Known as the New York Agreement (NYA) it was said to be a compromise between the two sides of the debate — those who want to achieve scaling through Segregated Witness (Segwit) and those who prefer to scale by increasing the block size. It consists of two sequential phases — to activate Segwit using BIP 91 (making it compatible with the UASF) and then to hard fork the base block size to 2 MB ninety days later.
Segwit2x is the name given to the project and the code itself is held in the ‘btc1’ repository. All development is being overseen by Jeff Garzik.
With phase one underway and with Segwit ‘lock-in’ looking inevitable another group, led by Bitcoin mining pool ViaBTC, then announced that they would take the August 1st UASF deadline and use it as the launch date for Bitcoin Cash, their own ‘big block’ hard fork.
So with Segwit now locked-in and a ‘big block’ fork of Bitcoin already live, many are left wondering if the second phase of the NYA is still relevant. Despite doubt over the continued validity of the project Jean-Pierre Rupp has recently added an announcement to the btc1 repository stating firm intention to press on with the hard fork.
Governance by Industry
Bitcoin’s very nature means that governance is distributed and formed by consensus as opposed to a more traditional top-down hierarchy in which a small number of people hold positions of central authority.
The now inevitable activation of Segwit is a success claimed by both UASF and Segwit2x supporters. The pressure to activate Segwit was due to the UASF (BIP 148) movement, who’s August 1st deadline led to the activation date of Segwit2x being brought forward to ensure compatibility. In that sense the community seem to have had the upper hand.
Despite the recent arrival of Bitcoin Cash, Segwit2x supporters are keen to point to the number of businesses that signed the NYA by way of showing support for the continuation of phase two of the plan
