Bitcoin SV, as a top-10 currency and one of the most prominent Bitcoin forks, certainly has a lot of eyes watching it. Not always this attention is in good faith, but this doesn’t subtract from the fact that the coin has a large and faithful following. So why is BSV worthy of all the fame? In this guide, ChangeHero will explain this, as well as look at the Bitcoin SV news and give a hint on how to buy BSV, exchange BSV and use it.
What is Bitcoin SV?
Bitcoin SV (BSV) is a cryptocurrency which is, technically, a Bitcoin Cash fork, which split from Bitcoin. The reason for this split, though, was the need to go back to the principles described in the original Bitcoin whitepaper by Satoshi Nakamoto. Therefore, the “SV” in the name of the coin stands for “Satoshi Vision”.
So what is the vision the BSV community is trying to achieve? First and foremost, Bitcoin was envisioned as a “peer-to-peer digital cash”, as the whitepaper title suggests. The transactions with Bitcoin had to be as convenient as the daily exchanging of cash, so the currency has to be secure and scalable. This has led to the ongoing dispute over solutions for the problem of scalability of the original Bitcoin. The BSV community consists mainly of those who believe the hard cap on the blocks in the original chain is the main hurdle to the solution of this problem.
The history of BitcoinSV
The sour disputes in the community over the block size cap began as early as in 2014, when there were enough users of Bitcoin to have network congestions on a regular basis. Besides, it became apparent that the payment network where the fees can get higher as a result and a transaction needs an hour to be settled, hardly could be used as a daily means of payment. That’s why in 2016, Bitcoin Cash split into a separate chain.
But this was not the end of the dispute. A part of the Bitcoin Cash community deemed the 8 MB block increase insufficient. Prominent members of this part of the community, like Calvin Ayre and Craig Wright started promoting an alternative to the new business model: they decided that mining would be more efficient as a business, and application developers would act as merchants who provide goods and services.
In November 2018, the conflict reached its peak and the chain split again. BCHABC (ABC standing for Adjustable Block Cap) won the “hashrate war” which was happening for a while after the split, and got to keep the original ticker. BSV decided to settle on incorporating “Satoshi Vision” in the name of the currency.
Ayre and Wright are still the most prominent members of the community. Ayre’s businesses provide tremendous financial support to the development, the CoinGeek media outlet, main source on Bitcoin SV news, and conferences.There is also the Bitcoin Foundation which unites the businesses developing in the BSV ecosystem. Other known members of the community include Daniel Connolly, lead developer and Steve Shadders, Technical director.
What is special about BSV?
The Metanet protocol
Bitcoin SV uses the original concept of Bitcoin blockchain as a means of data transfer, not only the transfer of value. On top of the original protocol, an overlapping directed acyclic graph (DAG, in computer theory — a kind of graph that can proceed in one direction only) sidechain runs, which actually makes the BSV network usable for on-chain development. The Metanet is a layer-two solution, and its goal is to serve as a foundation for the value-based Internet.
Payment Channels
Payment Channels are side-chain “tunnels” which can be arbitrarily opened and closed between participating parties without the need of an intermediary. Their point is to conduct several transactions faster and record the result on-chain upon closing. If it sounds familiar, it is because on the surface level Lightning Network operates in the same way.
The Fee Market
The ultimate goal of Bitcoin SV is to have no hard cap on a block size, which was implemented in the Genesis update in 2020. Without a limit on the number of transactions that can get included in the next block, there is no uncontrollable network fee increase. This is great for the users but what about the miners? The developers proposed to make transaction fees clearer to the end users and let the miners decide how much they are willing to charge, which is then communicated to the users so they can choose which service provider charges the fee they can afford.
How is it different from Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash?
Block size and cap
As it was mentioned a few times before that, the main and core difference between BSV and the chains it forked off is in the lack of a hard cap on the block size (the original Bitcoin is still on 1 MB and Bitcoin Cash now sports a 32 MB limit).
Side-chain solutions
Mostly for the same reason, the preceding blockchains tend to stick to transfer of value, while BSV also pursues the goal of creating an internet of value by making the network a tool to build on.
Transaction Fees
Thanks to the lack of hard cap limit on the block size and high throughput, there is no need to increase the network fee in BSV. As a result, the network fees are consistently lower than in BTC or even BCH.
Transactions and throughput
Speaking about throughput, BSV network hosts about twice as many transactions as the original Bitcoin, and by a wide margin many more than in BCH. The reason for this is the large amount of those are data transfers made by the apps in the BSV ecosystem. This gets clear when we check the average or median transaction value:
A median transaction in Bitcoin moves hundreds of dollars worth of BTC, and a median transaction in BSV network is barely worth a few cents.
How much a BSV is worth?
