For visual learners, this is a helpful flow chart showing the scenarios that could play out with Bitcoin's effort to scale its network.
Key players: miners and mining pools (or those who help keep the Bitcoin network stable, safe, and secure by approving transactions)
Key dates:
- July 17 - need 80% miners on board for BIP 91 to activate Segwit2x
- August 14 - need 100% miners on board to activate 2MB block increase hard fork
Key implications:
- For bitcoin protocol: either Bitcoin will scale with block size increase OR will it split into two paths: old client and new client.
- For Bitcoin currency: expect heavy buying and selling and thus volatility surrounding key events.
- For exchanges & their customers: expect a lot of customers buying, speculating, hedging, and withdrawing funds--which may overwhelm their capacity--expect the weaker exchanges to have potential network issues and/or freeze customer funds. Exchanges are working over time to prepare for technical glitches and increasing support staff.
- For bitcoin payment system: secure, immutable peer-to-peer payment system remains unchanged.
Source: Coindesk, available at https://media.coindesk.com/uploads/2017/07/Screen-Shot-2017-07-18-at-8.59.38-PM.png