Topic: Can Bitcoin survive a real fork? (Read 2702 times)

Its better for those who take care of theirs because this will raise the value of the remaining coins.

+ 21 million

Ripple is a sad attempt to dominate bitcoin.



He won't use it!!!

Ripple lacks privacy. Doesn't pass the Litmus Test of Wikileaks or Silk Road.

Someone has already named it LinearCoin, (LNC) which at least serves as a good 'working' name.

the concept of a fork is confusing and muddied.

put more simply, what we will see going forward is that there will continue to be modifications to the software that seeks to preserve the Bitcoin network, with all of its built up wealth, at all costs. 

everyone involved with Bitcoin will contribute in their own specific way, whether they be devs, merchants, users, speculators, to achieve this common goal.

in that sense, the future is extremely bright.

you would have to give the fork/client a new name - what will it be? (i'm correct right?)

There will certainly be a fork. I have promised it here:  https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/i-will-create-a-forked-bitcoin-chain-181488
It is planned for release September 1st 2013. Stay pepared 

Who is there to decide? Well, Ill decide! if i can add it to the amount in my bitcoin wallet and trade it like BTC @ BTC prices then its bitcoin. if not then its "not-bitcoin".

A fork is coming and thus the Fork Wars shall begin. I think bitcoin has evolved to the point one is necessary to save the ideology it was established upon.

Just like fiat money which can be forged/printed, there will be Bitcoin forks that do a little damage for a short time. But neither strategy will prove succesful: most fiat money is still the real thing, despite criminals printing millions of it.

Who is there to decide which branch is "not-bitcoin"? Is there a supreme court in charge of interpreting every word  (What "is" is?) of Satoshi's paper, and all the foundation documents? Is the self-consistency of all the "protocols"  future-proof? Who has the authority to appoint the judges of the supreme court? The economic mass Bitcoin attracts could be the very factor that undoes Bitcoin. Powerful interest groups will want to butt in.

BTC is only as strong as the technology that supports it. I have invested in BTC and carry no emotional or libertarian attachments. I hit hard and fast and wipe my thought patterns to reevaluate what systems are best for the functioning of the entire Universe as a whole in each new period of entropy. After an initial investment in late 2011, after two years of reaping the benefits of BTC without actively participating in the community (to avoid groupthink), I have objectively determined that Ripple is the superior protocol. Ripple will decrease the value of BTC since it includes a built-in exchange and equalizes the currencies technologically and incentively. With Ripple, the dollar is now on the same plane as the BTC technologically - we can exchange all world's currencies instantly, almost freely at scale. Ripple is quite simply, closer to the singularity. Ripple will eliminate the main forces driving BTC adoption by equalizing the incentives boosting the magnitude of these forces (the technological and therefore economic advantages of the BTC over the dollar). The BTC may still carry privacy advantages and may still carry weight in the criminal underground, but semi-anonymity is only a minor driving force. Regardless of the way OpenCoin chooses to hoard currency, regardless of the sickening idea of an authority controlling much of the currency, Ripple will prevail over BTC.

Peace for another two years.

I fear more the unintended network split that doesn't get detected quickly by happenstance (we got kinda lucky recently). De-splitting the network is painful and might not always work out as well.

No, no, no.  Bitcoin is a set of rules, a "protocol", if you'd prefer that word.  If there is a fork, the branch that does not follow the current rules is "not-bitcoin", and "bitcoin" continues as usual.  It doesn't matter what the looters call their branch, it will be "not-bitcoin", even if not in name.

The split between mining power is irrelevant, what ever fork the exchanges and merchants accept IS Bitcoin and the other fork is worthless, without the exchange and merchants to complete the circle BTC doesn't have any value regardless of the hash rates involved.

BitCoin cannot by itself serve successfully all the interests of its users. 

The user base will prefer alternative coins that have different rules.

Also, having only a single currency like BitCoin is akin to having a single European currency like the Euro.

We've seen the pros and cons of this.

The cons however are that a single currency does not allow countries to insulate themselves from other countries.  Multiple currencies allow that form of isolation and protection.   A country like Greece is unable to devalue its currency and make its services competitive with the rest of the euro zone.  A single European currency removes that kind of flexibility in the same way a single crypto currency does.

I can for example envision an alternative currency where anonymity is not prized as much as bitcoin or alternatively a currency where complete anonymity is built in.  Each one is ideal for different use cases. 

Bitcoin right now with it deflationary structure is not ideal for regular commerce where prices are expected to be more stable.  Bitcoin appears to be a store of wealth like Gold.  However, something else may emerge that will be the currency of exchange.   Only time will tell, but rest assured, multiple crypto-currencies are going to be the norm.

Almost no popular open source projects have an overwhelming economic penalty for forking. Bitcoin, OTOH...

Now and then, I start thinking that you might be confused by the polysemy of "fork".

The software can be "forked" by anyone at any time.  If their "fork" is compatible with bitcoin, then the world has two different clients for the same network.  The popularity of the two softwares will vary depending on how well they meet the needs of the users.  For now, call this #1.

If the "fork" is not compatible with bitcoin, then it is not bitcoin and the world now has two networks, each with their own client.  The popularity of these two networks will vary, depending on how well they meet the needs of their users.

The way these two networks differ depends on a choice made by the developers of the new software.  They can start fresh with a new genesis block and a new chain (#2A), or they can create a moment of divergence, where the blocks prior to that point are valid for both tines, while blocks after that are only valid for one or the other, this would be a chain "fork" (#2B).

#1 is encouraged, in a way, but difficult.
#2A is the standard scamcoin-de-jour model.  Note that no scamcoin has yet managed to develop any significant capital formation.
#2B has not yet been seen, and, as I've previously described, users of the not-bitcoin branch should expect the value of their holdings to evaporate quickly, making it unlikely to ever start.

Your last post seems to suggest that you are concerned about a #1 fork turning into a #2B fork.  It will not happen, because the gravity of bitcoin resides not in the whims of the developers, but in the economic power that has grown up around the network.  By last fall, bitcoin had grown big enough that the economic mass of the system was able to band together to hire a full time programmer, and several other people were making a decent living off of donations for their contributions.  Who knows where we will be by next fall...

Bitcoin the software project can live or die without consequence, but Bitcoin the network is probably self-sustaining and immortal at this point.

Democracy didnt make bitcoin successful. What made it successful is the fact that its an innovative idea. There is no voting, its not a democracy. Bitcoin is not an analogue of the welfare state where the state can steal money from one person and give it to someone else. if you need alternatives, make another altcoin.

Edit: The scenario you mentioned almost sounds like freicoin.