Last year Bitcoin forked multiple times but the most successful one was Bitcoin Cash providing a rival chain that caused a rift within the BTC community. This year both versions are forking again and two new blockchains are imminent, with World Bitcoin already arriving.
WBTC has already split from the Bitcoin chain at block 503,888. According to its founders it has been created to solve a number of existing problems with Bitcoin. Anyone that has used it is well aware of the transaction fees and the arduous hours it takes to send or receive. World Bitcoin aims to evolve beyond the current blockchain into something far more efficient;
“We call it World Bitcoin because we want to solve the practical problems in the Bitcoin Network from a global perspective and offer more diverse scenarios of applications,”
By creating blockchain 3.0 the founders want to develop a system characterized by an infinite platform of smart contracts, high concurrency, low fees and blocks with upper limits. According to a WBTC Medium post the team said;
“In such areas as financial services, food security and culture and entertainment, concepts in blockchain technology have already been adopted in real life. Just like “Internet +”, “blockchain +” will have a significant impact on the upgrade of the whole industry and WBTC will spearhead that change.”
In total there will be 2.121 billion WBTC, with 21 million being managed by the WBTC Foundation for marketing, building a global ecosystem, and developing new features. Bitcoin users can get 100 WBTC for 1 Bitcoin.
Bitcoin Candy is the second fork due to split from the Bitcoin Cash chain at block 512,666 where it will continue on its own 8Mb block chain. BCH users will get CDY at a ratio of a thousand per Bitcoin Cash. The vision behind this one is a system resilient to quantum computing which many speculate will break the existing blockchain model. The Bitcoin Candy website states;
“As top technology companies like D-Wave, IBM and Intel are ramping up their investment in quantum computing research and development, the age of quantum computing will probably arrive in five to ten years. As such, ECDSA-based cryptocurrencies will become breakable by quantum computers. The CDY team will focus on experimenting with post-quantum signatures to secure cryptocurrencies.”
Blocks will be created much faster, at a rate of every two minutes and a total supply of 21 billion will be available, 10% of which will be pre-mined as an incentive for early developers and adopters. 2018 is likely to see a lot more forks in the Bitcoin ecosystem which continues to evolve beyond its original and somewhat obsolescent from.