Addressing The ASIC Menace (and similar menaces)- Merriam-Webster defines competition in business as "the effort of two or more parties acting independently to secure the business of a third party by offering the most favorable terms". It was described by Adam Smith in The Wealth of Nations (1776) and later economists as allocating productive resources to their most highly-valued uses and encouraging efficiency. Later microeconomic theory distinguished between perfect competition and imperfect competition, concluding that no system of resource allocation is more efficient than perfect competition. Competition, according to the theory, causes commercial firms to develop new products, services and technologies, which would give consumers greater selection and better products. The greater selection typically causes lower prices for the products, compared to what the price would be if there was no competition (monopoly) or little competition (oligopoly).
We all know that competition generally leads to better and less costly products vis-a-vi monopolistic or oligopolistic paradigms, but what I want to bring to the fore here is a relatively new concept being taught in business and economic schools worldwide in recent decades that goes one step further:
the mere threat of competition is as good as competition itself.
Here's a PDF from a University of Arizona paper (examining the “threat of entry” for broadband providers) that I've drummed up if you're interested in a technical example:
http://econ.arizona.edu/downloads/working_papers/Econ-WP-07-18.pdfWhat in the world does this have to do with DGB and the current dilemma we are facing?
The concept holds true in other areas of life as well. In this case, we would formulate the theory by saying that “the mere threat of an algo change is sufficient to deter any manufacturer from even contemplating the idea of producing ASIC equipment for your particular algorithm." Unfortunately though, once ASIC hardware capable of hashing your algorithm is already in use, this theory is rendered impotent.
That's the bad news.
The good news is that this theory states that an algo change only needs to be done once – after that the simple threat of doing it again will suffice. And when you think about it, it makes perfect sense:
what manufacturer would even consider production of specialized equipment that is promised to be made obsolete on inception? After having seen the threat made good once, no manufacturer in their right mind would even give it a second thought.
The good news is that an algo change only needs to be done once, after that the clear, direct and openly stated commitment to do the same if necessary in the future will be all that's needed to keep anyone thinking about an ASIC device for your coin from contemplating further!We're only talking about a change in algorithm, nothing else, and it's a one-off event!
We're not talking about developing anything new (which would be fine for the future, the implementation of something even more energy efficient, for example, but it's not necessary to curb the present threat) since the algo is already out there.
It's really simply an “off the shelf” choice. Scrypt-N would get the job done. So would Keccak or X11 to name a couple of other possibilities.
But why choose any of those options when you've got a proven release of an algo
that uses 45% less energy than any of the others while generating the same mining output?
With the Groestl algorithm for Proof-Of-Work you get a double bang for your buck! - The Groestl algorithm is possibly the single most GPU-efficient algorithm implemented in any cryptocoin on the market. A comparison between many different algorithms shows that it has the lowest power consumption, heat, and noise of the array of newer ones being implemented in cryptocoins.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groestl http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gr%C3%B8stlIt's being successfully implemented, and even comes in two flavors now: sha256d or sha256 (single pass) for the transaction hashes.
In my very humble opinion, Groestl is the immediate solution that would not only give DGB a permanent ASIC-proof reputation (in combination with the threat to do the same in the future if necessary),
but it would also reward all DGB miners with an electricity bill that is almost half of what their previous scrypt mining bills were! This is win-win if I have ever seen it.
And if some crazy manufacturer wants to call our bluff, well, we'd just have to say, go ahead, call our bluff and ask them: “Are you feeling lucky, punk?”
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If some of you are wondering who I am and what I'm doing coming off so strong as a relative newbie here on the DGB thread, I would just say that I would have you think of me as just another one of you:
just another “shareholder” with sizable holdings
unapologetically and unabashedly campaigning with the best data I have available and the best rationale I am capable of producing
for what I think is best for DGB. Nothing more, nothing less, and I invite everyone with the desire to do so, and
similarly good data and thought out arguments (regardless of whether they are in agreement with mine or not), to do the same.
And with that I conclude this formal, three part proposal.
In order to keep this thread as clean [and mean] as possible, help to eliminate clutter by NOT quoting this entire post when responding. If you link to it by quoting only the title, or the particular comment you wish to respond to, that should suffice, and you'll be helping the rest of us to more quickly see and read your own contributions and comments on the subject as well!
That could be a big reason why the network hashrate is so low - lots of folks mining other coins and then buying DGB on the open market.