Exchanges are rebelling against constant hard forks

[alyssa85]

Here is the news from Coinfloor (UK exchange):

https://www.coindesk.com/uks-oldest-crypto-exchange-to-delist-ethereum-and-focus-solely-on-bitcoin

Coinfloor, the U.K.’s longest-running cryptocurrency exchange, plans to delist ethereum next month, citing an unclear future of hard forks and the need for onerous technical support for the second-biggest coin by market capitalization.

The company will also delist bitcoin cash, the splinter currency founded two years ago in the aftermath of bitcoin’s heated scaling debate. Starting Jan. 3, Coinfloor will support only bitcoin, whose eleventh anniversary happens to fall on that day.

The plan comes ahead of the launch of ethereum 2.0, tentatively planned for early 2020, which will begin the process of shifting the network away from the energy-consuming proof-of-work (PoW) consensus mechanism to proof-of-stake (PoS).

Coinfloor’s decision suggests that nurturing a team with the specific expertise to follow the technical trials and tribulations of coins like ethereum may be too expensive for smaller crypto players, particularly if this constitutes only a small part of their trading volume.

From the point at which it starts next year, ethereum’s platform upgrade “could take years to complete,” said Obi Nwosu, founder and CEO of Coinfloor. The complexity of the operation “means for a period of time there could be two versions of ethereum running.”

According to some ethereum developers, it’s likely to be years before the old ethereum PoW chain is fully merged into the new PoS network, leading to current discussions around ways to create a secure bridge between the two chains.

Developers really love doing all these forks - but they are a massive nuisance for everyone else. The exchanges, the online wallet providers, the payment processors, all of them have to do a shedload of work to accomodate these changes.

That's why I think coins that don't change much (bitcoin, doge) will end up being the winners. People just want something that works smoothly and that you don't need to do a lot of work to maintain, so that they can focus on the eco-system around the coin.

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[jackg]

Developers really love doing all these forks - but they are a massive nuisance for everyone else. The exchanges, the online wallet providers, the payment processors, all of them have to do a shedload of work to accomodate these changes.

Yeah, just look at the segwit forks to see how bad everyone is at wanting to use new forks. They were just two forks in august but it took many users more than 6 months to even bother to start using segwit.

Developers are going to have to do their best to make things backwards compaitble like is done with bitcoin to ensure everything remains fairly stable and usable for the exchanges. Btc, ltc and doge are pretty good at doing this, if eth starts adding a load of forks and a few other cryptos do the same, exchanges will find it hard to run anything less than a full/pruned node while keeping security but they may have to compromise on a few things (such as fully reviewing code) to ensure their version of the software is compatible with the current fork at the time.

[joniboini]

That's why I think coins that don't change much (bitcoin, doge) will end up being the winners.

Well, sometimes changes are needed (and of course, this is debatable). I think a more careful approach for this fork is needed overall. Instead of planning one or two changes every quarter, they should do 10 upgrades at once while maintaining the compatibility with the previous version.

Pretty sure this is annoying af for small exchanges, so hopefully, this fork thing goes in a better way.

[ADDONE]

Here is the news from Coinfloor (UK exchange):

https://www.coindesk.com/uks-oldest-crypto-exchange-to-delist-ethereum-and-focus-solely-on-bitcoin

Coinfloor, the U.K.’s longest-running cryptocurrency exchange, plans to delist ethereum next month, citing an unclear future of hard forks and the need for onerous technical support for the second-biggest coin by market capitalization.

The company will also delist bitcoin cash, the splinter currency founded two years ago in the aftermath of bitcoin’s heated scaling debate. Starting Jan. 3, Coinfloor will support only bitcoin, whose eleventh anniversary happens to fall on that day.

The plan comes ahead of the launch of ethereum 2.0, tentatively planned for early 2020, which will begin the process of shifting the network away from the energy-consuming proof-of-work (PoW) consensus mechanism to proof-of-stake (PoS).

Coinfloor’s decision suggests that nurturing a team with the specific expertise to follow the technical trials and tribulations of coins like ethereum may be too expensive for smaller crypto players, particularly if this constitutes only a small part of their trading volume.

From the point at which it starts next year, ethereum’s platform upgrade “could take years to complete,” said Obi Nwosu, founder and CEO of Coinfloor. The complexity of the operation “means for a period of time there could be two versions of ethereum running.”

According to some ethereum developers, it’s likely to be years before the old ethereum PoW chain is fully merged into the new PoS network, leading to current discussions around ways to create a secure bridge between the two chains.

