[iMerits] Why do some coins fork from the Bitcoin chain?

[Jet Cash]

The iMerits project awards merits for new and junior members who provide information to other members.

In this thread we ask you to explain why some new coins create a fork from the original Bitcoin chain. We don't want you to to discuss specific coins, but to explain the commercial logic or other reasons for these forks.

As usual, this thread is self moderated, and will be kept spam and bounty free. sMerits will be awarded for the best answers.

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[mdayonliner]

The iMerits project awards merits for new and junior members who provide information to other members.

In this thread we ask you to explain why some new coins create a fork from the original Bitcoin chain. We don't want you to to discuss specific coins, but to explain the commercial logic or other reasons for these forks.

As usual, this thread is self moderated, and will be kept spam and bounty free. sMerits will be awarded for the best answers.

What else you have left?
aMerit, bMerit, cMerit, dMerit and now iMerit...

Any plan to invent symbol merit and number merit?  

symbol = !"£$%^& etc.
number = 12345 etc.

PS: I love the way you are devoting your time thinking the ways to award merit to newbies and Jrs. Keep up the good works.

Why do some coins fork from the Bitcoin chain?
There could be many reasons. Some of them I can think of are...
a. The entire chain can not be changed so they start from the latest block and create a new coin
b. Personal gain
c. If the dev or team think the chain needs to be improved like scaling etc...

[MadGamer]

I don't believe that forks are done because the bitcoin blockchain is less complex then the other coins or because its easier to play with. Bitcoin have a strong community and so this is made on purpose. When someone see what's called 'A better version of bitcoin', he'll invest hoping he'll be an early adopter.

What is not taken in consideration by the community however, is that these projects don't have competent developers so they'll fail to deliver and even If they did, these developers clearly don't care about anything but money because If they were here for the technology and wanted to help build a better bitcoin, they would've invested their time and knowledge to make pull requests in the original bitcoin repository, there is no reason for core developers to deny them.

[Jet Cash]

What else you have left?
aMerit, bMerit, cMerit, dMerit and now iMerit...

So far these are the ones that are current
https://talkmerit.com/the-source/index.php/plank/today-is-merit-awarding-promotion

I'll probably do something to pull it all together one day. At the moment, it's really just a bit of fun.

[AnonJunkie]

Forks can happen for a number of reasons, Usually they occur because of disagreements between the development team these disagreements cannot be settled and often lead to a split (Sumo / RYO spilt). Sometimes greedy developers will create a fork just for personal enrichment. Forks also occur to prevent things like Asic miners from creating an unfair advantage over GPU miners (Monero for example). Sometimes their a necessity other times they're not (Bitcoin cash).  Forks can also occur if a mining pool with majority of the hashrate somehow loses consensus, a fork will occur.

[Joeyops]

To make the network speed faster, using Algorithms. or solving problems within the old network.

[r1s2g3]

The iMerits project awards merits for new and junior members who provide information to other members.

In this thread we ask you to explain why some new coins create a fork from the original Bitcoin chain. We don't want you to to discuss specific coins, but to explain the commercial logic or other reasons for these forks.

As usual, this thread is self moderated, and will be kept spam and bounty free. sMerits will be awarded for the best answers.

Slightly Off Topic: But why are your all challenges for Jr. members only? Do you have some challenge for member too that I missed?

[freighttrain]

Forks do happen mainly because of the need to upgrade an aspect of the coin's functionality which can be exploited if left unattended to. While some forks are worth it, most of them stem from the desire to make money. At times, there are disagreements between the team members too.

[pooya87]

disagreements about the development of btc, like mining parameters, implementation of segwit2x or block size.

nope, that's not it.

if a developer created a forked_coin from bitcoin because of "disagreement" then it only means he didn't understand what consensus means and how it works in a decentralized system.

also if you want to know what a dev would do in case he disagrees with the way bitcoin works, then search for Charlie Lee and his creation Litecoin which is basically because he wanted a faster bitcoin with a different mining algorithm and also to go back to GPU mining since ASICs were growing for bitcoin. 

[vagrom]

Personally feel that there are technical reasons for the fork, there are also human factors:
The technical reason is to solve some unsolvable problems, so fork.
The human factor is due to irreparable differences between the teams.

[Lagonda]

In this thread we ask you to explain why some new coins create a fork from the original Bitcoin chain. We don't want you to to discuss specific coins, but to explain the commercial logic or other reasons for these forks.

