fork is doing.
- jstanley 9y ago
  Yep. You're right, it doesn't mean anything. What they're trying to say is they'll support multiple implementations of the software on the same network (unlike Bitcoin ABC, which is a fork of the software and a fork of the network). But Bitcoin already supports that too. There is bitcoin core, bitcoin knots, bitcoinj, btc1, bitcore all running on the same network.
  - TD-Linux 9y ago
    I think they also may be referring to some Bitcoin Core authors recommending against other implementations - the concern is if the implementations contain an error in the consensus code, they could accidentally fork off, and potentially lose funds for the user. For similar reasons, Bitcoin Core builds reproducible static builds and recommends those, the minimize the chance of behavior divergence. But you're right - it's merely a suggestion from a portion of the developers, and it certainly doesn't stop anyone.
jsnathan 9y ago
Chains splitting off is a very interesting phenomenon. Just like with Ethereum Classic splitting off Ethereum, the value of the original chain can be divided into two, albeit unequal, parts. The process may even create new value - though I suppose it might just as well destroy value. What I've also wondered about though is multiple chains combining into one. Does anyone know if this has happened before? I believe there is a strong analogy here to how company stock can evolve, when companies are either split out as separate entities, or merged into one, respectively.
- Rmilb 9y ago
  Multiple chains that have diverged in the past can never join together. Unless you want to double the amount of total coins in the network. Its technically possible if two different chains wanted to merge they could decide on which block they will merge at, but there is the huge issue of agreeing on an exchange rate between the both old coins to the new coins.
  - rtkwe 9y ago
    From a strict ledger of transactions metaphor of the blockchain they could be joined without double value but it'd require that all blocks from both chains were strictly disjoint sets of transactions and no account overspent when combining both chains. On a more real technical level though the protocol doesn't have a way to have two parent blocks even if the two chains satisfied the conditions to avoid double spending.
  - jsnathan 9y ago
    Right, and that's a lot like agreeing on an acquisition price in the case of a merger. There too stock in the acquired company is commonly traded for stock in the acquiring company at agreed upon prices. And technically, I think it must remain possible as long as you can always simply issue a new token with a certain starting distribution.
- fab13n 9y ago
  > multiple chains combining into one. Does anyone know if this has happened before? I don't think it happened on any meaningful chain. It could be donetechnically through a proof-of-burn on the giving chain, and the corresponding minting on the receiving chain. Something loosely comparable would be conversion from a token to another within the same blockchain, and this must have happened quite a few times on Ethereum; but that's within a single blockchain, so arguably doesn't count. However when you see how difficult it is, in terms of governance, to address such an obvious issue as Bitcoin's tiny throughput, I can't imagine two distinct chains agree, in a timely fashion, both on the principle of a merge, and on the way to execute it. Maybe on-chain governance, as proposed by Tezos, will fix this problematic indecisiveness on blockchain evolutions, we'll see.
serg_chernata 9y ago
This is going to be a failed attempt of starting yet another altcoin. Just because this carries the "bitcoin" name doesn't make it any more special.
- um_ya 9y ago
  They've tried bitcoin classic, bitcoin unlimited, bitcoin ABC, bitcoin cash... It's the same small group that jumps to each one.
- Taek 9y ago
  It has special meaning to people frustrated with the stubborn refusal from bitcoin-core to raise the block size. Bitcoin has two major factions, and this is more or less a peaceful way for them to split out. I'm hoping it decreases the overall level of conflict, as both groups will be able to get what they want here.
  - thefalcon 9y ago
    The comments here (which overall are measured and reasonable relative to elsewhere) lead me to believe that this "us vs them" combative mentality will continue. It seems as long as there are two chains, supporters of one will still be trying to attack and hope for the demise of the other, even though I share your hope that the opposite will happen.
  - seppin 9y ago
    > bitcoin-core Who is this? who can "decide" to make changes in the original BC protocol. As far as I can see, no one can.
zck 9y ago
So if I have coin on, say, coinbase, what should I do? Should I withdraw it to a wallet before August 1, so I can access both Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash?
- nicpottier 9y ago
  I would not keep coins sitting in coinbase either way, so the decision is easy. Move it off. If you aren't planning on selling anytime soon then do it to a paper wallet or get a Trezor or the like if you want to actually use your coins. But don't trust any third party with your coins, especially Coinbase which isn't sharing the private keys with you.
  - CyberDildonics 9y ago
    Absolutely not. Keeping coins on coinbase means on the split you have your normal balance, but coinbase keeps your bitcoin cash balance. Take your money out of an exchange, it should not be kept there in the first place! If you don't own the private keys, you don't own your bitcoin. If it is on coinbase, you don't control it, you are just asking them for permission.
  - zck 9y ago
    Well, the decision isn't especially easy, given that I also don't feel comfortable having a bunch of cash sit out on a table in my kitchen. So I'd have to figure out a wallet strategy that made sense. Maybe I'll make a paper wallet this weekend? Hrm, security is hard.
CaliforniaKarl 9y ago
Reminder: You can monitor https://www.btcforkmonitor.info https://www.btcforkmonitor.info to see when the forks take place. (The site was discussed in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14809259 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14809259)
Nursie 9y ago
So... were I a bitcoin holder at the present time (I'm not) then I'm potentially going to have those same bitcoin on two chains? So depending on what value is held in either chain this could be a huge financial boost? Unless of course this tanks the system entirely, but that seems unlikely.
- Taek 9y ago
  Most likely the sum value of each token is not going to be much different from the pre-split value of the original token. Or if it is, it means that people on both sides are relieved and optimistic about this technique for conflict resolution, and really do see it as value added. If you care about one token over the other, the best thing to do is let the dust settle, then sell all of your non-preferred token for the preferred token. Financially, this should not set you back even if you prefer the minority token - you just end up with a bunch of them, and the total value of your wallet is still about the same.
- jstanley 9y ago
  It won't be a huge financial boost. Bitcoin isn't worth $2500 per Bitcoin by magic. It's worth that because of supply and demand. The only change might be that some of the demand shifts to BitcoinCash instead of Bitcoin, meaning the price of both will be lower than the price of Bitcoin now, but they'll likely add up to about the same amount.
gtrubetskoy 9y ago
8MB block means the block chain grows by 1,207,959,552 (~1GB) per day, or ~365GB per year. This means that now not everyone has the internet connection or the disk space to keep a copy of the block chain, and more control is in the hands of the miners. I understand the reason for a larger block - it seems like it's pure profit for the miners (should we just refer to it as greed?), but I do not understand the objection to SegWit which is essential for lightning to work. I am fairly convinced at this point that off-chain transactions as described in the lightning docs [1] is the future. The block chain cannot possibly support all the transactions, there could be millions per second if micropayments do take off, and that will most likely happen via the channels as described in the lightning docs. [1] https://github.com/lightningnetwork/lightning-rfc/blob/master/00-introduction.md https://github.com/lightningnetwork/lightning-rfc/blob/maste... Edit: If you're not familiar with lightning, you should read up on it. The gist of it (my understanding, I am not exactly a bitcoin expert) is that if I trust someone, there is no need to announce to the whole world that I just gave my kids ice cream money, it's between me and them. And it's instant. The blockchain is used only as last resort, when one of the parties does not cooperate as as agreed.
- hossbeast 9y ago
  And with SegWit about to lock in, lightning is beginning to look likely
- MichaelGG 9y ago
  Internet connection? It's under 128kbps, less than a 2 channel ISDN link. And for someone that cannot afford a 100$ drive every 5 years, toss the old blocks after saving a checkpoint and just keep the last X months plus UTXOs? How does this improve with offchain transactions? What's the point of validating the blockchain if it's no longer a peer to peer network? That can't be any better than validating from checkpoints.
  - MichaelApproved 9y ago
    > It's under 128kbps, less than a 2 channel ISDN link. How long would it take you to download the initial data? I don't think a 2 channel ISDN link could ever catch up.
MichaelGG 9y ago
