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That is a myth. BTC is backed ONLY by demand for it. If there is no demand, it has zero value no matter what it cost to create.

They are literally wasting hundreds of millions on electricity that could go into funding useful work. Think of that!

Miners won't sell at 0 value if the cost is much higher. Anyway, market will verify if BTC-U has anything to do with real Bitcoin.

By the way, other are also trying to make money on naming their alt-coin Bitcoin.
https://steemit.com/bitcoin/@cardboard/bitcoin-segwit2x-update-war-incoming

Precisely. We aren't going to offer this upgrade unless there are multiple candidates already. If there are multiple candidates, why not have the best be one of them?