Developers really love doing all these forks - but they are a massive nuisance for everyone else. The exchanges, the online wallet providers, the payment processors, all of them have to do a shedload of work to accomodate these changes.

That's why I think coins that don't change much (bitcoin, doge) will end up being the winners. People just want something that works smoothly and that you don't need to do a lot of work to maintain, so that they can focus on the eco-system around the coin.

It would have been much easier to understand whether or not the delisting is a political move had the exchange released some percentages as to the amount of business trading eth and bch brings them.

[Mometaskers]

As someone who can't be bothered with technical aspects (I don't even run a node), I mostly see these forks as just a money grab. Oh, your crypto forked, now you have the same amount of two different coins...

Investors probably don't mind suddenly getting a bit more money but I can see why exchanges are getting tired of possible upcoming forks, it costs money to prepare to accept new coins. Our local exchange didn't even started supporting BCH until late last year.

[eaLiTy]

It would have been much easier to understand whether or not the delisting is a political move had the exchange released some percentages as to the amount of business trading eth and bch brings them.

This is not a political move, it is a small exchange with a 24 hour trading volume of $450,000 according the reported volume by coinmarketcap which pale in comparison to the big exchanges in the market and their decision to delist ETH and the other fork coins is because of the technical issues they will have to encounter when a fork happens and if they are not careful they will be paying a huge prize and hence i understand why they are delisting ETH because of the massive change they are planning to implement but i still do not understand why they want to remove Bitcoin cash now as i am not aware about any upgrade from them.

[Hydrogen]

I don't think its hard forks they oppose. Ethereum may be owned and operated by developers who lack the competence and technical sophistication to successfully manage an altcoin. Everything ETH releases appears to be borderline dysfunctional, whether its their crypto cat app that crashed the ETH network. Or their proposals for the future, some of which have been criticized by legit software engineers as being unworkable.

Bitcoin cash has always been shady under Roger Ver who misled people into buying btc cash, claiming it was the "same thing" as bitcoin.

[alyssa85]

As someone who can't be bothered with technical aspects (I don't even run a node), I mostly see these forks as just a money grab. Oh, your crypto forked, now you have the same amount of two different coins...

Investors probably don't mind suddenly getting a bit more money but I can see why exchanges are getting tired of possible upcoming forks, it costs money to prepare to accept new coins. Our local exchange didn't even started supporting BCH until late last year.

You nailed it - that's what they are, a money grab for both the investors and developers (who have a lot of coins).

But they are destroying the eco-system being built around cryptocurrency by introducing a lot of expensive maintenance for all the support companies.

[gentlemand]

As someone who can't be bothered with technical aspects (I don't even run a node), I mostly see these forks as just a money grab. Oh, your crypto forked, now you have the same amount of two different coins...

The ETH forks aren't money grabs, they're technical kludges and can kicking.

I can see why exchanges in particular can't be bothered with that shit any more. Running a proper ETH node sounds like a seriously demanding task. It would no doubt be worth it if they were making money from it but Coinfloor have never really taken off.

For other chains that fork or splinter or just get weaker over time exchanges are the ones who'll be targeted with double spends. To combat that they have to introduce tons of confirmations which is turn pisses off their customers.

I remember someone who pledged their willy to BSV, money button whatever that is, saying soon they couldn't afford to run a node any more and that was one of BSV's thimbleful of real services. When sizeable crypto businesses themselves can't run nodes then you know you've fucked it.

[CarnagexD]

It would have been much easier to understand whether or not the delisting is a political move had the exchange released some percentages as to the amount of business trading eth and bch brings them.

This is not a political move, it is a small exchange with a 24 hour trading volume of $450,000 according the reported volume by coinmarketcap which pale in comparison to the big exchanges in the market and their decision to delist ETH and the other fork coins is because of the technical issues they will have to encounter when a fork happens and if they are not careful they will be paying a huge prize and hence i understand why they are delisting ETH because of the massive change they are planning to implement but i still do not understand why they want to remove Bitcoin cash now as i am not aware about any upgrade from them.

Only small exchanges will suffer on what the ETH is going to change, with the technical sides on ethereum and other hard forks the compatibility is the very vital to be stable. But if these small exchanges are going to delist eth due to hard fork then Bitcoin cash and Bitcoin Satoshi Vision is at large when they go for changing protocols and transitioning transactions.

[gentlemand]

Only small exchanges will suffer on what the ETH is going to change

We need to wait and see whether other places do this as well as it's just as likely to be an excuse for them to drop a market they haven't made the best of. If others follow suit that reflects very badly on ETH.