Do I have this right? Some miners want to increase blocksize, keeping Bitcoin in line with its original "peer to peer" nature, and thus are going to do Bitcoin Cash, with 8MB blocks to start. Others want Bitcoin to become a settlement layer, and certain backers have said that $1000 tx fees would be great, since that means BTC won as a settlement layer. This kills the peer to peer aspect though, and end users would rely on offchain third parties to actually get transactions done. This group has fought to keep small blocks, despite recent congestion and increasing fees. The argument is that increasing blocksize can't solve all problems so why even start, and that increasing it even a bit would somehow prevent regular people from validating the chain. Complicating matters a bit is that some miners have an optimised way of mining, exploiting Bitcoin block header layout to get an optimisation during hash calculations (AsicBoost). This is a 20% advantage but also encourages mining occasional empty blocks. AsicBoost is incompatible with many suggestions of changing the Bitcoin protocol, giving economic incentives to object to such things. This muddies the water. On the other side, companies have invested a lot into becoming clearinghouses (Coinbase) or inventing ways to do offchain tx (Blockstream) casting doubt on their intentions of killing P2P and making BTC just for settlements. It's not clear to me why an increase to 2 or 4MB wasn't done though. Perhaps to force the issue?
- apeace 9y ago
  Everything you said is correct AFAIK. > It's not clear to me why an increase to 2 or 4MB wasn't done though. Perhaps to force the issue? Yes, and it seems also out of spite. They could have increased to 2MB in order to avoid the horrible congestion on the network for a couple years. Once that was in place, they could have continued the SegWit work. In fact, originally, everyone was in support of SegWit. Even the big-blocks camp (we can see that from the New York Agreement, where virtually the whole industry supported both big-blocks and SegWit). The only reason so many like Bitcoin Cash are against it today is because the debate has become emotionally-charged and us-versus-them. SegWit is an all-around good idea. But the Core developers held out from a blocksize increase because, once they had declared that going from 1MB -> 2MB would be the end of the world, the network would become "centralized", etc, they didn't want to walk it back and simply compromise. IMO, this is the main reason the ecosystem is migrating to Ethereum. It's not because of the Turing-complete scripting that is possible on Ehtereum, it's because development has been a lot more sane. Despite the problems they've had (e.g. the DAO), the Ethereum ecosystem is more diverse and professional. They rationally discuss problems and make tradeoffs. They encourage alternate implementations, whereas the Core folks have engaged in baseless fear tactics to ensure theirs is the only implementation on the network[0] (and not talking about protocol changes--simply alternate implementations of the same protocols and consensus rules). I think unless these leadership problems are addressed somehow, Bitcoin is going to fade into obscurity as others, like Ethereum, lead the way. [0] https://web.archive.org/web/20160316061949/https://blog.conformal.com/the-bitcoin-consensus-red-herring/ https://web.archive.org/web/20160316061949/https://blog.conf... --- EDIT: Corrected "Bitcoin ABC" to "Bitcoin Cash"
ve55 9y ago
This should be very interesting. It's quite possible that this fork is negligible for awhile. But because parties such as Core will likely refuse to let the segwit2x part of segwit happen [1, many others], if the miners follow through on their promises, then this could be real entertaining to watch if the larger miners start switching to BCC during this later period. Just like when ETH split into ETH and ETC, it seemed as if almost everyone dumped their ETC coins as quickly as possible. But contrary to what most predicted, the chain ended up having real value. It seems like quite a few Bitcoin holders are planning on doing this as well, although many are being more cautious this time around and holding their BCC instead. You don't want to sell your stash of the next Bitcoin, just in case you're wrong. These things are impossible to predict for normal investors. [1] https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Segwit_support https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Segwit_support
- danmaz74 9y ago
  > You don't want to sell your stash of the next Bitcoin, just in case you're wrong If you think that the price will first crash and then bounce, you might want to sell your stash and then buy it back at a lower price. To keep the price up it wouldn't be enough to have many who wait and see; you also need lots of buyers for all the BCC that will be sold by those who have BTC and will want to get something out of their BCC as soon as possible.
kang 9y ago
Lets keep the blockchain protocol in the mind for a second. Now, given that bitcoin is born due to some problem with banks that the creator felt, what can the banks do at best? They can create a bank that cannot control printing of money by cryptographically publically proving the held amount and all transactions, backed by proof-of-work as a proof that they are revoking the rights to change their own books. How would such a bank look like? It would look like BitcoinCash(currency)+Viabtc(interface of the bank)+Bitmain(guards)+this particular dev group(sales) all of them owned by JihanWu. This is a prelimn form of the ultimate bank of the future. Epitome of centralised money. Will it succeed? Well for most people when they are asking this ques they are asking "will it rise in price?". Well I know there are shit ton of shitcoins that trade in the market, and this here is something that is the best form of something historically considered useful vs a group of people who are saying history was wrong and wanting decentralization but this group feels lost in this group noise of speculators.
k2xl 9y ago
Related, I posted recently a step by step guide on moving bitcoin out of an exchange (like Coinbase) to your own wallet. https://hackernoon.com/how-to-move-money-from-coinbase-to-your-own-wallet-2507aef1f717 https://hackernoon.com/how-to-move-money-from-coinbase-to-yo... Here is why you need to move from Coinbase to your own wallet before Aug 1st: https://keepingstock.net/move-your-coins-out-of-coinbase-to-a-wallet-that-you-can-control-before-aug-959ea4cd625a https://keepingstock.net/move-your-coins-out-of-coinbase-to-...
s73ver 9y ago
Why don't they just go make their own coin? Nobody is going to have confidence in a currency if the threat of forking is constantly over it's head.
PhrosTT 9y ago
What do you think the exchanges will do here (aka Coinbase) [Yes I know you should pull all your BTC off...]. If there is a hard fork, are they just going to wait until the dust settles and then give people access to both coins? I.E. BCC would magically appear in your account. Or do they seriously intend to not support one of the chains and just have all their users holding BTC worth X% less?
- jstanley 9y ago
  > What do you think the exchanges will do here (aka Coinbase) Here's what they say: https://support.coinbase.com/customer/portal/articles/2844217-uahf-uasf-faq https://support.coinbase.com/customer/portal/articles/284421... Notably: > Coinbase will not support the new blockchain or its associated coin.
  - ue_ 9y ago
    Coinfloor however says that they'll support Cash if it gains traction.
- GordonS 9y ago
  Bitstamp sent an email last night to say they won't support BCC, and will also be disabling withdrawals prior to the fork. Now would be a good time to get your BTC out of Bitstamp, to ensure you get access to your BCC coins when the fork takes place.
rcarrigan87 9y ago
Still wrapping my head around the Bitcoin ecosystem, but listened to an interview of Nick Szabo by Tim Ferris where Nick pretty explicitly indicates that increasing the block size isn't a good idea and shouldn't even be a debate. He makes it sound like anyone in the "know" understands this. What is the argument for the other side? A Reddit post has the quote here, but I recommend the whole interview. https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/6fhmge/nick_szabo_theres_an_obsessive_group_of_people/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/6fhmge/nick_szabo_... https://tim.blog/2017/06/04/nick-szabo/ https://tim.blog/2017/06/04/nick-szabo/
- MichaelGG 9y ago
  Satoshi said blockchain size isn't an issue, and the solution is to not care about how big it gets. For this guy to pretend this is some super advanced thing mere mortals can't understand and shouldn't talk about is obscene.
- TD-Linux 9y ago
  He's probably referring to this handy chart of Bitcoin Core developer support of current hard and soft forks: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Segwit_support https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Segwit_support However, I think it's incorrect to say most developers disagree with increasing the block size or a hard fork. Segwit increases the block size, as do hard forks proposed by some Bitcoin Core developers like Spoonnet [1]. There is just a general dislike towards the existing technical proposals. [1] https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/bitcoin-dev/2017-February/013542.html https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/bitcoin-dev/2017...
- wolco 9y ago
  We must look very closely at experts who made the argument that anyone who is an expert agrees and understands this. If you do not agree you are not in the 'know'. This shouldn't even be discussed now that experts like myself have stated our opinion. This topic seems technical but at it's core it is about self interest, fear and money.
- Obi_Juan_Kenobi 9y ago
