Why you shouldn't support Segwit2x - even if you like the 2MB increase

[d5000]

Summary: I think Segwit2x is dead on arrival. If you support it, you will probably lose. And Bitcoin could be severely harmed.

I'm writing this as a Bitcoin user that in principle has nothing against the technical side of Segwit2x and never believed the conspiracy theories around it. In my opinion, a blockchain with a maximum of 4-6MB blocks like it is expected to be the "realistic maximum" of Segwit2x - that probably won't be full until 2019 at least - would work perfectly.

But the Segwit2x supporters have made three big mistakes (if their intention was really to become "the Bitcoin"):

• they created or at least tolerated the creation of Bitcoin Cash
• they set a very close hard fork date, without even trying to negotiate a later date with the Core team (2018/19) when more features of the hardfork wishlist could have been included.
• they didn't specify the "Bitcoin symbol" question. Most non-NYA exchanges will use BTC for the 1MB original chain, and NYA-supporting Coinbase using "BTC" for the 1MB chain is a big setback because it was the biggest "fish" in the NYA pool. So: Most users will see Segwit2x as an altcoin on exchanges, and they will treat it that way.

Now if the hard fork happens, I can see three scenarios:

• Segwit2x gets less than 70-75% of the hashrate. There will be a little bit more congestion at the original chain than usual, but it could be used normally. Miners will gradually switch back to the legacy chain as it will have a higher price. Core wins.
• Segwit2x gets ~70-85% of the hashrate. The legacy chain will become very hard to use and extremely congested. However, some miners will stay with it because most nodes will still run Core/1MB software, and it will survive. After 1-2 weeks some miners will switch back, and gradually other miners follow. Core eventually wins.
• Segwit2x gets >85-90% for more than a week. This could lead to a successful 51% attack and make the original Core/1MB chain unusable, forcing it to hard-fork to another algorithm. But it's only feasible if F2Pool supports Segwit2x, and they have announced that they won't. Segwit2x temporarily wins, but the scenario is unlikely, and the Core chain will continue to exist with another algorithm.

Another argument why for the good of Bitcoin a Core "victory" would be better: The rejection of Segwit2x by almost all Core developers will put the future Bitcoin development in danger if the Segwit2x chain wins. The BTC1 team is small, most work is done by Jeff Garzik. Do you really accept this loss of man-power only because of a f**** variable?

So I propose to everybody who likes Bitcoin, and wants to continue to be part of the biggest monetary revolution up to date, to stay with the legacy chain.

PS: Many folks will wonder why I'm writing this. In the past I wrote posts about Segwit2x in a pretty favourable way. But worries about the latest news and the small BTC1 development team made me write that post. (What hasn't changed: I continue to dislike the No2x movement because of the strange theories they're spreading.)

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[hatshepsut93]

But the Segwit2x supporters have made three big mistakes (if their intention was really to become "the Bitcoin"):

• they created or at least tolerated the creation of Bitcoin Cash
• they set a very close hard fork date, without even trying to negotiate a later date with the Core team (2018/19) when more features of the hardfork wishlist could have been included.
• they didn't specify the "Bitcoin symbol" question. Most non-NYA exchanges will use BTC for the 1MB original chain, and NYA-supporting Coinbase using "BTC" for the 1MB chain is a big setback because it was the biggest "fish" in the NYA pool. So: Most users will see Segwit2x as an altcoin on exchanges, and they will treat it that way.

1. BCH and SegWit2x have strange relations, since BCH was created by Bitmain which also support SegWit2x. This shows that there's no unity or strong political beliefs in SegWit2x camp - they are simply guided by greed.

2. They did it on purpose to be as contentious and disruptive as possible, it's all about trying to force Core to submit to their demands instead of having their own vision. It's not a secret that eventually Core will start preparing for their own block size increase, but only when they will feel like the network is ready - they don't want to risk security for some short term gain in capacity. So, SegWit2x people want to actually control Core or replace it, simply increasing blocksize is not their main goal.

3. There would be a huge legal shitstorm if a company like Coinbase tried to name SegWit2x coin as "BTC". They are not completely suicidal.

[d5000]

1. BCH and SegWit2x have strange relations, since BCH was created by Bitmain which also support SegWit2x. This shows that there's no unity or strong political beliefs in SegWit2x camp - they are simply guided by greed.

