Topic: A bet on the future difficulty level (Read 3739 times)

Grats to Cyde, who beat all the odds!

Keep the betting going, it was interesting while it lasted

Thanks to black8, who graciously admitted defeat and sent the payment: http://blockexplorer.com/tx/caccaad9800a8ffc2284d7986904b30c5e37af0aa08890bf449853803d2b4665

Now, for my next bet ... 

434882.7217497

well done CydeWeys. Very close in the end.

It just hit 16 blocks per hour.  But I doubt it will be enough to move the average.  I'm guessing 450k difficulty.  But I wouldn't be surprised if it's higher.

I first read this as you betting 500,000 and 360,000 bitcoins and choked on my drink.

427,000 with 177 blocks left to go, this is fun. I'm betting cyde will win but it will be close either way

lucky for me.

I should've taken that bet with you Kirian, then I would've made another 1 BTC 

 it looks like you're going to win CydeWeys. I'm thinking it'll come in ~436000 now

Well yes, that's what it is.  But it adds some flavor to see the reasoning behind the derivation of the 430,000 figure as well.

You could have just described this as an over-under bet at a difficulty of 430,000 with black8 taking the under and CydeWeys taking the over.

I'll let you guys in on my original reasoning.  That 500K figure comes from my reckoning as to what the instantaneous difficulty level would be at block 127007.  Yeah, I plum forgot about figuring the 2000-block sliding window into my number, which obviously makes the calculated difficulty a lot less than the instantaneous difficulty at the time of switch-over.  The crazy thing is the instantaneous difficulty level is actually probably going to be above 600K at the time of block 127007 (it's at 520K now and rising).  That means it'll easily be way above 600K for the increase after this next one.  Holy crap!  Here's the chart to prove it:  http://bitcoin.sipa.be/

But between me forgetting to figure in the sliding window, and Black8's bet being way too optimistic, the middle ground between the two has actually resulted in a highly competitive horse race.  It's still too close to say with much certainty which side of 430,000 we're going to see -- and that makes it a good and entertaining wager!


Kirian and BCPokey, you may commence the ingestion of humble pie    Oh, and Kirian, the block solving rate is at 12.83 and climbing right now.  I expect it to see at least 14 before the next difficulty level, which means your numbers are low, and hopefully the difficulty level at the switchover will not be 423,000, but rather, just a tad bit above 430,000.

I'm glad I didn't post in here before. When I first read this thread i was all "clyde is a sucka, just givin his money away". Now I stand humbled eating all kinds of nasty crow pie. The difficulty jump is still 500 blocks away, which I believe is 2 days give or take, but it's already coming right on up on his numbers, well done man, if you win the bet you deserve the monies

P.S. @ 400k+ difficulty (> 70% inc)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2R0oECCuN6I

that 430,000 number is definitely going to be close - too close to call now. I didn't believe you had a chance.

did a calculation and if the block generation continues at 12/hour the difficulty will increase to ~423000. But if the hash rate increase over the next 2 days as it has been the next difficulty could go over the 430000 barrier.

The estimated difficulty level is hovering around 400,000 right now with over two days to grow.  I can win this still.  It's going to be close!

No worries.

no problem.

i misinterpreted the to mean that you'd accepted my bet but wouldn't take any more. that's all right.

good luck in your bet with Black8 but I reckon he'll be the winner

Kirian, if the bet was on, there would be a GPG-signed message to that effect like there was from Black8.  Instead, I said "no more bets for now", which means precisely what it sounds like.

just to confirm, does that mean then bet is on between you and me?


that's fine. I'll have to figure out how to rate on #bitcoin-otc. I'm a total irc noob. Been meaning to learn how to use it so this will be a good incentive.

All right, no more bets for now.  I might be up for another bet on what the difficulty level for the cycle after this one will be once the next cycle arrives.  I will grant that 430K is a big jump up from the present 244K, but I still think it's realistic given the explosive growth in Bitcoin's popularity and publicity.  Specifically, I think a lot of the capacity that is being added is simply videocards that were already hanging around, and were added to the network when their owners learned about Bitcoin.  I also think there's still a lot of equipment that was bought specifically for mining when the exchange rate was pushing 9 USD/BTC, a lot of which is still in the mail.  So we shall see.

Oh, and there was an unspoken assumption in the original bet that I figure is best to get out in the open.  Regardless of who wins the bet, so long as that bet is paid, both of us will rate each other as positive on #bitcoin-otc.  However, if someone loses and welches out, then the other person will rate them negatively.