  > He makes it sound like anyone in the "know" understands this. That's quite telling, isn't it? There's this huge debate, but his argument is that it's obvious? From a 'tradition' or 'legacy' standpoint, the blocksize limit was never meant to be a persistent thing. It was not present in the whitepaper or the initial implementations, and when Satoshi added it, it was explicitly stated that the limit should be raised as needed and as computer hardware and network capacity increased. When Satoshi left, the project was handed to Gavin, who has gone to great lengths to support blocksize increase. Similarly, other early developers like Jeff Garzik and Mike Hearn strongly support on-chain scaling. I think it is quite fair to say that the original intention for the limit was simply an anti-spam measure, and was not intended to limit network usage, for whatever that's worth. Larger blocks require more cost to run a node. It costs more network capacity, more storage, more time to spin up a node, etc. The argument is that these costs will decrease node count to a dangerous degree. More network use could, however, create incentive for more people to run nodes. Clearly there's a trade-off between extremes, so a careful consideration must be made about where the best trade-off occurs. Larger blocks are a liability to miners as they increase the chance of orphaned blocks. This has two primary effects: it places a natural limit to the block size miners are willing to mine, and it creates incentives for miners to have excellent network access to the rest of the network. This later issue can mean mining centralization. This is one of the core arguments against increasing block size, but it's a very complicated issue. One of the primary confounders is ASIC development, which means rapid capital turnover and short investment timelines for mining. As ASIC development reaches state-of-the-art node sizes, and also as the Bitcoin price stabilizes, mining investment looks very different. This is very difficult to predict. Small blocks greatly limit what Bitcoin can do. It places a hard cap on transaction throughput. The formation of a transaction fee market greatly discourages small transactions, making Bitcoin inaccessible to a wide range of people. It makes any address with Bitcoin less than the txn fee effectively unspendable. In the extreme, it limits Bitcoin to the role of digital gold, a speculation vehicle with little use as a medium of transaction. There are two big open questions: * Will larger blocks lead to dangerous centralization? * Will 2nd layer solutions provide effective scaling solutions? In the end, all of this deals with trade-offs, but worse, trade-offs with difficult-to-quantify risks at either extreme. I simply would not trust anyone that is dogmatic about their favored approach. My personal view is that the conservative approach with least risk is to permit moderate blocksize increases while 2nd layer solutions are being developed, and to continue the debate as the network develops. This is, in effect, exactly what the '2X' compromise does.
slashzeppelin 9y ago
It's the culmination of a years-old debate. Looking at both arguments in a positive light, Bitcoin Cash wants to stick to the original idealistic vision of Bitcoin, and is offering a temporary solution for it. Bitcoin wants a better solution, and is ready to make some ideological compromises in exchange for growing the chain faster and making it easily usable. Idealism vs pragmatism.
- placeybordeaux 9y ago
  I don't think there was anything about the "original idealistic" vision of bitcoin that was explicitly against secure off-chain tx. Rolling back segwit is shooting yourself in the foot because your enemy told you that it was a bad idea. Who would want tx malleability?
apeace 9y ago
Something I haven't seen in the comments yet: it's a realistic possibility that the Core team will make a change to Bitcon's proof-of-work, with the explicit goal of shutting down miners' efforts to implement the "2X" part of Segwit2X (a block size increase). So while disaster has been avoided for now, and Bitcoin Cash is unlikely to garner much support, they could become the longest chain within a year or two if they keep at it. As the Bitcoin Cash developer said in the article: > If the Segwit2x agreement fails to implement the 2x part, which is not entirely unreasonable, and only ends up being being basically SegWit without the 2x, many miners will likely defect to Bitcoin Cash. He's right. The Core-versus-the-world battle is far from over.
- flashdance 9y ago
  > He's right. The Core-versus-the-world battle is far from over. Proposals from the core development team have widespread support from businesses and exchanges [1]. Saying it's bitcoin core versus the world is a tad bit hyperbolic. [1] https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Segwit_support https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Segwit_support
  - apeace 9y ago
    Yes, SegWit has always had widespread support. But what I would call "most of the industry" supports a block size increase, in addition to SegWit[0]. As I said in the parent comment, rather than making a compromise with this huge portion of the community, Core has discussed changing the proof of work algorithm in order to shut them out. I don't think "Core versus the world" is hyperbolic at all. EDIT: To add to that, remember that Core had to propose a soft-fork which risked a chain split in order to force SegWit into activation. Many were holding back support for the promise of a block size increase. That is why SegWit is now going to lock in: because the New York Agreement folks rallied together, compromised like adults, and agreed to implement both SegWit and a block size increase. [0] https://medium.com/@DCGco/bitcoin-scaling-agreement-at-consensus-2017-133521fe9a77 https://medium.com/@DCGco/bitcoin-scaling-agreement-at-conse...
josh2600 9y ago
This whole thing is actually really straightforward if you evaluate it from the perspective of governance. In bitcoin, miners run software and the software they run controls the performance of the network. Miners therefore control the future software state of the network. Anything that moves transactions off of the network or decreases the number of miners queried per transaction is therefore antithetical. If you are a miner, lightning and segwit just hurt you. The only way you'll allow them is if you believe that to do otherwise would slay the golden goose. Edit: Source: I run a crypto hedge fund.
- Obi_Juan_Kenobi 9y ago
  The counterpoint to this (not that I necessarily disagree) would be that 2nd layers solutions add new value to the network, and thus add value to a Bitcoin transaction. This is very likely to occur to some degree (e.g. micro-transactions and fast retail transactions that Bitcoin can't do), but will also cannibalize some on-chain activity. Also, altcoins present a real competitive risk; failure to maintain an advantage over them will see network value approach zero.
GordonS 9y ago
I hold a small amount of Bitcoin today (in my own wallet, not in an exchange). How do I access my Bitcoin Cash coins after the split? Is there another wallet I need to install? Also, is there any news on what exchanges will trade Bitcoin Cash?
bitcoinfused 9y ago
I've got some stored in a client called bitcoin-qt, which I haven't opened in years and I expect would take months to catch up with the block chain as it is. Should I be worried about trying to shift them before (or after) the fork? Am I likely to be tied into which ever fork the bitcoin-qt maintainers support? Should I be trying to transfer to a paper wallet before the fork?
- cesarb 9y ago
  If you haven't opened it in years, do nothing. Wait for the dust to settle. Then you can decide what to do with it; whatever you have in that wallet will still be valid on both sides of the fork.
placeybordeaux 9y ago
One important detail that this article is missing is that the proposed fork forces a new sighash. This is important because it prevents a replay attack. https://steemit.com/bitcoincash/@bitbizke/bitcoin-cash-implements-strong-replay-protection https://steemit.com/bitcoincash/@bitbizke/bitcoin-cash-imple...
GigabyteCoin 9y ago
>Indeed, the cryptocurrency is currently trading at $461, meaning it's worth about 18% of bitcoin's current price of $2,568, in an already-open futures market. This statement needs a lot of asterisks added to it imho. BCC has been trading at $600K USD volume in the past 24 hours [0] compared to Bitcoin's trading volume topping over $600M USD in the same time period. BCC futures have only been trading on a single, unpopular exchange, that does not allow withdrawal of the coins being traded until only after the fork takes place. If you can send them BCC to trade before the fork, I fail to see why you can only cash out after the fork. I'm all for Bigger Blocks, but claiming that BCC has 18% support of the community based on that single price valuation is extremely misleading imho. From a volume standpoint, I would argue that it has less than 1% support of the community at large. [0] https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/bitcoin-cash/ https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/bitcoin-cash/
runeks 9y ago
Question: according to Coin Dance[1], SegWit will lock in around 14 days from now. Will the max block size be what the SegWit code says, or the 2MB that SegWit2x has chosen? There is a majority of nodes running Bitcoin Core, but a majority of miners that run SegWit2x nodes. So what will happen? https://coin.dance/blocks#proposals https://coin.dance/blocks#proposals
kbody 9y ago
Keep in mind, that there's an big amount of propaganda going on in the comments and a lot of selective arguments floating, so don't take a single comment for an absolute truth. (including this comment) One thing is for sure, that there are many dynamics at different levels in conflict around this situation.