Bitmain has always favoured big blocks, so their "secret support" or even "secret creation" of BCH is not a surprise. But I doubt BCH is supported by most NYA signers. There may be some of the big blocker camp, but the Segwit2x supporter group isn't made up exclusively by big blockers, even in the mining sector.

2. They did it on purpose to be as contentious and disruptive as possible, it's all about trying to force Core to submit to their demands instead of having their own vision. [...] So, SegWit2x people want to actually control Core or replace it, simply increasing blocksize is not their main goal.

If the Core devs continued to work on BTC even if Segwit2x "won", the "hardcore big blocker fraction" among the Segwit2x supporters (those that want control over the code and implement more miner-friendly changes)  wouldn't be able to replace Core. What Core could do is simply to publish a client compatible with the 2MB fork, but continue pretending it to be the main Bitcoin client (distributing it via Bitcoin.org etc.).

The NYA signers are a very heterogeneous group. If Bitmain, let's say in 2018 wanted to implement a hard fork again, it would be much harder for them to reach an agreement like the NYA with 90% of miner approval and several big companies.

I am sure that you're right that companies like Bitmain want more control over the code, but they would never reach absolute control, and I doubt that other NYA signers had the same goal. Most of them probably simply wanted to see Segwit implemented or a blocksize increase to get advantages from lower fees.

3. There would be a huge legal shitstorm if a company like Coinbase tried to name SegWit2x coin as "BTC". They are not completely suicidal.

Here you may be right - I'm not a legal expert. But if this is true, a cryptocurrency hard fork "as an update" would never be legally possible if only a small group opposed them. I wonder if Ethereum case faced similar problems after the ETH/ETC fork - because here the "modified version" was the one that retained the "ETH" symbol on all exchanges.

[Alns]

I like segwit2x because they will be much more faster than bitcoin at the moment, but i have read a lot of things regarding to them and their team and it is very suspicious, i would not support this fork because they are the most greedy developers that i have ever seen since i am in the bitcoin community.
They are harming bitcoin a lot, and i am sure that they will try to spread a huge fud about bitcoin once that the fork is done. It is a garbage, once that i get my coins i will dump them.

[xBitHodler]

Well... I have to agree with you that Bitcoin SegWit2x is one step closer to centralisation of Bitcoin. That's why I don't support it either.
I will treat Bitcoin SegWit2x as an another altcoin which is pumped really hard because some people want to earn a lot of money just on hard forks. There were too many of them recently. Bitcoin Gold is "great" for some people because it has different algorithm. So what about BitcoinZ? It has also Equihash algorithm.

[Victorycoin]

But the Segwit2x supporters have made three big mistakes (if their intention was really to become "the Bitcoin"):

• they created or at least tolerated the creation of Bitcoin Cash
• they set a very close hard fork date, without even trying to negotiate a later date with the Core team (2018/19) when more features of the hardfork wishlist could have been included.
• they didn't specify the "Bitcoin symbol" question. Most non-NYA exchanges will use BTC for the 1MB original chain, and NYA-supporting Coinbase using "BTC" for the 1MB chain is a big setback because it was the biggest "fish" in the NYA pool. So: Most users will see Segwit2x as an altcoin on exchanges, and they will treat it that way.

1. BCH and SegWit2x have strange relations, since BCH was created by Bitmain which also support SegWit2x. This shows that there's no unity or strong political beliefs in SegWit2x camp - they are simply guided by greed.

2. They did it on purpose to be as contentious and disruptive as possible, it's all about trying to force Core to submit to their demands instead of having their own vision. It's not a secret that eventually Core will start preparing for their own block size increase, but only when they will feel like the network is ready - they don't want to risk security for some short term gain in capacity. So, SegWit2x people want to actually control Core or replace it, simply increasing blocksize is not their main goal.

3. There would be a huge legal shitstorm if a company like Coinbase tried to name SegWit2x coin as "BTC". They are not completely suicidal.

I quite agree with everything you said in 1 and 2 above, greed and plans to seize the BTC brand was the main motive behind the idea to split Bitcoin and we can be sure that they would, like black mailers keep asking for more or coming up with things intentionally meant to derail Bitcoin, but disappointment is and will always remain their lot!