Bitcoin SV price has had quite a few spikes throughout its history. First, at the very beginning, when the network launched. As a rule, the holders of a currency from which a new network forks, get the equivalent amount in the new currency as well. Some of the BCH holders sold off at the start, hence a quick correction. Second time, in May of 2019, when Craig Wright copyrighted the Bitcoin whitepaper. Third time, in January 2020, the price surged supposedly with the news that Craig Wright reportedly received the keys of Tulip Trust, the Bitcoin fund where $9.6 billion fortune of the original creator is safeguarded. On January, 14 the price reached the latest ATH, $441.20. However, the market crash two months later would correct the sharp rise. Lately, as all the market is following Bitcoin, the Bitcoin SV price was also moving up.
The total existing supply of BSV will not exceed 21,000,000 BSV. Currently, there are 18,480,915 BSV in circulation and with the $4,355,158,689 market cap (rank 6), the price of an individual coin is $235.66 (according to CoinMarketCap).
Is BSV controversial?
No point in sugarcoating the fact — Bitcoin SV is known outside the community as a project ridden with controversies from the very start.
The most known point of contempt is connected with the claims of Craig Wright, Chief scientist of nChain, that he is the creator of original Bitcoin, Satoshi Nakamoto. Wright has been providing proof that he was involved in the earliest days of Bitcoin, but none of it was not irrefutable. The infamy of these claims even got BSV delisted from the largest exchanges like Binance and Kraken in its early days. Earlier this year, BSV news were all about the court battle with a brother of his deceased business partner, David Kleiman, over the ownership of the Tulip Trust bitcoin.
BSV exchange is still problematic when it comes to the largest exchanges, since they delisted the currency or have never had it listed thanks to its main proponent’s reputation. A newcomer to crypto, to exchange BSV, would need to do more research just to find a reliable dedicated BSV exchange. This is why ChangeHero is the go-to place to get or exchange BSV — we make the process easy and secure.
The tech behind BSV was also criticized because the high or nonexistent block size limit actually makes it less accessible to the hobbyist and non-industrial miners and, therefore, creates an environment where the number of nodes is limited to a few businesses. One can argue that this is actually the idea, but fewer miners on the network also means lower network security.
What is the future of Bitcoin SV?
With the Genesis upgrade out of the way, the plans of the team are more maintenance oriented. There is no publically available official roadmap that is up-to-date as of now.
The focus in ecosystem development shifted to the Metanet expansion, where developers can utilize the BSV network for app building needs. As of July, there are more than 400 known projects and resources in the BSV ecosystem, covering the ground of eSports, streaming, gaming, social networking and, of course, financial services. If we are to expect any Bitcoin SV news, they would probably be about the ecosystem expansion.
BSV news and opinions on Twitter
In the most recent BSV news, CoinGeek announced that the next conference will be headlined by Thomas Lee of Fundstrat Global Advisors (and a huge Bitcoin believer) and economist George Gilder.
The official Bitcoin SV account frequently posts tidbits of data about BSV’s achievements. For example, BSV consistently has more on-chain activity than its main competitors thanks to the apps in the ecosystem. By July, the number of transactions in total is already twice as Bitcoin’s.
It’s likely that you’ve heard of Bitcoin maximalists. But have you heard about BSV maxis? (Although true BSV maxis would use Twetch)
How to buy BSV? How to exchange BSV?
If you came here looking for the answer to how to buy BSV, you are in luck. On ChangeHero you can buy Bitcoin SV with more than 25 fiat currencies or exchange BSV against dozens of cryptocurrencies supported by ChangeHero. For crypto-to-crypto BSV exchange, the transactions are extra fast, because we process the incoming transactions with zero confirmations.
Either way, it will not take you a lot of time and effort, and should anything come up — our support is always there to help.
How to store Bitcoin SV?
BitcoinSV has a long list of BSV-exclusive wallets, which have excellent operability within the chain, like CentBee, CashPay or RelayX. The latter positions itself as a superwallet, given how much it can do: it can operate with other apps on the BSV chain like Dimely or Baemail, and the users can top it up with other crypto currencies and send any coin from their BSV balance.
Some multi-currency crypto wallets like Atomic, Guarda, Edge and Exodus also support Bitcoin SV. In Exodus wallet you can even exchange BSV to and from with the help of ChangeHero.
How to use Bitcoin SV?
Like it was already mentioned, there are hundreds of applications where BSV microtransactions are enabled. The most used is a social network (similar to Twitter) Twetch. There are also games (Kronoverse, Peergame) and streaming (My movies, Streamanity). MoneyButton is a convenient tool for tipping with Bitcoin SV which can be integrated anywhere.
As for the digital cash vision and payment method, BitcoinSV still has the room to grow. Several payment gateways like CoinGate and Coinify enable purchases with BSV. On the map you can find some of the hundreds of merchants that use it.
Summary
Even though Bitcoin SV has a fair share of sceptics, it is embraced by a large community that comes up with fun new applications for the coin almost on a weekly basis. Be it from the outside or the inside, the unfolding history of Bitcoin SV is and will be interesting to observe.
Don’t forget that the best place to buy or exchange BSV quickly and safely is on ChangeHero!
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