Why Bitcoin is Forking

Ah, the never-ending bitcoin scaling debate. After years of highly tense talks and discussions, the scaling issue has finally taken center stage this past month and figures to continue to do so until the end of October. While it has been positive following the BIP91 lock-in, news of Bitcoin Cash splitting from bitcoin dropped a bombshell and threatens to do damage to the network (or could be a positive thing, as they argue).

For me, I'm sitting back and seeing how it all unfolds (while also protecting my BTC in my hardware wallet). It is, afterall, the first ever situation where we are experiencing a split in the network.

Developer Calin Culianu, who is contributing code to Bitcoin Cash, was asked what their goal was and laments that it is "to save bitcoin. We want to scale bitcoin up so that it won't die. It's already a bit sick and dying."

He went on to say that "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."

So, what is Bitcoin Cash exactly? Well, there are two main changes of note:

1. It increases the block size to 8 MB.
2. It removes SegWit, a code change that might activate on the bitcoin blockchain by the end of August.

In conclusion, I'll leave it to Alyssa Hertig writing for Coindesk, when she says:

"...without much support from miners and users, [Bitcoin Cash] might not end up having that much of an impact on the course of the main network.

Nonetheless, it might if be worth watching if the second half of Segwit2x falls through. That's when it might see some more supporters."

We shall see. For more information check out the CoinDesk article under sources, and stay informed everybody!

Sources:

CoinDesk

Image Sources:

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