Ethereum classic was never supposed to exist.
The hard fork of the ethereum blockchain earlier this month was meant to move funds associated with the hacking of The DAO into an account controlled by investors and leave the old record of transactions to be forgotten by history.
Most of ethereum's developers made the switch, as did exchanges, startups and other members of the budding ecosystem. For a few days, the project returned to normalcy.
But not everyone wanted that record to be forgotten.
A small group of miners continued to use the original blockchain as a protest for what they depicted as a bailout of the defunct project.
Read more here:
http://www.coindesk.com/three-value-propositions-ethereum-classic/