As for Coinbase trying to name Segwit2x coin as BTC, I guess they had to think again and came up with this:

https://blog.coinbase.com/timeline-and-support-bitcoin-segwit2x-and-bitcoin-gold-eda72525efd

[bitfools]

But the Segwit2x supporters have made three big mistakes (if their intention was really to become "the Bitcoin"):

1. BCH and SegWit2x have strange relations, since BCH was created by Bitmain which also support SegWit2x. This shows that there's no unity or strong political beliefs in SegWit2x camp - they are simply guided by greed.

2. They did it on purpose to be as contentious and disruptive as possible, it's all about trying to force Core to submit to their demands instead of having their own vision. It's not a secret that eventually Core will start preparing for their own block size increase, but only when they will feel like the network is ready - they don't want to risk security for some short term gain in capacity. So, SegWit2x people want to actually control Core or replace it, simply increasing blocksize is not their main goal.

3. There would be a huge legal shitstorm if a company like Coinbase tried to name SegWit2x coin as "BTC". They are not completely suicidal.

You missed the 4th, NYA should have NEVER been created, letting the KOSHER-NOSTRA run out the orginal BTC ppl in NYC, and then letting NYC MAFIA Kosher-Nostra take over BTC and create NYA, then NYA takes over BTC-CORE, all they want is the "BITCOIN BRAND", The NYC assholes shouldn't WIN this one, it would be better to let the CHINESE win, and let BTC exchanges be ran in JAPAN where its all going anyway's in ASIA.

FUCK NYA, FUCK the Kosher-Nostra, Fuck the Federal Reserve Bank,

All wars are Banker Wars.

Don't let the fucking "BANKS" own BTC.

[fiulpro]

I recently read a news where the developers of segwit2x explained how they choosed to implement bitcoin gold hard fork before segwit2x because they aimed at making it Completely decentralized and both hard forks were in support of each other, but they failed to mention the fact that , this fork is not supported by 90% of the miners
.. and now we can see that few influential People are controlling this and making this decision.
It makes it centralized when only 10% People are in the favour of it !!!
Also the heavier a transaction get , more and more it will be difficult to keep it secure.
The founder of bitcoins made the limit 1 MB because the first priority they had was security!!! With millions of People investing in it... They need to be secure !!! First them only will the consider investing in the future.
Getting the blockchain size to exceed that limit makes it vulnerable to attacks , to cyber crimes.
I don't think I really hate this segwit2x but yes I do hate that they are playing with the security of their investors.

[Razick]

I don't even understand the technology behind all of these things coming out. I mean it is so hard for the average person to understand. All I know is Segwit stand for Segregated Witness. I wish they would just make a Lightning Network already so the transactions fees would decrease and would also be instantaneous.

[The One]

Summary: I think Segwit2x is dead on arrival. If you support it, you will probably lose. And Bitcoin could be severely harmed.

I'm writing this as a Bitcoin user that in principle has nothing against the technical side of Segwit2x and never believed the conspiracy theories around it. In my opinion, a blockchain with a maximum of 4-6MB blocks like it is expected to be the "realistic maximum" of Segwit2x - that probably won't be full until 2019 at least - would work perfectly.

But the Segwit2x supporters have made three big mistakes (if their intention was really to become "the Bitcoin"):

• they created or at least tolerated the creation of Bitcoin Cash

BCH was a hardfork to settle the "civil war" between the block minimalists and maximalists and therefore it should end there and then. Any other hardfork are pointless and achieves nothing, except create new coins and hopefully new money. (bonus for the scammers like bitcoin Gold)

Having Bitcoin under the control of segwit2x, especially from New York with their Bitlicence, set my mental alarm bells ringing. It is obvious that the majority of users have no interest, both BTC and BCH, in segwit2x. Users will simply have to wait and ride the out the storm and reject the miners/centralised companies attempt to control Bitcoin for their own agenda.

Has anyone thought through various scenarios and how the price of BTC, BCH, etc will be affected?

[d5000]

@Alns, @Victorycoin: The goal of this post is to make "moderate big blockers" think again about their support for Segwit2x. Accusing the BTC1 developers of "greed" or other "bad intentions" isn't helpful for this goal. 

Based on purely rational arguments, the health of Bitcoin could be compromised if there is a long struggle between both forks, and more so if the Core devs leave the boat.

@bitfools: Hard to take you seriously after this post ...