You can't expect to be the 'world's computer' if you need the permission of a mega corporation running a node to use it.

[Vishnu.Reang]

Coinfloor has been one of the shittiest cryptocurrency exchanges out there, and no one really cares whether they are going to delist Bitcoin Cash or not. This is an exchange which has a trade volume of only around $2 million per day. I will be more worried if the bigger exchanges decide to delist coins such as Bitcoin Cash, Bitcoin Gold and Bitcoin SV.

[abhiseshakana]

Developers really love doing all these forks - but they are a massive nuisance for everyone else. The exchanges, the online wallet providers, the payment processors, all of them have to do a shedload of work to accomodate these changes.

That's why I think coins that don't change much (bitcoin, doge) will end up being the winners. People just want something that works smoothly and that you don't need to do a lot of work to maintain, so that they can focus on the eco-system around the coin.

Apart from the problems faced by Coinfloor, the show must go on because it is clearly not possible for the ETH developer team to cancel the hard fork process, which preparation itself takes a long time.

And in my opinion, there will be many other major exchanges that will support the hard fork process. Moreover, the hard fork process carried out by ETH is an effort to overcome the problem of the Difficulty bomb (ETH Ice Age).

[dothebeats]

I understand their sentiment knowing how hard it is to change wallet versions and such every time a coin forks. Basically it's just money-grab for the devs and their constituents and does not really bring in a lot of necessary changes to the crypto table and their respective communities. These devs, for the most part don't care about improvements. They just want to get more money from their brainchild and that's it.

[JC btc]

Well, they should understand this as this is part of their contract, so they must also be patient in this kind of situation and not just being greedy and after how much money they can earn for a day, it's part of the contract. Anyway, not only exchange but also holders/traders, but let's be patient as this is for everyone's safety too.

[hatshepsut93]

As someone who can't be bothered with technical aspects (I don't even run a node), I mostly see these forks as just a money grab. Oh, your crypto forked, now you have the same amount of two different coins...

Investors probably don't mind suddenly getting a bit more money but I can see why exchanges are getting tired of possible upcoming forks, it costs money to prepare to accept new coins. Our local exchange didn't even started supporting BCH until late last year.

The word (hard) fork has two meanings in crypto - a software upgrade without backwards compatibility or a chain split and creation of new coin as the result. You are talking about the latter, while the article is focused on the former - the cost of frequent software upgrades, the risks associated with them, etc, all these things annoy both the users and especially the service providers.

[enhu]

Coinfloor is the first to have done delisting all altcoins. If all other exchanges follows, its bad for the altcoins prices, the altcoins are already down for years so i hope it won't happen. There is a lot to lose for them if they delist all. Maybe the exchange just too tired to keep updating the blockchain after ethereum fork taking too long, the technical team got frustrated.   

[Quidat]

Coinfloor is the first to have done delisting all altcoins. If all other exchanges follows, its bad for the altcoins prices, the altcoins are already down for years so i hope it won't happen. There is a lot to lose for them if they delist all. Maybe the exchange just too tired to keep updating the blockchain after ethereum fork taking too long, the technical team got frustrated.   

Its impossible to think that majority of exchangers would consider on a delisting all altcoins yet we know that this business is profitable due to those coins in the market
which do generate out volume and thats really a big benefit for them.

Delisting all altcoins by Coinfloor? Quite rare to be done by an exchange.For sure theyre already done with those forks.Its actually kinda hassle due to another set or batch of alterations
and adjustments made due to such changes.

[Febo]

Exchanges are rebelling against constant hard forks

LOL. Rebelling?  They are just lazy. All they need to do is just close their exchange down. Or sell it like Poloniex owners sold their exchange after they lost interest. Other exchanges will pick up their customers.  Cryptocurrenies are developing s fast that all infrastructure that serve them has to be constantly updated. It is simple as that.

[Amel]

Coinfloor is the first to have done delisting all altcoins. If all other exchanges follows, its bad for the altcoins prices, the altcoins are already down for years so i hope it won't happen. There is a lot to lose for them if they delist all. Maybe the exchange just too tired to keep updating the blockchain after ethereum fork taking too long, the technical team got frustrated.   

It would be bad if all altcoins were delisted, but it would be better if only a few altcoins which according to them have no power to develop. As far as we know, there have been many new altcoins that have appeared in recent years, and on average altcoins become shitcoins, this should be delisted and let potential coins continue to be updated.