Luke Dashjr has resigned as chairman and chief technology officer of Bitcoin mining pool OCEAN, shortly before a Bitcoin hard fork he backs splits from the main chain on Tuesday, September 1. The company also repurchased all of his equity. The fork replaces Bitcoin's proof-of-work algorithm with BLAKE2b, which existing Bitcoin mining hardware cannot run.
Why Dashjr Left OCEAN
The departure follows a turbulent month for the pool. OCEAN's hashrate fell 96% in August after the company routed customer power to a minority chain for approximately 18 hours. Miners reported they had not given clear consent and called for leadership changes.
Earlier in the year, Dashjr had championed BIP-110, an anti-spam soft fork that required 55% miner support to activate. Signaling peaked at just 2.53%, and the resulting chain stalled after two blocks. Backers subsequently regrouped around a September breakaway coin.
The Technical Argument and Its Critics
Dashjr contends that Bitcoin lost decentralized block construction years ago and that BLAKE2b eliminates ASICBoost, a shortcut that grants large miners an efficiency advantage. He says the change also penalizes concentrated mining power. In a post dated August 30, 2026, he argued that the main chain runs under centralized management and blocks miners from building their own block templates.
Critics have pushed back. Adam Back called BIP-110 "idiocracy" in July, and Ripple's former chief technology officer David Schwartz dismissed the network-under-attack framing as nonsense.
Dashjr now channels his efforts into CONVOY, which he describes as a second attempt at decentralized mining. OCEAN continues operating as a non-custodial pool.
What Holders Should Know
Bitcoin (BTC) trades near $77,655, down 0.59% on the day but still up 23.3% for the month. Network hashrate has declined throughout the year as miners redirect machines toward artificial intelligence contracts, thinning the pool of hardware any breakaway chain could recruit.
Holders face two practical concerns: replay risk between the two chains and which chain their wallet will track. Dashjr recommends using a light wallet rather than running a full node. These questions already surfaced during the August chain split.
A proof-of-work change mints a separate coin, after which the market prices which chain carries value. Dashjr's previous fork attempt never cleared 3% miner support. The September 1 split will test whether meaningful hashrate follows the BLAKE2b chain or whether the network freezes within hours as it did in August.