170 points by nicpottier 9y ago

Javascript developer: "We like to constantly replace all our frameworks every 18 months" Cryptocurrency developer: "Hold my beer"

artursapek 9y ago
Bitcoin actually rarely changes, which is why this is a big event. You're probably thinking of all of the shitcoins/ICOs that come out nearly every day - make no mistake, those are a cash grab.
- woah 9y ago
  Only bitcoin is the one true religion
- Taek 9y ago
  This is only a big event if you choose to run the BitcoinCash software. If you stick with Bitcoin-core you aren't even going to notice that a thing happened.
  - artursapek 9y ago
    It's still a big event in that all of the exchanges have had to take a stance on the fork. And there will be an initial competition between the two forks, like with Ethereum and "Ethereum Classic" (in that case, the new fork actually won over the unchanged version).
  - geofft 9y ago
    It matters for the ability to convert BTC to other currencies (like USD), right? If I'm understanding this right, an existing bitcoin is now valid in both the BTC chain and the BCC chain, and presumably the world isn't going to let you sell the resulting BTC for its previous value and the resulting BCC for its previous value (since the two sales would now be transactions on two different chains). So unless BCC fails completely, the market value of BTC will be reduced by the market value of BCC, which seems like a thing you'd notice.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
    - fapjacks 9y ago
      Yes, this is right, but it appears that the value of the original coin and the forked coin don't correlate with one another too strongly after the fork. I mean here that it appears that the market value of BTC will not be reduced by the market value of GCC, in such a manner as you suggest. The less popular coin after the fork certainly is less valuable, but after the fork, the two values follow their own destinies, unrelated to one another.

