From 2009-2015, Bitcoin BTC was run by programmers like Satoshi Nakamoto, Gavin Andresen, Mike Hearn, and promoted by people like Roger Ver. Most in this community tended to lean libertarian, and liked Bitcoin BTC's potential to take power away from governments & central banks.
Satoshi left the project. In the spirit of openness & freedom, Gavin & Mike naively made the mistake of letting too many bad actors (like Blockstream) gain access to the Bitcoin BTC project.
The Blockstream side had more money, and they had Theymos (who controls the #1 & #2 Bitcoin communities - rBitcoin & BitcoinTalk.org). As a result, they were able to push enough of the community into believing that small blocks were the way to go.
As Gavin & Mike were being pushed out, they tried to create the first "big block" fork of Bitcoin, called Bitcoin XT. The Blockstream / Bitcoin Core side hired a botnet operator to DDoS Bitcoin XT to death in its infancy.
From Mike Hearn:
"..After Blockstream successfully took over Bitcoin Core and expelled anyone who opposed them, Gavin and I forked Bitcoin Core to create Bitcoin XT, the first alternative node implementation to gain any serious usage. The creation of XT led to the imposition of censorship across all Bitcoin discussion forums and news outlets, resulted in the creation of this sub, and Core supporters paid a botnet operator to force XT nodes offline with DDoS attacks.."
https://np.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/89z483/ama_ask_mike_anything/
https://np.reddit.com/r/bitcoinxt/comments/3iumsr/udp_flood_ddos_attacks_against_xt_nodes/
~~~ embed:641524932334235648 { twitter metadata:cGV0ZXJrdG9kZHx8aHR0cHM6Ly90d2l0dGVyLmNvbS9wZXRlcmt0b2RkL3N0YXR1cy82NDE1MjQ5MzIzMzQyMzU2NDgge3w= ~~~archived}
Gavin & Mike were pushed out.
Even Brian Armstrong, the CEO of Coinbase, was censored by rBitcoin back in 2015:
"I just unsubscribed rBitcoin and subscribed /r/btc" - Brian Armstrong, CEO of Coinbase (largest fiat gateway for crypto), Nov 2015
Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin talks about the absurd censorship on rBitcoin:
By 2016, the Bilderberg Group & AXA funded Blockstream, and the takeover was complete.
- My List of Links & Sources: https://steemit.com/bitcoin/@normalrc/how-the-bilderberg-group-took-over-bitcoin-btc-links-and-proof-inside
Any talk about "big blocks" and "low fees" was banned.
- Censored Post: https://images2.imgbox.com/48/be/g23Aqs7Y_o.png
In August 2017, another attempt to create a "big block" fork happened, thus creating Bitcoin Cash (BCH). And learning from the defeat of Bitcoin XT, this time around, Bitcoin Cash made sure they had the support of big miners, so the Blockstream / Bitcoin Core side couldn't use a botnet to DDoS it to death in the cradle.
So that is where we are today.
Bitcoin BTC has been taken over by the Bilderberg Group / Blockstream, deliberately crippled by small blocks & high fees, so people will have to use the Lightning Network (which is where Bilderberg Group / Blockstream will profit). This was pushed through via brutal censorship on the #1 & #2 Bitcoin communities (rBitcoin & BitcoinTalk.org, which are both controlled by Theymos)
Bitcoin Cash BCH continues with bigger block size limits, low fees, and the "P2P electronic cash system" vision as laid out by Satoshi Nakamoto's Bitcoin whitepaper.
