What's so wrong about Hard Forking?

[xflowerpowergox]

I'm just really curious. I understand that Bitcoin has to keep some originality, but doesn't it need to change eventually?

[QFT]

It's not that there is something inherently wrong with hardforking.
People just have different opinions about what should be forked in or out, not everyone agrees on blocksize for example, and many other things.

[pooya87]

there is nothing wrong with hard fork. bitcoin already had 1 hard fork in the past.
but there are a lot of things wrong about how that hard fork is performed. when something is this big and decentralized, like bitcoin, you can't just decide one day to want to "change" something and do it irregardless of what the majority of the users want. that causes a split and will harm things more than it fixes them.

also in a hard fork, because of not being backward compatible, there is always a higher risk of split. and for that ALL the network must upgrade which is hard and will take a long time.
but with a soft fork the risks are lower, specially with the backward compatibility and the fact that if you don't upgrade you still are able to use the old software.

[Myfe]

People are afraid of change or insulted by the people that suggest the change. I don't think there's anything wrong with hard forking either, and the people against it never have a reason (let alone a good reason) why it shouldn't happen.

[gribble]

Bitcoins hard fork was not wrong, it happened because of be supported by almost all of comunity bitcoins themselves
it is just about the choice the people who agree to bitcoin's hard fork they can be bitcoin's users and support for it
and the people who doesn't agree with bitcoin's hard fork can be support bitcoins cash the best results from the bitcoin's hard fork is the chain of bitcoins and bitcoins cash are alive now, so depend on the comunity what will be choosen.

[bitcoinmaniac52]

People are afraid of change or insulted by the people that suggest the change. I don't think there's anything wrong with hard forking either, and the people against it never have a reason (let alone a good reason) why it shouldn't happen.

People are always scared of change.
We want to live in a world that is the same every single day.
Bitcoin has been going smooth for years and people want it to stay like that.
However, transactions are slower and fees increase because of network congestion.
We need a solution for sure, but I am not in a position to say which one.

[xJuturna]

It's essentially just like he saying, if it's not broken don't fix it. But that's not always the case as some things need to be phased out or altered to improve performance and sometimes you just have to test something new to see if it's beneficial or not. Change can be both good and bad, depends on your outlook.

[shodiqtercinta]

The problem is 1 block, which appears every 10 minutes, can only accommodate Bitcoin transactions up to 1 MB, which means there are only about 3 transactions that can be processed every second. When we count, meaning within 10 minutes until the next block is created, there are 1,800 transactions that can be processed. But keep in mind not necessarily in one block can actually load 1,800 transactions.

[skorupi17]

I'm just really curious. I understand that Bitcoin has to keep some originality, but doesn't it need to change eventually?

As far as I know, hardfork happens if only it is the only way to implement an upgrade to the Bitcoin network. Such as increasing the block size. Hardfork is not wrong or harmful, it all depends on how the community react from it or how the fork gets underway. The best way to have a healthy HF is to kill the minor chain after the split in order to avoid the sharing of hash force.

[Coffee135]

It's essentially just like he saying, if it's not broken don't fix it. But that's not always the case as some things need to be phased out or altered to improve performance and sometimes you just have to test something new to see if it's beneficial or not. Change can be both good and bad, depends on your outlook.

Nothing depends on my worldview. If let's say I'm against the fact that the fork is not? We are all pawns in someone else's game. Ultimately, this instability can have very bad consequences not only for those who make such decisions, but for the entire community.

[joebrook]

there is nothing wrong with hard fork. bitcoin already had 1 hard fork in the past.
but there are a lot of things wrong about how that hard fork is performed. when something is this big and decentralized, like bitcoin, you can't just decide one day to want to "change" something and do it irregardless of what the majority of the users want. that causes a split and will harm things more than it fixes them.

also in a hard fork, because of not being backward compatible, there is always a higher risk of split. and for that ALL the network must upgrade which is hard and will take a long time.
but with a soft fork the risks are lower, specially with the backward compatibility and the fact that if you don't upgrade you still are able to use the old software.

I really believe that any change thats is effected in the bitcoin network should be approved by the majority of it's users, a percentage of eighty percent approval is needed before any change is to be effected, we dont want any more splits happening again in the near future, am sure it's going to devalue the currency if it continues to happen.

[bitart]

there is nothing wrong with hard fork. bitcoin already had 1 hard fork in the past.
but there are a lot of things wrong about how that hard fork is performed. when something is this big and decentralized, like bitcoin, you can't just decide one day to want to "change" something and do it irregardless of what the majority of the users want. that causes a split and will harm things more than it fixes them.

also in a hard fork, because of not being backward compatible, there is always a higher risk of split. and for that ALL the network must upgrade which is hard and will take a long time.
but with a soft fork the risks are lower, specially with the backward compatibility and the fact that if you don't upgrade you still are able to use the old software.

I really believe that any change thats is effected in the bitcoin network should be approved by the majority of it's users, a percentage of eighty percent approval is needed before any change is to be effected, we dont want any more splits happening again in the near future, am sure it's going to devalue the currency if it continues to happen.

Upgrades, changes should not always lead to chain splits that creates different coins. If you have read about ethereum, they are planning to do some updates, and they are going to do a fork, and they will arrange with the difficulty adjustment, that the original chain will stop and miners will be able to continue mining on the new chain. (If I understood their plans well).
So there will be a split, but it's like Highlander, only one can survive

[monocolor]

nothing wrong with hard fork, if the mining community agrees with it. Otherwise just creates a separate blockchain.

[Xavofat]

there is nothing wrong with hard fork. bitcoin already had 1 hard fork in the past.
but there are a lot of things wrong about how that hard fork is performed. when something is this big and decentralized, like bitcoin, you can't just decide one day to want to "change" something and do it irregardless of what the majority of the users want. that causes a split and will harm things more than it fixes them.

I really believe that any change thats is effected in the bitcoin network should be approved by the majority of it's users

How do you determine what the "majority of the users" think?  Do you force intense KYC procedures on anyone who downloads any Bitcoin software or even runs their own?

I'll tell you:  you don't have a clue what the majority of users think, because they don't all flock to do whatever you say they should do.  Users just run whatever client seems most appealing to them at the time, and if that switches to different consensus rules then so be it.  The BTC network does not involve everyone coordinating and doing exactly the same thing, and people very much can decide to change something whenever they want.

There might be something wrong with the consensus rules that a certain group decides to run.  But people should be arguing against that, not against the principle of people deciding to run different consensus rules.

[deisik]

People are afraid of change or insulted by the people that suggest the change. I don't think there's anything wrong with hard forking either, and the people against it never have a reason (let alone a good reason) why it shouldn't happen

Change for the sake of change itself isn't a very bright idea overall

It is most conspicuous with software which turned into huge blobs of useless functions which are there as a substitute for actual development and improvement. If you want an example, look at the Windows operating system family, what it turned into. So there is a reason why people don't want changes very much. Indeed, they may be quite lazy and just happy with what they already have. Nevertheless, all changes should be actually required, and then the history of good and timely improvements will speak for itself