Getting the blockchain size to exceed that limit makes it vulnerable to attacks , to cyber crimes.
I don't think I really hate this segwit2x but yes I do hate that they are playing with the security of their investors.

No, I don't think 1MB is a "magic number" that should never be changed. I'm in favour to change it, but from 2019 onwards when it will be necessary to increase the capacity.

Technology will have moved on then, and an effecitve block size 4-6MB then won't be the same problem for CPU/RAM/bandwidth/storage requirements for nodes like it still is now. Maybe it's possible to achieve this increase even via a soft fork (a German user has insinuated that some weeks ago).

[mindrust]

You guys are so naive. You still think it's about blocksize/scaling.

It is not.

It's about controling the beast.

Right now a big dev team is responsible of bitcoin but they are not alone. A whole big user community supports that dev team.

What really happening is, bitmain, the biggest mining corporation wants to replace the dev team with some puppets they can control. They want the dev team to be their employees.

That's an attack. An hostile takeover.

[d5000]

What really happening is, bitmain, the biggest mining corporation wants to replace the dev team with some puppets they can control. They want the dev team to be their employees.

I already wrote here (second paragraph) that this kind of "takeover" would not necessarily work (it would only work if the Core devs reacted emotionally to a Segwit2x "victory", what is maybe likely and thus we should try to avoid it). But the Core team could simply publish a 2MB client and they would continue to be the main development team.

It would be very unlikely that the NYA could be repeated if the "takeover" fails, because it was an exceptional situation.

You are also not understanding my stance here. We must convince the moderate big blocker folks to support Core, not making them angry with strange accusations and military symbolism.

[mindrust]

What really happening is, bitmain, the biggest mining corporation wants to replace the dev team with some puppets they can control. They want the dev team to be their employees.

I already wrote here (second paragraph) that this kind of "takeover" would not necessarily work (it would only work if the Core devs reacted emotionally to a Segwit2x "victory", what is maybe likely and thus we should try to avoid it). But the Core team could simply publish a 2MB client and they would continue to be the main development team.

It would be very unlikely that the NYA could be repeated if the "takeover" fails, because it was an exceptional situation.

You are also not understanding my stance here. We must convince the moderate big blocker folks to support Core, not making them angry with strange accusations and military symbolism.

Have you ever stepped in r/btc lately?

These people are (mostly) paid trolls. You can't convince paidtrolls with common logic. They've made up their minds and chosen to be supporters of scammers like Craig Wright or Roger Ver.

How can anybody support a freak like Craig Wright? What common logic do expect from a person like this?

Good luck with talking sense to them.

[bitPico]

Do you really accept this loss of man-power only because of a f**** variable?

Yes 

[d5000]

Have you ever stepped in r/btc lately?

These people are (mostly) paid trolls. You can't convince paidtrolls with common logic. They've made up their minds and chosen to be supporters of scammers like Craig Wright or Roger Ver.

No, I'm not talking about these "extremists".

There are, however, a lot of Bitcoiners that have supported a 2MB+Segwit solution in the past. This poll shows that the solution had "some" acceptance within the Bitcointalk forum. Since then, unfortunately, the "dust" has increased in this forum and it's harder to tell which opinions are real and which one are simply "pseudo-opinions" by spammers that want to increase their post count.

This thread is directed to the moderate people that have some sympathy for the 2MB solution, not to die-hard big blockers.

[Iranus]

they created or at least tolerated the creation of Bitcoin Cash

Most of them did not support Bitcoin Cash.  Even BITMAIN didn't actively support Bitcoin Cash - they supported NYA earlier than that.  As for tolerating it, what else are you going to do?  Try and kill the developers?

they didn't specify the "Bitcoin symbol" question. Most non-NYA exchanges will use BTC for the 1MB original chain, and NYA-supporting Coinbase using "BTC" for the 1MB chain is a big setback because it was the biggest "fish" in the NYA pool. So: Most users will see Segwit2x as an altcoin on exchanges, and they will treat it that way.

They treat it that way because they don't perceive it to have enough support.  I don't see why this should prevent others from supporting it.
Your other couple of points, though, seem quite reasonable to me.  I'll just be holding both chains and sitting back to see the show, personally.

[Victorycoin]

@Alns, @Victorycoin: The goal of this post is to make "moderate big blockers" think again about their support for Segwit2x. Accusing the BTC1 developers of "greed" or other "bad intentions" isn't helpful for this goal.  

