um lol. Yes anyone can hard fork the code, but if you don't get social consensus it will be understood that your hard fork is not Bitcoin.
Its been explained to me before that there are layers to consensus
Miner consensus => What order transactions go in Full node consensus => What blocks are valid according to the rules of Bitcoin Social consensus => What is Bitcoin/Which chain is Bitcoin
You just can't get social consensus without consent. Social consensus means you'll get full node consensus which pay the miners to give you miner consensus.
BCash didn't have social consensus. They had changed the rules, and then went forward with that along with a chunk of the bitcoin value, mindshare, hashrate, etc. Was it bitcoin? No. Was it harmful to bitcoin? Absolutely.
Could it happen again? I wouldn't doubt it.
Here's a lead belligerent.
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