The Ethereum Classic Hard Fork Update Reduces Mining Difficulty

29th May 2018. Ethereum Classic successfully eliminated the “difficulty bomb” feature from the ETC network protocol by implementing a major network update on Tuesday. The ‘bomb’ was an element of the original Ethereum (ETH) source-code and it was prevalent at the block 5,900,000 of the ETC network. The feature was added to the original Ethereum network protocol to exponentially increase the mining difficulty (so that it may become slow) whenever the need arises for a Proof-of-Stake (PoS) consensus algorithm. In a nutshell, it would just temporarily ‘freeze’ the block validations, causing a halt in process for some period of time. Because of this fact, the feature was previously known as the “Ethereum Ice Age” in the original ETH network.  

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In 2016 when the split happened and Ethereum Classic came into play, the “difficulty bomb” was also passed on to the ETC main net. Although the feature enabled switching to the Proof-of-Stake (PoS) protocol, it eventually led to slowing down the mining process and made mining unprofitable for the cryptocurrency (both ETH and ETC). Finally after the successful hard fork on Tuesday, Ethereum Classic (ETC) has stamped out this feature once and for all. This is no doubt the most crucial network update since the inception of Ethereum Classic.

However, it’s still difficult to account the exact proportion of nodes in the ETC network that are updated owing to the unavailability of tools. Nevertheless, a majority of exchanges and mining pools reported upgradation in their software prior to the hard fork update. The good news is, there were reportedly no bugs or ill effects even hours after the fork. Once it extends to all the nodes, the upgrade is expected to reduce the total time consumed in creating a new block. So more or less, it segregates the ETC blockchain from its parent ETH blockchain and creates a technical as well as ideological distance between the two. Let’s see how this update makes a difference in the ETC network and how beneficial it turns out for the miners.