Will the next Ethereum hard fork lead to the formation of a new currency?

In any cryptocurrency ecosystem, the topic of a hard fork is always accompanied by some criticism and confusion. Following the hard fork to resolve the DAO issue , Ethereum split into two currencies. The next Ethereum release, dubbed Metropolis, implies another hard fork. This doesn't automatically mean the emergence of a third iteration of Ethereum, but it can't be completely ruled out.

METROPOLIS HARD FORK DOES NOT MEAN A GUARANTEED APPEARANCE OF A NEW CURRENCY

Many people don't seem to fully understand why Ethereum and Ethereum Classic became different currencies. It's actually quite simple to explain. To date, the Ethereum ecosystem has undergone a total of five different hard forks. This is a significant number, but according to the developers, each of these "interventions" was necessary. One of these hard forks was carried out to return funds to investors siphoned off from The DAO by attackers who exploited a bug in its code, a move that was met with mixed reactions in the Ethereum community.

As a result of the hard fork, not all miners supported it and switched to the new blockchain . Instead, owners of a small percentage of hashing power decided to continue the unchanged blockchain that existed before the hard fork, which led to the creation of new coins based on this chain. Since the forked chain could not also be called Ethereum, it was called Ethereum Classic. The new coins were designated ETC and are traded on many exchanges around the world.

Some people are concerned that the upcoming Metropolis hard fork could create another currency, another Ethereum . While this is certainly theoretically possible, in reality, it is extremely unlikely. The reason for the creation of Ethereum Classic stems from fundamental differences in views on how to rescue DAO investors . Some community members felt this decision was fundamentally flawed and therefore decided to fork away from the Ethereum network. This does not mean that every Ethereum hard fork will create a new currency.

If this were true, then by today there would be not two, but five different Ethereums. For now there are only two, and it is highly doubtful that this number will ever increase. Unless, of course, new deep ideological differences arise. However, Metropolis in no way falls into this category. Metropolis brings a lot of technical changes, but they are unlikely to provoke anyone to break away from the network in the foreseeable future.

It's important to note that any hard fork could, in principle, have unexpected consequences. Some miners or nodes may fail to update their client software by the time Metropolis is released. This may seem extremely unlikely, but it should never be underestimated. A blockchain fork is certainly theoretically possible, but for Metropolis, the likelihood of such a scenario is relatively low.

Some may wonder why hard forks are necessary in order to make significant changes to the Ethereum ecosystem. Developers are proponents of hard forks because they are the most efficient way to update the network. In addition, the release of Metropolis was announced well in advance, and all participants in the network had and still have the opportunity to update the software they use in advance and save a lot of time when implementing a hard fork. It will be interesting to see whether we will witness a bifurcation of the network during this hard fork, but there is practically no chance of a bright and memorable development of events in this case.

Source: The Merkle