A new bitcoin fork called United Bitcoin has been announced by a few prominent cryptocurrency luminaries that aims to improve the mechanics of the original bitcoin software. United Bitcoin was forked on December 12, 2017 at block height 498777 and the creators claim it will feature an 8MB block size, Lightning Network support, Segregated Witness, and the ability to process smart contracts.

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United Bitcoin: A Fork of a Different Color Plans to Find a Purpose for Lost and Inactive Wallets

The ‘forking fever’ has been contagious these days as there seems to be a new bitcoin-based fork announced every two weeks. Now the well-known bitcoin developer and Bloq founder Jeff Garzik, Bitbank Group’s Songxiu Hua, and the chairman of Bloq, Matthew Roszak, have decided to launch their own form of bitcoin. The project called United Bitcoin (UB) has many goals which include raising the block size to 8MB and adding smart contract functionality to the digital asset. Additionally, one upcoming feature that is fairly controversial is how the United Bitcoin team plans to distribute funds to certain allocations that stem from lost and inactive bitcoin wallets. This means inactive stashes like Satoshi Nakamoto’s addresses will be accessible and distributed to certain aspects of the UB roadmap.

“United Bitcoin will use the pressure-tested mechanics of Bitcoin, such as PoW, block times, supply cap, and issuance model, while it upgrades areas to accommodate larger social demands — These improvements will be an increase in block size to 8MB, the addition of smart contract support based on UVM, the addition of Lightning Network support, and SegWit implementation,” explains the UB white paper.

The mission of United Bitcoin is to find a purpose for lost Bitcoin and inactive wallets and create a stable cryptocurrency system through an association of joint credit and smart contracts.

Influential Communities and Creating a ‘Crypto-Gold Standard’

The United Bitcoin distribution process is a bit different than most of the other bitcoin forks this year. Bitcoin core (BTC) users who transfer their funds would be eligible to receive their UB balances if they transferred between Block 494000 and Block 498777. The receiving address must be tethered to one of the input addresses, and cannot be a fresh new address. The output address must contain a balance of more than 0.01 BTC says the UB white paper. Eligible bitcoin addresses will be credited UB 1:1 for every BTC they hold. United Bitcoin’s official website has a full node client that can synchronize the blockchain.

Of course, across the community and social media, the subject of another bitcoin fork is controversial. Moreover, the plan to distribute funds from inactive address is probably the biggest bone of contention for some bitcoin proponents. The UB team says the balances of inactive addresses will serve the community. 30 percent will be allotted to “influential communities” that help spread UB adoption. The other 70 percent of idle balances will serve as reserves that will be tethered to stable tokens pegged to chosen fiat currencies. The UB team believes this process will create a system similar to the Gold Standard.

What do you think about the United Bitcoin project led by Jeff Garzik and other prominent blockchain community members? Do you think people who are forking bitcoin are taking the process a little too far? Let us know in the comments below.