A Bitcoin HardFork And Its Potential Consequences - August 1st Will Be An Interesting Day
A major hardware mining producer, Bitmain, announced a few hours ago that on August 1st it may launch its own hardfork, or UAHF (User Activated Hard Fork, as opposed to the more popular UASF - User Activated Soft Fork).
I will leave the technical tidbits apart and give you the link where all this is discussed in greater detail.
I will just chip in my 2 SteemCents on the matter of Bitcoin hardfork.
a potential hardfork in the main Bitcoin network will eventually raise the question: which is the official Bitcoin? The answer to this question may include the concept of altBitcoins, or currencies based on the main Bitcoin blockchain, but with different protocols - alternative Bitcoins. This will most likely draw more attention to altcoins entirely, even more than it is now.
the potential for a political involvement in a hardfork is very likely and that will mark the beginning of the mainstream age for cryptos all together. By political, I mean control by a certain state or consortium of private companies (hardware producers, for instance).
on or around the announced date for the hardfork the price of Bitcoin (and, subsequently, of all crypto currencies) may suffer huge swings. Even for experienced traders who want to benefit form the increased liquidity, this may be a very edgy moment.
All in all, prepare for a hot summer.
I'm a serial entrepreneur, blogger and ultrarunner. You can find me mainly on my blog at Dragos Roua where I write about productivity, business, relationships and running. Here on Steemit you may stay updated by following me @dragosroua.
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Does it mean that if I am currently holding BTC it will still be called BTC and if I want "altBTC" then I will need to go purchase the "altBTC". I assume the "altBTC" will still be based on BTC blockchain as ETC is based on ETH.
Still very confusing to me as more and more coins and used for this and that......currently I only know them as crypto-coins and used as a medium of exchange to buy an sell. Coming next are smart contract.....a bit above my pay grade at the moment.
Pretty much that.
we are all patiently waiting...
good info for a new trader like me.
I'm just watching and learning. In the meantime I'll just "Steemit"!
I still have my BTC in Coinbase . But know I need to move to cold storage -do you think it's too late? I mean in order to reap the benefits of the fork (having one of the new 'bitcoins' as well as the original BTC?
For a limited time, like 3 days, you will have both, but once (and if) the hardfork happens, you will have ti stick just with one coin.
I think this is not true. When ethereum had a hardfork you had ethereum an ethereum classic. The blockcain of etheum was then also used for ethereum classic. If you had 10 ethereum than after the hardfork you had 10 ethereum and 10 ethereum classic. After three days nothing happens you can choose to hold bout coins forever. But I’m looking forward to august 1!!!
Oh wow. I've misunderstood all along- I thought you would have BTC plus BTU, or X version of BTC. So basically, post hardfork, we have to choose which one we want? Thanks appreciate the reply!
The hardfork will not "double" your coins. It will split the protocol, so one one branch you will have Bitcoin and on the other BTX or whatever the name they'll give it. Each branch will operate independently and the price of each version of the coin will evolve independently.
ETH and ETC are the most obvious examples. ETC used to be ETH.
From the Bitcoin Magazine article:
"If a majority of hash power signals support for Segregated Witness through BIP148 on or before August 1st, the protocol upgrade will activate smoothly. In that case, you’re fine, even if you didn’t prepare at all.
But it’s also possible that a majority of hash power will not go along with the BIP 148 UASF on August 1st, in which case the chain could split. If you hold your private keys, you will then have both 148 BTC and Legacy BTC."
So, you could end up with two different flavors of BTC, with your original number of coins in both.
I should point out that this article isn't mentioning the Hard Fork at all, but the Soft Fork. The Hard Fork will additionally complicate things, to the point that there might be three brands of BTC on August 2.
Got it thanks for the explanation !
here some more info about it
Thanks :)
I will call it MAHF (miner activated hard fork) because no one user want the hard fork..
Yeah, good call.
This is like Y2K. It might turn out to be more worry than actual problem.
I only hold a very small amount of bitcoin so I'm not too worried, but should be interesting to see how it all plays out.