Topic: ASICMINER: Entering the Future of ASIC Mining by Inventing It - page 1295. (Read 3917029 times)

Seeing as most people think they will get an ASIC from BFL soon, I doubt many people will sell off their Bitcoins if ASICMINER temporarily holds >51% of the hashing power.

Would make no sense at all.

And if BFL never produces a working ASIC the shit will hit the fan anyway, the biggest monetary scam in Bitcoin yet.

So, move on people, nothing to see here, have a good day !

Fair enough, I agree. This is logical. The problem is - just look at this forum - there is an irrational, overblown fear of the "51% attack". If ASICMINER starts soloing with a huge chunk of power, or if it contributes to one pool thus making that pool close to or over 50%, all hell will break loose in the forums, then the press will pick up, and next thing you know the public will be irradiated with sensational half-truths, disinformation, and fear mongering. Therefore, it may be a prudent PR move to distribute the power, in a transparent manner, into the hands of several pool operators.

Friedcat is going to abuse that to double-spend - in which case us talking about whether to use one pool or many is going to achieve precisely zero.

Friedcat is NOT going to abuse that to double-spend - in which case using ANY pool or combination of pools only adds risk and inefficiency.

I was under the impression that people here were discussing whether to distribute ASICMINER hashing power between multiple pools or not. I am not sure I understand your comment, but I am sure you did not understand mine. Also, I am sure mine was not nonsensical.

People are concerned with a single entity controlling >50% hashing power. Personally, this doesn't make my top list of concerns. Anyway, if someone fired up ~20 THash/s tomorrow, they would be able to (with absolute certainty) double-spend their own transactions, and to prevent others' transactions from getting confirmed. If that same someone directed this mining power to a pool, then that pool operator would be able to perform these disruptions. By the same token, if someone contributed 10-15 THash/s to one of few major pools, this may get that pool close or above the 50% of total power, leading to same kinds of problems as above.

Nonsense, you control the hash power. You don't need to mine on any pool. Besides, mining on a pool doesn't prove anything and only introduces inefficiencies.

You don't "control" anything as a miner, the pool operator does. You simply contribute the hash power into their hands. They choose what to do with it and how. Therefore yes, if ASICMINER is the first to start, it would be prudent to distribute the power.

I'd like to see it listed on Bitfunder instead.

A few more points to consider: (1) current network hash rate is closer to 18-20 GH/s than 24 GH/s, (2) the estimate of 12 GH/s was conservative and already considered that 1/3 of the chips won't work - if successful ASICMINERs hashing power could be anywhere between 12 and 18 GH/s, (3) the increase in difficulty due to ASICMINER could cause other miners to give up.

Taking those into consideration, the estimates in the posts above could even be on the conservative side.

However, this also opens up a very real possibility of a single outfit owning >50% of the network hash rate, which could cause a great deal of panic because the "51% attack" is widely misunderstood and feared. That could cause the exchange rate to tank. Would probably be a good idea to share the hashing power between a few different pools and do some self-mining, just to avoid a >50% panic in the beginning...

What is the purpose of sharing the hashing between pools? As long as the actual farm can be controlled from a central point, how it is balanced shouldn't change much. AFAIK the original idea to even use a public pool was only for transparency. Best measure against an attack would be to divide the farm itself to multiple disconnected locations and actively seek to transfer control to other entities.

Would probably be a good idea to share the hashing power between a few different pools and do some self-mining, just to avoid a >50% panic in the beginning...

Look. When someone add 6 TH to existing 24 TH, there is 3600+900 earned each day. The adjustment comes no later than after 11.2 days.

You guys are living in fantasy land.  If you really think ASICs are going to ramp that fast and soon, you could make plenty of coins buying X.DIFF.MAR on mpex.

You guys are living in fantasy land.  If you really think ASICs are going to ramp that fast and soon, you could make plenty of coins buying X.DIFF.MAR on mpex.

Let's do some back of an envelope math for the value of the shares:

Assumptions:
1. ASICMINER starts mining Jan 1st 2013 with 6TH
2. ASICMINER brings online another 6TH Jan 14th
3. BFL and Avalon customers start mining Jan 21st
4. Network hashrate stays around these levels between now and Jan 1st

ASICMINER will be about 1/5th of the total network for 2 weeks (6 out of 30 TH)
This means they will  mine 1/5th off the Bitcoins for 14 days = (14 * 24 * 6 * 25) / 5 =  10080 BTC
They will mine for one week with 1/3rd of the total network (12 / 36 TH) = (7 * 24 * 6 *25) / 3 = 8400 BTC

So a total of 18480 BTC will be mined by ASICMINER in the first 3 weeks

Divided by 200.000 shares = 0.0924 BTC per share. Which brings us close to the point where the other 200.000 shares owned by Friedcat et al will start receiving dividend as well (after 0.10 BTC is paid out as dividend)

After BFL and Avalon customers start mining as well the total hashrate will go up to perhaps 200 - 250 TH

ASICMINER will slowely build out their mining farm to 50TH, becoming 1/6th of the total network, perhaps less but will also add a new revenue stream by selling ASICs to customers.

Being 1/6th of the network will yield (7 * 24 * 6 * 25) / 6 = 4200 BTC per week divided by 400.000 shares = 0.01 BTC div per week

Valuation for the shares based on this:

Anyones guess, but looking at how mining stock and bonds were valued on GLBSE then I would say well over 1 BTC per share

disclaimer: back of the envelope valuations are not based on actual figures and the mathematician can not be held responsible should investments yield anything less than expected !

I was under the impression that difficulty doesn't matter in this case

If you look at the % of the total  network you can just use the theoretical number of Bitcoins mined and that is always the same (because of difficulty adjustments).
25 BTC per block, 6 blocks per hour, so  3600 BTC per day no matter what the difficulty.

If anything getting 6TH online on a lower difficulty will mean you mine those BTC quicker, bringing the higher difficulty forward. It won;t impact the number of BTC mined by ASICMINER