Bitcoin Cash: Comprehensive Guide to BCH (2021)

An unknown programmer, going by Satoshi Nakamoto utilized cryptographic hash functions and public-key cryptography to create Bitcoin. Bitcoin’s purpose is to be a global decentralized financial system while empowering people to have full control over their finances. When Nakamoto was coding bitcoin, he put a 1 MB block size limit to limit the number of spam transactions per block. However, many considered this as a temporary measure, since Nakamoto wanted to minimize spam transactions.

As Bitcoin grew more popular, it had difficulty scaling up to meet the escalating demand. A possible solution called “SegWit” or Segregated Witness was suggested. SegWit would take the bulky signature data from the transactions and put it inside a parallel sidechain. However, this received heavy criticism from parts of the community since it brought significant changes to the original protocol.

These sections demanded an increase in block size. According to them, Satoshi always meant to increase the block size as the coin got more popular. After a lot of back-and-forths, which has been since labeled the “block size debate,” they finally branched off the main Bitcoin chain on August 1, 2017, and created Bitcoin Cash.

Defining Bitcoin Cash

This is how the Bitcoin Cash project website is defining itself: “Bitcoin Cash is peer-to-peer electronic cash for the Internet. It is fully decentralized, with no central bank and requires no trusted third parties to operate.” 

Did you notice the emphasis on the words “peer-to-peer electronic cash”? It is done by design since the primary motivation of Bitcoin Cash’s existence depends solely on carrying out more transactions.

According to them, by increasing the block size, they will be able to allow for faster and more efficient transactions. Initially, Bitcoin Cash had an 8 MB block size, as opposed to bitcoin’s 1 MB block size. Since then, they have adopted an “adjustable blocksize cap” approach, wherein blocks could be mined with an upper cap of 32 MB.

Since we have mentioned that Bitcoin Cash is a hard fork of bitcoin, let’s understand what the term actually means.

A fork is a condition whereby the state of the blockchain diverges into chains where a part of the network has a different perspective on the history of transactions than a different part of the network.

So, why would you want to diverge away from the main protocol? There are three major reasons:

• The original protocol is going through an upgrade.
• There is a game-breaking flaw in the old protocol, which needs to be corrected.
• Someone wants to create an altcoin based on the old protocol.

There are two kinds of forks:

• Soft Fork.
• Hard Fork.

What Is A Soft Fork? 

Think of soft fork as an update in the software which is backward compatible. Suppose you are running MS Excel 2005 in your laptop and you want to open a spreadsheet created in MS Excel 2015. You will be able to open it because MS Excel 2015 is backward compatible. Having said that, all the updates that you can enjoy in the newer version won’t be visible to you in the older version. Going back to our MS excel analogy again, suppose there is a feature which allows you to put in GIFs in the spreadsheet in the 2015 version, you won’t see those GIFs in the 2005 version. So, basically, you will see all text but won’t see the GIF.

What Is A Hard Fork?

The hard fork, unlike a soft fork, is not backward compatible. Once it is utilized there is absolutely no going back whatsoever. If you do not join the upgraded version of the blockchain, then you do not get access to any of the new updates or interact with users of the new system whatsoever. Likewise, think of Playstation 3 and Playstation 4. Obviously, you can’t play PS3 games on the PS4 and vice-versa.

On the differences between a hard fork and soft fork, Andreas Antonopoulos said:

“If a vegetarian restaurant would choose to add pork to their menu it would be considered to be a hard fork. If they would decide to add vegan dishes, everyone who is vegetarian could still eat vegan, you don’t have to be vegan to eat there, you could still be vegetarian to eat there and meat eaters could eat there too so that’s a soft fork.”

Gambling with Bitcoin Cash

So, how do you gamble with Bitcoin Cash? Are there any websites that allow you to gamble with Bitcoin Cash, or do you have to sell them for bitcoins? Well, since Bitcoin Cash happens to be one of the most widely-used cryptocurrencies in the world, there are plenty of casinos offering you the option to gamble with Bitcoin Cash. Bitcoin Cash-friendly casinos include – Fortune Jack, Stake, 1xBit.com, 7Bit Casino, Bet Chain, and edgeless, etc.

Bitcoin has slowly garnered a huge following. However, a lot of newcomers make the mistake of confusing bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash. Here are some of the main differences between the two ‘Bitcoin’-related currencies:

Bitcoin vs Bitcoin Cash

In conclusion, Bitcoin Cash is a worthy addition to your crypto portfolio and will allow you to enjoy a plethora of casino games.