Bitcoin fork, as a topic of great concern in the field of digital currency, has triggered extensive discussion and research. With the continuous development of the cryptocurrency market, Bitcoin fork phenomenon has become more and more frequent. So, what is Bitcoin fork? Why does Bitcoin fork? Next, we will explore this topic in depth to reveal the mystery.

Bitcoin fork refers to the phenomenon that due to differences in views on changes in the Bitcoin protocol within the community, the blockchain is eventually forked, forming two independent digital currency networks. Bitcoin fork can be divided into two forms: hard fork and soft fork. Hard fork refers to incompatible protocol changes on the blockchain, which causes the original nodes to be unable to verify new blocks and thus part ways. Soft fork is a conservative upgrade method, in which the new rules are compatible with the old rules, and nodes can choose whether to upgrade.

There are many reasons for Bitcoin fork, mainly including technical improvements, governance differences and community differences of opinion. First of all, technical improvement is one of the important reasons for promoting Bitcoin fork. With the continuous advancement of blockchain technology, in order to improve the performance, security and scalability of the Bitcoin network, community members may propose various improvement plans, causing differences. For example, the Bitcoin fork in 2017 was caused by a dispute over the block size limit.

Secondly, governance differences are also an important reason for Bitcoin forks. As a decentralized digital currency, Bitcoin lacks a clear governance mechanism. Community members have different opinions on protocol upgrades and network development, which leads to intensified differences. Bitcoin's current governance method mainly relies on community consensus, so it is often difficult to reach a consensus on major issues, resulting in forks.

Finally, community differences are also one of the reasons for Bitcoin forks. The Bitcoin community is large and diverse, and different interests and concepts may conflict and split at critical moments in the development of the network. For example, some community members may attach more importance to Bitcoin's attributes as a value storage tool, while others may attach more importance to its potential as a means of payment. This conflict of interest may trigger a fork.

In general, Bitcoin forks are an inevitable phenomenon in the development of digital currencies, and are the exploration and practice of community members on the future development direction of the network. Although forks will bring short-term market fluctuations and uncertainties, they will also bring new opportunities and challenges to the long-term development of the network. In future development, the Bitcoin community needs to constantly negotiate and compromise, seek consensus, and jointly promote the Bitcoin network to develop in a healthier and more stable direction.

The Bitcoin fork is like a storm in the world of digital currency. Although it will bring chaos and uncertainty in the short term, it also brings new opportunities for the maturity and development of the entire industry. In the future, the Bitcoin community needs to be more united, face challenges together, and promote the Bitcoin network to a more prosperous and stable future. I hope that Bitcoin will continue to improve itself in the baptism of forks and become a shining pearl in the digital economy.

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What is a Bitcoin fork? Why does Bitcoin fork? Bitcoin forks mean that there are two types. A hard fork means that after a series of changes have occurred in the Bitcoin code, the old related nodes do not accept the newly created blocks. A soft fork means that, contrary to a hard fork, it can accept it. Many friends are asking what a Bitcoin fork is? Why does Bitcoin fork? Then this article will introduce it to you in detail. I hope you will have a certain understanding after reading this article.

Bitcoin forks have a long history. The so-called forks refer to the differences in accounting caused by different underlying protocols. According to Xue Hongyan, director of the Internet Finance Center of Suning Financial Research Institute, Bitcoin is maintained by a number of peer-to-peer decentralized nodes. The orderly operation of the entire system depends on the consensus of all nodes, that is, there is a set of recognized standards for key issues such as which transactions are acceptable and which nodes have the right to record accounts. This set of standards is deployed in the underlying blockchain protocol and automatically executed.

A hard fork means that the Bitcoin protocol has undergone some changes, so that the old nodes do not accept the blocks created by the new nodes. As these blocks are abandoned by old nodes, miners will add blocks on top of the most recent block that they consider correct in their (respective) protocols. A hard fork is a software upgrade that introduces new rules that are incompatible with old software to the network. You can think of it as an extension of the rules (making the block size 2MB instead of 1MB will require a hard fork).

Nodes that have not upgraded will continue to see new transactions as valid. However, blocks that continue to be mined by non-upgraded nodes will be rejected by upgraded nodes. Therefore, soft forks require most of the network's computing power. When there is some kind of political deadlock and some people in the community insist on the old rules, problems will arise. The hash rate and network computing power of the old chain will become outdated. Importantly, the data and rules of the old chain are still considered valuable, and miners certainly want to continue mining, and developers also want to continue to support it. TheDAO hard fork is the best analytical case to show the divergence of community rules. Now we have two blockchains with different software - ETC and ETH, each with different philosophies and currencies.

A soft fork is when some changes are made to the Bitcoin protocol, but old nodes cannot detect the changes and continue to accept blocks mined by new nodes using the new protocol. Soft forks are about strengthening some rules. So new rules may deny 1MB blocks and support 500K blocks. Soft forks are backward compatible.

Nodes that have not been upgraded will continue to consider new transactions as valid. However, blocks that continue to be mined by non-upgraded nodes will be rejected by upgraded nodes. Therefore, soft forks require most of the network's computing power. If a soft fork is supported by a minority of hash power, it may become the shortest chain and then be encouraged by the network. Or it can be separated like a hard fork and run separately. Soft forks are a common way to upgrade Bitcoin because they make the risk of network splitting considered to be lower. Successful soft forks in the past include BIP66 software upgrades (involving signature verification) and P2SH (modifying the Bitcoin address format).

Old node miners may continue to add blocks to new blocks that they cannot fully understand and verify
The reason why Bitcoin has a fork is that the underlying technology of Bitcoin is blockchain. Some people began to think that the block capacity of Bitcoin is too small and there is always congestion, so these people demanded that Bitcoin be upgraded and expanded. Some people think that the function of Bitcoin is too single and the future development is not optimistic, so these people also require Bitcoin to have the function of building DApp (decentralized application). Some people support it and some people oppose it. This disagreement on the development of Bitcoin can be understood as the fork of Bitcoin

Although the forked coins use different protocols from Bitcoin, they are ultimately born from the original Bitcoin chain and now become two chains, which is equivalent to doubling the total issuance amount or more. In the short term, the number of digital currency investors is relatively stable, and other types of forked coins will inevitably divide a part of the capital flow and attention, resulting in the dilution of the value of Bitcoin and the price starting to fall.