Firstly, it's technical issue. As we all know bitcoin is the first and iconic coin of blockchain technology. The same goes with bitcoin blockchain. But in time, bitcoin blockchain had to face with a seriously realistic problem: scalability. This restricted bitcoin from being mass-adopted.

Secondly, commercial motivation. Hardware manufacturers are benefited a lot from selling mining devices building on mining algorithm of the forked coins.

Finally, political claim. This reason may follow the forks but I think the slogan "Bitcoin of China" contributed a lot the well-exist of Bitcoincash.

[retprogramisto]

Forks can be used to give alternatives to core bitcoin, such as different blocksize, ASIC resistance or additional features.

Instead of cloning bitcoin and making a fresh blockchain, hardforks allow people to try the new altcoin for free, if they held bitcoin at the time of the fork. This creates more publicity for the fork (≈ profits), than if it was only a clone, and it gives an opportunity for bitcoin holders to profit, as they can sell or hodl their free altcoins.

However it is important to ensure that the new chain includes replay protection, so that your bitcoins cant be stolen when you claim your altcoins from the fork.

Forks also occur to prevent things like Asic miners from creating an unfair advantage over GPU miners (Monero for example).

Monero isnt a bitcoin fork, it is an independent altcoin based on the CryptoNight algorithm and is developed for privacy but has advantage of profitable CPU/GPU mining. Bitcoin Gold was the bitcoin fork designed for ASIC resistance.

[Jet Cash]

Slightly Off Topic: But why are your all challenges for Jr. members only? Do you have some challenge for member too that I missed?

Well my objective is not really to award merits, but to provide new members with an incentive to research the Bitcoin and crypto economy.

I'm happy to award merits to anybody who corrects a misconception, or clarifies a point that a previous poster has made.

[pooya87]

~
Exactly what I said. Disagreements. Then he made his coin as he wanted. Mining algorithm is one of the reasons for most forks. You just rewrote what I said using your own words I don't need to search because I know well...

Read more carefully before posting, it helps to keep a high quality standard in the forum. I'm surprised that you got merits for that. Perfect example of how the distribution is subject to personal preferences and beliefs, with a strong emotional component.

you need to read again my friend. this topic is about forked_coins aka altcoins that fork from bitcoin and use its blockchain not just its code and modify it then create something from scratch:

In this thread we ask you to explain why some new coins create a fork from the original Bitcoin chain.

there are multiple kinds of fork that concerns cryptocurrencies.
1. forks that apply to the same coin to add/remove features or rules or fix a bug. for example the fork a couple of years ago to add the new script sig outputs (multi signature wallets) to bitcoin.
1.1. fork in the programming sense of the word. which means "create a new branch" and is done for coding in a way not to effect the "main branch" at first. test the addition/deletion thoroughly and then merge it into main branch. this is basically the same as #1
2. fork the code to create a new project.
2.1. that new project like these 600+ ONLY copy the code, edit it and create their own coin with a different genesis block (aka block 0)
2.2. that new project like the 20-50 coins we saw be created in the past 10 months copy the code, edit it but use the same blockchain as bitcoin.

#2.1 is like litecoin and #2.2 is the discussion here like BCH, BTG, BTV, BTX,....

only #1 sticks to consensus

[arde13]

The main reason for creating Bitcoin fork is getting into the top of the cryptocurrencies by the market cap.
Beginners in the market, notice a new "perspective" player buy a fork coin, thereby inflating the bubble.
The team of such a project has no motivation for development and invests all resources in marketing activity.

[The Cryptovator]

Day by day technology are are improving worldwide. Same thing on blockchain. A hard forked happen with new and advanced featured, like security , transaction speed & fee.

Hard fork means create a new coin with advanced & individual  blockchain from existing blockchain. It's totally independent from existing blockchain. There is no any connection or transaction will happen with existing blockchain. Hard fork can accrued by miner community  & developer team.

Best explaination I have seen ever about hard fork for newbie on cointelegraph What is hard fork .

Btw, now come to the point why choose Bitcoin for Hard fork. As well as Bitcoin is most popular & top crypto currency all over world. What I understand, to gain popularity & reach to investor easily dev. or miner team chose the Bitcoin hard fork. They gain trust & popularity by  award 1:1 . So the remaining coin they can sale easily on high price. Almost Bitcoin fork raise price rapidly, we can see it on Bitcoin cash.

Thanks to OP for this kind of motivational post. People will research now as well there is merit question. Somehow people will gain some knowledge about Hard fork.