hn_throwaway_99 9y ago

This is not surprising. The miners (or I guess I should say "some miners") want to retain their power by keeping all transactions on-chain in Bitcoin Cash, but I think at the end of the day a coin only has value if it has wide acceptance in the community, mainly including the people who actually use it for transactions. I think Bitcoin Cash will fail, but in the short term people will try to see how far "greater fool theory" will go by selling their Bitcoin Cash coins while still holding on to their bitcoins on the main blockchain.

dcosson 9y ago
Why is that greater fool theory?
- Tyr42 9y ago
  That you'll buy it so you can sell it to the next, greater fool to come along. The bubble keeps expanding as long as people think there are "greater fools" to take it off their hands.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
- hn_throwaway_99 9y ago
  Because I think there will be a lot of people who don't think that Bitcoin Cash has long term value, but will try to make a quick buck off it before it goes to 0.
smokeyj 9y ago
> want to retain their power by keeping all transactions on-chain in Bitcoin Cash Exactly what power is that? The power to collect smaller mining fees? Honest question - what's the status of Lightning? Core promotes it as the solution to scaling and it's essentially a page on github. Litecoin already has Segwit and no one is using Lightning. Am I missing something here?

simias 9y ago

Another difference is the project says it will support multiple implementations of its software, a move that's not surprising given the criticism that Bitcoin Core's software is too dominant on the bitcoin network. What does that mean exactly? Bitcoin being open source and anybody being able to connect to the network means that anybody can fork the client if they want to, doesn't it? After all that's exactly what this Bitcoin ABC fork is doing.

jstanley 9y ago
Yep. You're right, it doesn't mean anything. What they're trying to say is they'll support multiple implementations of the software on the same network (unlike Bitcoin ABC, which is a fork of the software and a fork of the network). But Bitcoin already supports that too. There is bitcoin core, bitcoin knots, bitcoinj, btc1, bitcore all running on the same network.
- TD-Linux 9y ago
  I think they also may be referring to some Bitcoin Core authors recommending against other implementations - the concern is if the implementations contain an error in the consensus code, they could accidentally fork off, and potentially lose funds for the user. For similar reasons, Bitcoin Core builds reproducible static builds and recommends those, the minimize the chance of behavior divergence. But you're right - it's merely a suggestion from a portion of the developers, and it certainly doesn't stop anyone.

jsnathan 9y ago

Chains splitting off is a very interesting phenomenon. Just like with Ethereum Classic splitting off Ethereum, the value of the original chain can be divided into two, albeit unequal, parts. The process may even create new value - though I suppose it might just as well destroy value. What I've also wondered about though is multiple chains combining into one. Does anyone know if this has happened before? I believe there is a strong analogy here to how company stock can evolve, when companies are either split out as separate entities, or merged into one, respectively.

Rmilb 9y ago
Multiple chains that have diverged in the past can never join together. Unless you want to double the amount of total coins in the network. Its technically possible if two different chains wanted to merge they could decide on which block they will merge at, but there is the huge issue of agreeing on an exchange rate between the both old coins to the new coins.
- rtkwe 9y ago
  From a strict ledger of transactions metaphor of the blockchain they could be joined without double value but it'd require that all blocks from both chains were strictly disjoint sets of transactions and no account overspent when combining both chains. On a more real technical level though the protocol doesn't have a way to have two parent blocks even if the two chains satisfied the conditions to avoid double spending.
- jsnathan 9y ago
  Right, and that's a lot like agreeing on an acquisition price in the case of a merger. There too stock in the acquired company is commonly traded for stock in the acquiring company at agreed upon prices. And technically, I think it must remain possible as long as you can always simply issue a new token with a certain starting distribution.
fab13n 9y ago
> multiple chains combining into one. Does anyone know if this has happened before? I don't think it happened on any meaningful chain. It could be donetechnically through a proof-of-burn on the giving chain, and the corresponding minting on the receiving chain. Something loosely comparable would be conversion from a token to another within the same blockchain, and this must have happened quite a few times on Ethereum; but that's within a single blockchain, so arguably doesn't count. However when you see how difficult it is, in terms of governance, to address such an obvious issue as Bitcoin's tiny throughput, I can't imagine two distinct chains agree, in a timely fashion, both on the principle of a merge, and on the way to execute it. Maybe on-chain governance, as proposed by Tezos, will fix this problematic indecisiveness on blockchain evolutions, we'll see.

serg_chernata 9y ago

This is going to be a failed attempt of starting yet another altcoin. Just because this carries the "bitcoin" name doesn't make it any more special.

um_ya 9y ago
They've tried bitcoin classic, bitcoin unlimited, bitcoin ABC, bitcoin cash... It's the same small group that jumps to each one.
Taek 9y ago
It has special meaning to people frustrated with the stubborn refusal from bitcoin-core to raise the block size. Bitcoin has two major factions, and this is more or less a peaceful way for them to split out. I'm hoping it decreases the overall level of conflict, as both groups will be able to get what they want here.
- thefalcon 9y ago
  The comments here (which overall are measured and reasonable relative to elsewhere) lead me to believe that this "us vs them" combative mentality will continue. It seems as long as there are two chains, supporters of one will still be trying to attack and hope for the demise of the other, even though I share your hope that the opposite will happen.
- seppin 9y ago
  > bitcoin-core Who is this? who can "decide" to make changes in the original BC protocol. As far as I can see, no one can.

zck 9y ago

So if I have coin on, say, coinbase, what should I do? Should I withdraw it to a wallet before August 1, so I can access both Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash?

nicpottier 9y ago
I would not keep coins sitting in coinbase either way, so the decision is easy. Move it off. If you aren't planning on selling anytime soon then do it to a paper wallet or get a Trezor or the like if you want to actually use your coins. But don't trust any third party with your coins, especially Coinbase which isn't sharing the private keys with you.
- CyberDildonics 9y ago
  Absolutely not. Keeping coins on coinbase means on the split you have your normal balance, but coinbase keeps your bitcoin cash balance. Take your money out of an exchange, it should not be kept there in the first place! If you don't own the private keys, you don't own your bitcoin. If it is on coinbase, you don't control it, you are just asking them for permission.
- zck 9y ago
  Well, the decision isn't especially easy, given that I also don't feel comfortable having a bunch of cash sit out on a table in my kitchen. So I'd have to figure out a wallet strategy that made sense. Maybe I'll make a paper wallet this weekend? Hrm, security is hard.

