Imagine internet kill switch is in action around the world due to some lets say major conflict and previously global network becomes local in some territories or even turned off in others. So what is the bitcoin destiny in this case? Will people in some areas continue to mine bitcoin that will lead to several separate chains? Is there plan for such a scenario?

  • Salamander
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    fedilink
    13 years ago

    I don’t know if there is a plan, but this is what I think:

    At the beginning, you will have many identical copies of the blockchain. We can assume that there will be several local networks with people who have enough bitcoin to want to keep the blockchain alive, so they will continue mining. From this point onward, each blockchain becomes an independent chain with the same starting point.

    Assuming that the people are truly constrained to their local network, it would be possible to continue independently and merge the blockchains once the networks reconnect.

    However, in practice it might be possible for someone to move from one network to the other. This person can spend all of her bitcoins in local network A and she will still have all of her bitcoins in the other copies of the blockchain. I think that what makes the most sense is to simply add the bitcoins from the networks when two networks merge. So, if you have 1 bitcoin, the network splits into 10, and then the 10 networks get back together, you would have 10 bitcoins that are worth ~1/10th of their original worth.