Why is the Bitcoin Gold Hardfork happening? I haven't been following up on the story behind Bitcoin Gold. I wonder why this is a fork from the already created Bitcoin ledger, and why this cannot be a fork from the core software, and start their own ledger from the beginning.
It's just a group of people trying create more money and gain control of their own blockchain using a hard fork.  

My guess on why they aren't starting their own blockchain and just forking Bitcoin's is that Bitcoin already has huge name recognition and they probably already own a bunch of Bitcoins to begin with.  If they fork the Bitcoin chain with the name "Bitcoin Gold" they can basically ride the coattails of Bitcoin and possibly create an altcoin with significant value (making money out of nothing).  This is nothing short of fraud, and anybody who ends up buying "Bitcoin Gold" coins is essentially just giving them free money.