Based on purely rational arguments, the health of Bitcoin could be compromised if there is a long struggle between both forks, and more so if the Core devs leave the boat.

You vision seems somehow blurred D5000, those guys only care to covert the BTC brand and have been working hard at it and the only way to make that obvious is by unmasking their treacherous plans for all to see. You moderate big blockers have to at least know the truth and reach their own well informed decisions. It's the future of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency that's being subtly negotiated and am afraid gentle manly approach or being civil is a sell out and water on the back of a dock at most!

100% in agreement with Mindrust's suggestion that you step out of you closet quite often to see what's going on in the neighborhood, that's how your closet can ever remain safe. Also whenever you happen to dine with the devil, be sure to use a very long spoon, because they're ever unrelenting and uncompromising in their pursuits. Here, you may want to read this again without bias:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2328044.0

[rakeshsoni86]

Ok Guys let me clear what i have understood from Bitcoin Segwit Hardfork.


Bitcoin Segwit hard fork is happening on the 18th of November 2017.

The exact time is not known yet, but it is scheduled to go live from block height 494784.

And according to Blockchain.info at the time of this writing, the Bitcoin network is currently sitting at 489179 block height. So you can see that we are only a few thousand blocks away from the SegWit2x hard fork.

From this threshold block height, Bitcoin’s blockchain will be diverging into two different directions with two different rules onto two different blockchains.
f this fork happens, then everyone who was holding Bitcoin before the fork will have an equivalent number of these new SegWit2x coins.

So like Bitcoin Hard fork on 1st Aug'17 and 25th Oct'17 those who are holding Bitcoin will get equivalent Segwit2X coins..(Please correct me if i am wrong).

But as i heard from other news this will not be the case...Can anyone explain what exactly going to happen on 18th November.

[d5000]

those guys only care to covert the BTC brand

They can't, at least not only "winning the fork war", as I already explained above (see here). Having the most popular Bitcoin website (bitcoin.org) is a BIG asset if you want to be in control of the code that will be used by the majority of the users.

What "they" can do - and only that - is to pursue a common agenda with miners and Bitcoin companies, trying to force the developers to include certain changes like the 2x weight/blocksize increase.

I think, however, that an "extended NYA" or a "new NYA for a 4x blocksize" (for example) will be very hard to achieve, because the NYA was an exceptional compromise in a pretty critical situation, and some or even most of the companies that signed it were more interested in Segwit than in the 2MB fork. Segwit would very likely still not be "live" if it wasn't because of Segwit2x, as the BIP148 folks never got the majority of the nodes and hadn't much hashrate support.

It's the future of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency that's being subtly negotiated and am afraid gentle manly approach or being civil is a sell out and water on the back of a dock at most!

No. It's a single (protocol-relevant) variable in the code that would be changed. That's all

Other cryptocurrencies are not affected at all. It isn't even the first time a contentious hard fork happens in the crypto-sphere (see Crypti/Lisk, Eth/Etc ...).

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2328044.0

I already commented on that. That's a single opinion of a big blocker and Bitcoin Cash fan in a Chinese forum.

they created or at least tolerated the creation of Bitcoin Cash

Most of them did not support Bitcoin Cash.  Even BITMAIN didn't actively support Bitcoin Cash - they supported NYA earlier than that.  As for tolerating it, what else are you going to do?  Try and kill the developers?

There were some pools - mainly ViaBTC - that greatly helped BCash getting some hashrate and becoming a major altcoin. We don't know what exactly was Bitmain's stance, and that's also why I wrote "or tolerated". OK, maybe I should have written "some Segwit2x supporters".

They treat it that way because they don't perceive it to have enough support.  I don't see why this should prevent others from supporting it.

In my opinion, this is a slow "domino effect". If they perceive Sw2x to have low support, and thus do things (assign "BTC" to the 1MB chain) that will result in even less support, then it will be increasingly harder for Segwit2x to become "the Bitcoin". Not impossible, but I consider it unlikely, and the last ViaBTC statement (that they, for now, do not support 2x) has strengthened my belief in that the 2x chain won't "win" the "fork battle".

Your other couple of points, though, seem quite reasonable to me.  I'll just be holding both chains and sitting back to see the show, personally.

That seems like a good decision I'll do the same.