CaliforniaKarl 9y ago

Reminder: You can monitor https://www.btcforkmonitor.info https://www.btcforkmonitor.info to see when the forks take place. (The site was discussed in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14809259 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14809259)

Nursie 9y ago

So... were I a bitcoin holder at the present time (I'm not) then I'm potentially going to have those same bitcoin on two chains? So depending on what value is held in either chain this could be a huge financial boost? Unless of course this tanks the system entirely, but that seems unlikely.

Taek 9y ago
Most likely the sum value of each token is not going to be much different from the pre-split value of the original token. Or if it is, it means that people on both sides are relieved and optimistic about this technique for conflict resolution, and really do see it as value added. If you care about one token over the other, the best thing to do is let the dust settle, then sell all of your non-preferred token for the preferred token. Financially, this should not set you back even if you prefer the minority token - you just end up with a bunch of them, and the total value of your wallet is still about the same.
jstanley 9y ago
It won't be a huge financial boost. Bitcoin isn't worth $2500 per Bitcoin by magic. It's worth that because of supply and demand. The only change might be that some of the demand shifts to BitcoinCash instead of Bitcoin, meaning the price of both will be lower than the price of Bitcoin now, but they'll likely add up to about the same amount.

gtrubetskoy 9y ago

8MB block means the block chain grows by 1,207,959,552 (~1GB) per day, or ~365GB per year. This means that now not everyone has the internet connection or the disk space to keep a copy of the block chain, and more control is in the hands of the miners. I understand the reason for a larger block - it seems like it's pure profit for the miners (should we just refer to it as greed?), but I do not understand the objection to SegWit which is essential for lightning to work. I am fairly convinced at this point that off-chain transactions as described in the lightning docs [1] is the future. The block chain cannot possibly support all the transactions, there could be millions per second if micropayments do take off, and that will most likely happen via the channels as described in the lightning docs. [1] https://github.com/lightningnetwork/lightning-rfc/blob/master/00-introduction.md https://github.com/lightningnetwork/lightning-rfc/blob/maste... Edit: If you're not familiar with lightning, you should read up on it. The gist of it (my understanding, I am not exactly a bitcoin expert) is that if I trust someone, there is no need to announce to the whole world that I just gave my kids ice cream money, it's between me and them. And it's instant. The blockchain is used only as last resort, when one of the parties does not cooperate as as agreed.

hossbeast 9y ago
And with SegWit about to lock in, lightning is beginning to look likely
MichaelGG 9y ago
Internet connection? It's under 128kbps, less than a 2 channel ISDN link. And for someone that cannot afford a 100$ drive every 5 years, toss the old blocks after saving a checkpoint and just keep the last X months plus UTXOs? How does this improve with offchain transactions? What's the point of validating the blockchain if it's no longer a peer to peer network? That can't be any better than validating from checkpoints.
- MichaelApproved 9y ago
  > It's under 128kbps, less than a 2 channel ISDN link. How long would it take you to download the initial data? I don't think a 2 channel ISDN link could ever catch up.

MichaelGG 9y ago

Do I have this right? Some miners want to increase blocksize, keeping Bitcoin in line with its original "peer to peer" nature, and thus are going to do Bitcoin Cash, with 8MB blocks to start. Others want Bitcoin to become a settlement layer, and certain backers have said that $1000 tx fees would be great, since that means BTC won as a settlement layer. This kills the peer to peer aspect though, and end users would rely on offchain third parties to actually get transactions done. This group has fought to keep small blocks, despite recent congestion and increasing fees. The argument is that increasing blocksize can't solve all problems so why even start, and that increasing it even a bit would somehow prevent regular people from validating the chain. Complicating matters a bit is that some miners have an optimised way of mining, exploiting Bitcoin block header layout to get an optimisation during hash calculations (AsicBoost). This is a 20% advantage but also encourages mining occasional empty blocks. AsicBoost is incompatible with many suggestions of changing the Bitcoin protocol, giving economic incentives to object to such things. This muddies the water. On the other side, companies have invested a lot into becoming clearinghouses (Coinbase) or inventing ways to do offchain tx (Blockstream) casting doubt on their intentions of killing P2P and making BTC just for settlements. It's not clear to me why an increase to 2 or 4MB wasn't done though. Perhaps to force the issue?

apeace 9y ago
Everything you said is correct AFAIK. > It's not clear to me why an increase to 2 or 4MB wasn't done though. Perhaps to force the issue? Yes, and it seems also out of spite. They could have increased to 2MB in order to avoid the horrible congestion on the network for a couple years. Once that was in place, they could have continued the SegWit work. In fact, originally, everyone was in support of SegWit. Even the big-blocks camp (we can see that from the New York Agreement, where virtually the whole industry supported both big-blocks and SegWit). The only reason so many like Bitcoin Cash are against it today is because the debate has become emotionally-charged and us-versus-them. SegWit is an all-around good idea. But the Core developers held out from a blocksize increase because, once they had declared that going from 1MB -> 2MB would be the end of the world, the network would become "centralized", etc, they didn't want to walk it back and simply compromise. IMO, this is the main reason the ecosystem is migrating to Ethereum. It's not because of the Turing-complete scripting that is possible on Ehtereum, it's because development has been a lot more sane. Despite the problems they've had (e.g. the DAO), the Ethereum ecosystem is more diverse and professional. They rationally discuss problems and make tradeoffs. They encourage alternate implementations, whereas the Core folks have engaged in baseless fear tactics to ensure theirs is the only implementation on the network[0] (and not talking about protocol changes--simply alternate implementations of the same protocols and consensus rules). I think unless these leadership problems are addressed somehow, Bitcoin is going to fade into obscurity as others, like Ethereum, lead the way. [0] https://web.archive.org/web/20160316061949/https://blog.conformal.com/the-bitcoin-consensus-red-herring/ https://web.archive.org/web/20160316061949/https://blog.conf... --- EDIT: Corrected "Bitcoin ABC" to "Bitcoin Cash"

ve55 9y ago

This should be very interesting. It's quite possible that this fork is negligible for awhile. But because parties such as Core will likely refuse to let the segwit2x part of segwit happen [1, many others], if the miners follow through on their promises, then this could be real entertaining to watch if the larger miners start switching to BCC during this later period. Just like when ETH split into ETH and ETC, it seemed as if almost everyone dumped their ETC coins as quickly as possible. But contrary to what most predicted, the chain ended up having real value. It seems like quite a few Bitcoin holders are planning on doing this as well, although many are being more cautious this time around and holding their BCC instead. You don't want to sell your stash of the next Bitcoin, just in case you're wrong. These things are impossible to predict for normal investors. [1] https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Segwit_support https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Segwit_support

danmaz74 9y ago
> You don't want to sell your stash of the next Bitcoin, just in case you're wrong If you think that the price will first crash and then bounce, you might want to sell your stash and then buy it back at a lower price. To keep the price up it wouldn't be enough to have many who wait and see; you also need lots of buyers for all the BCC that will be sold by those who have BTC and will want to get something out of their BCC as soon as possible.

