The lingering Bitcoin blocks size debacle is once again causing significant controversy among Bitcoin enthusiasts. A new subreddit has been created, which goes by the name of BTCFork. As the name suggests, this initiative was created by people who see no other solution for Bitcoin than to hard fork shortly. As a result, we may very well end up with two competing blockchains.
To Hard Fork Bitcoin Or Not, That Is The Question
For quite some time now, there has been a substantial debate on how the Bitcoin block size issue needs to be addressed. Segregated Witness is a powerful solution, and combined with the Lightning Network; it has the potential to solve all of the problems all at once. Unfortunately, it will take [too] long until that solution comes to fruition.
Another solution would be to hard fork Bitcoin and implement a fixed increased block size right away. On paper, this solution has a lot of potential, but it may not be the best option for Chinese mining pools. With their slower broadband speeds, huge Bitcoin blocks will be harder to process by the mining pools, who control the majority of network hashpower.
That being said, hard forking Bitcoin is not a decision that should be taken lightly. The recent Ethereum hard fork has shown how troublesome such a decision can be, regardless of the reasoning behind it. Keeping this in mind, it is rather interesting to see the rise of the BTCFork subreddit, albeit it only has just over 125 members so far.
Their introductory post states the following objective:
“We are bringing together like-minded people to work on this hard fork split of the network to allow the market to decide on how bitcoin should move forward rather than a very small group of developers and miners.”
In the end, the block size outcome will depend on miner participation. Chinese pools may not accept the hard fork concept, which would diminish its chances of success. Moreover, a hard fork would divide the community even further, and send the Bitcoin price further down. However, a solution to these issues has to be found soon, as many people are getting tired of network congestion and this lingering doubt for the future.
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