[Bitcoin-development] questions about bitcoin-XT code fork & non-consensus hard-fork

[Sean Lynch]

It seems to me the real problem would be the community making a big deal
about the fork, not the fork itself. Maybe the fork will take off, in which
case anyone who has a position in Bitcoin now will have a position in the
forked currency, or it won't, in which case who cares? Sure, Bitcoin might
be less valuable for a while while people wait and see how the fork does,
but anyone who thinks a hard fork is a large risk to Bitcoin compared to
all the other risks it faces is deluding themselves.

I think we would all be better off if the community said, "Fine, fork if
you want. May the best fork win," than to sing doom and gloom every time
someone decides not to follow the community process. Besides, a bunch of
different people being involved does not a decentralized system make. Not
if they all have to follow the same process and forks without consensus are
not allowed. That can actually be worse in many ways than a benevolent
dictatorship, because it will quickly ossify as the community grows larger
and more diverse.

If Bitcoin itself had to get community consensus before it was tried, we'd
have no Bitcoin. I have no problem at all with someone deciding to fork it.
In fact, I *prefer* it, because I think in the long run it makes my own
position *more* valuable to have different forks trying different things.
Anyone who holds Bitcoin before the fork gets the sum of the values of
their account on each fork. Over the long run, the value on most forks will
go to zero, but then it's at worst a max function.

Claiming that forks make Bitcoin less valuable sounds to me a lot like
Bernie Sanders saying we don't need so many choices of deodorant.
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