kang 9y ago

Lets keep the blockchain protocol in the mind for a second. Now, given that bitcoin is born due to some problem with banks that the creator felt, what can the banks do at best? They can create a bank that cannot control printing of money by cryptographically publically proving the held amount and all transactions, backed by proof-of-work as a proof that they are revoking the rights to change their own books. How would such a bank look like? It would look like BitcoinCash(currency)+Viabtc(interface of the bank)+Bitmain(guards)+this particular dev group(sales) all of them owned by JihanWu. This is a prelimn form of the ultimate bank of the future. Epitome of centralised money. Will it succeed? Well for most people when they are asking this ques they are asking "will it rise in price?". Well I know there are shit ton of shitcoins that trade in the market, and this here is something that is the best form of something historically considered useful vs a group of people who are saying history was wrong and wanting decentralization but this group feels lost in this group noise of speculators.

k2xl 9y ago

Related, I posted recently a step by step guide on moving bitcoin out of an exchange (like Coinbase) to your own wallet. https://hackernoon.com/how-to-move-money-from-coinbase-to-your-own-wallet-2507aef1f717 https://hackernoon.com/how-to-move-money-from-coinbase-to-yo... Here is why you need to move from Coinbase to your own wallet before Aug 1st: https://keepingstock.net/move-your-coins-out-of-coinbase-to-a-wallet-that-you-can-control-before-aug-959ea4cd625a https://keepingstock.net/move-your-coins-out-of-coinbase-to-...

s73ver 9y ago

Why don't they just go make their own coin? Nobody is going to have confidence in a currency if the threat of forking is constantly over it's head.

PhrosTT 9y ago

What do you think the exchanges will do here (aka Coinbase) [Yes I know you should pull all your BTC off...]. If there is a hard fork, are they just going to wait until the dust settles and then give people access to both coins? I.E. BCC would magically appear in your account. Or do they seriously intend to not support one of the chains and just have all their users holding BTC worth X% less?

jstanley 9y ago
> What do you think the exchanges will do here (aka Coinbase) Here's what they say: https://support.coinbase.com/customer/portal/articles/2844217-uahf-uasf-faq https://support.coinbase.com/customer/portal/articles/284421... Notably: > Coinbase will not support the new blockchain or its associated coin.
- ue_ 9y ago
  Coinfloor however says that they'll support Cash if it gains traction.
GordonS 9y ago
Bitstamp sent an email last night to say they won't support BCC, and will also be disabling withdrawals prior to the fork. Now would be a good time to get your BTC out of Bitstamp, to ensure you get access to your BCC coins when the fork takes place.

rcarrigan87 9y ago

Still wrapping my head around the Bitcoin ecosystem, but listened to an interview of Nick Szabo by Tim Ferris where Nick pretty explicitly indicates that increasing the block size isn't a good idea and shouldn't even be a debate. He makes it sound like anyone in the "know" understands this. What is the argument for the other side? A Reddit post has the quote here, but I recommend the whole interview. https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/6fhmge/nick_szabo_theres_an_obsessive_group_of_people/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/6fhmge/nick_szabo_... https://tim.blog/2017/06/04/nick-szabo/ https://tim.blog/2017/06/04/nick-szabo/

MichaelGG 9y ago
Satoshi said blockchain size isn't an issue, and the solution is to not care about how big it gets. For this guy to pretend this is some super advanced thing mere mortals can't understand and shouldn't talk about is obscene.
TD-Linux 9y ago
He's probably referring to this handy chart of Bitcoin Core developer support of current hard and soft forks: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Segwit_support https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Segwit_support However, I think it's incorrect to say most developers disagree with increasing the block size or a hard fork. Segwit increases the block size, as do hard forks proposed by some Bitcoin Core developers like Spoonnet [1]. There is just a general dislike towards the existing technical proposals. [1] https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/bitcoin-dev/2017-February/013542.html https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/bitcoin-dev/2017...
wolco 9y ago
We must look very closely at experts who made the argument that anyone who is an expert agrees and understands this. If you do not agree you are not in the 'know'. This shouldn't even be discussed now that experts like myself have stated our opinion. This topic seems technical but at it's core it is about self interest, fear and money.
Obi_Juan_Kenobi 9y ago
> He makes it sound like anyone in the "know" understands this. That's quite telling, isn't it? There's this huge debate, but his argument is that it's obvious? From a 'tradition' or 'legacy' standpoint, the blocksize limit was never meant to be a persistent thing. It was not present in the whitepaper or the initial implementations, and when Satoshi added it, it was explicitly stated that the limit should be raised as needed and as computer hardware and network capacity increased. When Satoshi left, the project was handed to Gavin, who has gone to great lengths to support blocksize increase. Similarly, other early developers like Jeff Garzik and Mike Hearn strongly support on-chain scaling. I think it is quite fair to say that the original intention for the limit was simply an anti-spam measure, and was not intended to limit network usage, for whatever that's worth. Larger blocks require more cost to run a node. It costs more network capacity, more storage, more time to spin up a node, etc. The argument is that these costs will decrease node count to a dangerous degree. More network use could, however, create incentive for more people to run nodes. Clearly there's a trade-off between extremes, so a careful consideration must be made about where the best trade-off occurs. Larger blocks are a liability to miners as they increase the chance of orphaned blocks. This has two primary effects: it places a natural limit to the block size miners are willing to mine, and it creates incentives for miners to have excellent network access to the rest of the network. This later issue can mean mining centralization. This is one of the core arguments against increasing block size, but it's a very complicated issue. One of the primary confounders is ASIC development, which means rapid capital turnover and short investment timelines for mining. As ASIC development reaches state-of-the-art node sizes, and also as the Bitcoin price stabilizes, mining investment looks very different. This is very difficult to predict. Small blocks greatly limit what Bitcoin can do. It places a hard cap on transaction throughput. The formation of a transaction fee market greatly discourages small transactions, making Bitcoin inaccessible to a wide range of people. It makes any address with Bitcoin less than the txn fee effectively unspendable. In the extreme, it limits Bitcoin to the role of digital gold, a speculation vehicle with little use as a medium of transaction. There are two big open questions: * Will larger blocks lead to dangerous centralization? * Will 2nd layer solutions provide effective scaling solutions? In the end, all of this deals with trade-offs, but worse, trade-offs with difficult-to-quantify risks at either extreme. I simply would not trust anyone that is dogmatic about their favored approach. My personal view is that the conservative approach with least risk is to permit moderate blocksize increases while 2nd layer solutions are being developed, and to continue the debate as the network develops. This is, in effect, exactly what the '2X' compromise does.

slashzeppelin 9y ago

It's the culmination of a years-old debate. Looking at both arguments in a positive light, Bitcoin Cash wants to stick to the original idealistic vision of Bitcoin, and is offering a temporary solution for it. Bitcoin wants a better solution, and is ready to make some ideological compromises in exchange for growing the chain faster and making it easily usable. Idealism vs pragmatism.

placeybordeaux 9y ago
I don't think there was anything about the "original idealistic" vision of bitcoin that was explicitly against secure off-chain tx. Rolling back segwit is shooting yourself in the foot because your enemy told you that it was a bad idea. Who would want tx malleability?

apeace 9y ago

Something I haven't seen in the comments yet: it's a realistic possibility that the Core team will make a change to Bitcon's proof-of-work, with the explicit goal of shutting down miners' efforts to implement the "2X" part of Segwit2X (a block size increase). So while disaster has been avoided for now, and Bitcoin Cash is unlikely to garner much support, they could become the longest chain within a year or two if they keep at it. As the Bitcoin Cash developer said in the article: > If the Segwit2x agreement fails to implement the 2x part, which is not entirely unreasonable, and only ends up being being basically SegWit without the 2x, many miners will likely defect to Bitcoin Cash. He's right. The Core-versus-the-world battle is far from over.

flashdance 9y ago
> He's right. The Core-versus-the-world battle is far from over. Proposals from the core development team have widespread support from businesses and exchanges [1]. Saying it's bitcoin core versus the world is a tad bit hyperbolic. [1] https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Segwit_support https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Segwit_support
- apeace 9y ago
  Yes, SegWit has always had widespread support. But what I would call "most of the industry" supports a block size increase, in addition to SegWit[0]. As I said in the parent comment, rather than making a compromise with this huge portion of the community, Core has discussed changing the proof of work algorithm in order to shut them out. I don't think "Core versus the world" is hyperbolic at all. EDIT: To add to that, remember that Core had to propose a soft-fork which risked a chain split in order to force SegWit into activation. Many were holding back support for the promise of a block size increase. That is why SegWit is now going to lock in: because the New York Agreement folks rallied together, compromised like adults, and agreed to implement both SegWit and a block size increase. [0] https://medium.com/@DCGco/bitcoin-scaling-agreement-at-consensus-2017-133521fe9a77 https://medium.com/@DCGco/bitcoin-scaling-agreement-at-conse...

josh2600 9y ago

This whole thing is actually really straightforward if you evaluate it from the perspective of governance. In bitcoin, miners run software and the software they run controls the performance of the network. Miners therefore control the future software state of the network. Anything that moves transactions off of the network or decreases the number of miners queried per transaction is therefore antithetical. If you are a miner, lightning and segwit just hurt you. The only way you'll allow them is if you believe that to do otherwise would slay the golden goose. Edit: Source: I run a crypto hedge fund.

Obi_Juan_Kenobi 9y ago
The counterpoint to this (not that I necessarily disagree) would be that 2nd layers solutions add new value to the network, and thus add value to a Bitcoin transaction. This is very likely to occur to some degree (e.g. micro-transactions and fast retail transactions that Bitcoin can't do), but will also cannibalize some on-chain activity. Also, altcoins present a real competitive risk; failure to maintain an advantage over them will see network value approach zero.

GordonS 9y ago

I hold a small amount of Bitcoin today (in my own wallet, not in an exchange). How do I access my Bitcoin Cash coins after the split? Is there another wallet I need to install? Also, is there any news on what exchanges will trade Bitcoin Cash?

bitcoinfused 9y ago

I've got some stored in a client called bitcoin-qt, which I haven't opened in years and I expect would take months to catch up with the block chain as it is. Should I be worried about trying to shift them before (or after) the fork? Am I likely to be tied into which ever fork the bitcoin-qt maintainers support? Should I be trying to transfer to a paper wallet before the fork?

cesarb 9y ago
If you haven't opened it in years, do nothing. Wait for the dust to settle. Then you can decide what to do with it; whatever you have in that wallet will still be valid on both sides of the fork.

placeybordeaux 9y ago

One important detail that this article is missing is that the proposed fork forces a new sighash. This is important because it prevents a replay attack. https://steemit.com/bitcoincash/@bitbizke/bitcoin-cash-implements-strong-replay-protection https://steemit.com/bitcoincash/@bitbizke/bitcoin-cash-imple...

GigabyteCoin 9y ago

>Indeed, the cryptocurrency is currently trading at $461, meaning it's worth about 18% of bitcoin's current price of $2,568, in an already-open futures market. This statement needs a lot of asterisks added to it imho. BCC has been trading at $600K USD volume in the past 24 hours [0] compared to Bitcoin's trading volume topping over $600M USD in the same time period. BCC futures have only been trading on a single, unpopular exchange, that does not allow withdrawal of the coins being traded until only after the fork takes place. If you can send them BCC to trade before the fork, I fail to see why you can only cash out after the fork. I'm all for Bigger Blocks, but claiming that BCC has 18% support of the community based on that single price valuation is extremely misleading imho. From a volume standpoint, I would argue that it has less than 1% support of the community at large. [0] https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/bitcoin-cash/ https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/bitcoin-cash/

runeks 9y ago

Question: according to Coin Dance[1], SegWit will lock in around 14 days from now. Will the max block size be what the SegWit code says, or the 2MB that SegWit2x has chosen? There is a majority of nodes running Bitcoin Core, but a majority of miners that run SegWit2x nodes. So what will happen? https://coin.dance/blocks#proposals https://coin.dance/blocks#proposals

kbody 9y ago

Keep in mind, that there's an big amount of propaganda going on in the comments and a lot of selective arguments floating, so don't take a single comment for an absolute truth. (including this comment) One thing is for sure, that there are many dynamics at different levels in conflict around this situation.