Ah.. I now see what you are saying..
The extra 1%..
I'm not so sure mining operations would give up their independence so easily, for what would probably be much less than 1% increase in revenue. ( you need to be 144x difficulty for that )
At twice difficulty you would only make 0.014% more. Hardly worth jumping ship for.
If you removed that extra incentive, a miner would make the same whether they went for harder blocks or not. Whether they split up or not. But you couldn't tell.
Would miners still go for less blocks, harder blocks, if they made the same amount? If it were just for the health of the network. Doubtful..
Topic: Fixing Bitcoin's 2nd big issue.. - page 2. (Read 4165 times)
So there would be no point to a miner splitting himself up and trying to find blocks as separate users. He makes more as one miner, finding one block, than as many finding many.
If it's profitable for smaller miners to "split up" and mine these less difficulty blocks, then A Fortiori it's going to be profitable for a centralized miner to mine them. So you haven't shown how this is going to prevent a centralized miner from mining all blocks in precisely the same fashion as they do so absent the protocol.??
It's not profitable for individual miners to split up. Big or small.
So there would be no point to a miner splitting himself up and trying to find blocks as separate users. He makes more as one miner, finding one block, than as many finding many.
If it's profitable for smaller miners to "split up" and mine these less difficulty blocks, then A Fortiori it's going to be profitable for a centralized miner to mine them. So you haven't shown how this is going to prevent a centralized miner from mining all blocks in precisely the same fashion as they do so absent the protocol.??
It's not profitable for individual miners to split up. Big or small.
So there would be no point to a miner splitting himself up and trying to find blocks as separate users. He makes more as one miner, finding one block, than as many finding many.
If it's profitable for smaller miners to "split up" and mine these less difficult blocks, then A Fortiori it's going to be profitable for a centralized miner to mine them. So you haven't shown how this is going to prevent a centralized miner from mining all blocks in precisely the same fashion as they do so absent the protocol.
hmm.. sorry.. not sure I get what you are saying..
Yes - I am assuming the last 144 miners are different entities. Or at least would like to be. Since :
Using this system, finding 10 blocks at Level 1, is less profitable than finding 1 block at Level 10.
Therefore, I would say that all miners would try and find as few blocks as possible per day, and make each block as hard as possible.
So there would be no point to a miner splitting himself up and trying to find blocks as separate users. He makes more as one miner, finding one block, than as many finding many.
Yes - I am assuming the last 144 miners are different entities. Or at least would like to be. Since :
Using this system, finding 10 blocks at Level 1, is less profitable than finding 1 block at Level 10.
Therefore, I would say that all miners would try and find as few blocks as possible per day, and make each block as hard as possible.
So there would be no point to a miner splitting himself up and trying to find blocks as separate users. He makes more as one miner, finding one block, than as many finding many.
You're begging the question by assuming the last 144 miners are different entities and so haven't addressed the problem you correctly observed is separate from the block size issue.
In other words, if we can assume the last 144 miners are different, then you've assumed the problem has already been fixed to that extent, and so your solution couldn't be inside the scope of the problem according to your own assumption.
There is a paradox in Bitcoin that we want nodes to be trivially easy to run while also providing a substantial amount of Work. I suppose the goal should be for mining to be unprofitable, to keep big entities at bay, and instead many individuals need to perform the service charitably.
In other words, if we can assume the last 144 miners are different, then you've assumed the problem has already been fixed to that extent, and so your solution couldn't be inside the scope of the problem according to your own assumption.
There is a paradox in Bitcoin that we want nodes to be trivially easy to run while also providing a substantial amount of Work. I suppose the goal should be for mining to be unprofitable, to keep big entities at bay, and instead many individuals need to perform the service charitably.
Blocksize is the 1st issue.
That's not what this post is about. There are lots of people saying lots of things, and eventually, something will happen and this issue will be fixed. Of that I have no doubt.
But there is another issue. One that does not seem to have any, let alone many solutions being put forward.
That is the issue of mining centralisation.
From a 'technical' point of view is there anything that can be done ? (There has been discussion of this before, but not for a while.. thought we could revisit /re-examine)
Well.. How about this :
Currently miners are incentivised to mine every block. The more blocks they find the more they get paid. Simple.
Therefore, a miner is happiest if he is paid every block.
This doesn't leave much/any room on the blockchain for smaller miners, who may through cunning and guile become bigger actors if allowed to continue. They can only continue by joining pools, and boom!, we start seeing centralisation again.
What we need is a chain that actually doesn't incentivise miners to find every block.. can this be done ?
Well - P2Pool had a nice solution. It allowed miners to increase their individual difficulty, so they were actually looking for even harder blocks, and when they found those, they would be paid EXTRA (proportionally to their extra work).
In blockchain terms you could do this :
1) Every block that is found also includes a field (greater than 1) that is the extra proportional difficulty a miner chooses for his block. So if you have an individual difficulty of 2, your blocks are twice as difficult as a regular block. So a miner that was finding a block every 10 blocks, would now find one every 20.
2) Every block that is found, pays the last 144 miners (1 day's worth - could be more). Proportionally based on the individual difficulties. So a block that is twice as hard gets paid twice as much as a block that is normal difficulty. There are still only 25btc (or whatever) per block, but that amount is divided up. All the difficulties are proportional to each other.
3) A Miner makes EVEN MORE for finding a harder block. Say up to 1% if he chooses a difficulty of 144. (This is to be decided)
The point is, that now, miners need only find 1 block per day, and they will still be paid every block.
AND - if they are looking for harder blocks they will actually make slightly more, but not a lot more. So they are incentivised to do it. Why not.
This way there is lots of room on the chain, for lots of miners. In a perfect world, 144.
From there, new miners may rise, and be able to survive, in the dog-eat-dog blockchain-miner's world.
That's not what this post is about. There are lots of people saying lots of things, and eventually, something will happen and this issue will be fixed. Of that I have no doubt.
But there is another issue. One that does not seem to have any, let alone many solutions being put forward.
That is the issue of mining centralisation.
From a 'technical' point of view is there anything that can be done ? (There has been discussion of this before, but not for a while.. thought we could revisit /re-examine)
Well.. How about this :
Currently miners are incentivised to mine every block. The more blocks they find the more they get paid. Simple.
Therefore, a miner is happiest if he is paid every block.
This doesn't leave much/any room on the blockchain for smaller miners, who may through cunning and guile become bigger actors if allowed to continue. They can only continue by joining pools, and boom!, we start seeing centralisation again.
What we need is a chain that actually doesn't incentivise miners to find every block.. can this be done ?
Well - P2Pool had a nice solution. It allowed miners to increase their individual difficulty, so they were actually looking for even harder blocks, and when they found those, they would be paid EXTRA (proportionally to their extra work).
In blockchain terms you could do this :
1) Every block that is found also includes a field (greater than 1) that is the extra proportional difficulty a miner chooses for his block. So if you have an individual difficulty of 2, your blocks are twice as difficult as a regular block. So a miner that was finding a block every 10 blocks, would now find one every 20.
2) Every block that is found, pays the last 144 miners (1 day's worth - could be more). Proportionally based on the individual difficulties. So a block that is twice as hard gets paid twice as much as a block that is normal difficulty. There are still only 25btc (or whatever) per block, but that amount is divided up. All the difficulties are proportional to each other.
3) A Miner makes EVEN MORE for finding a harder block. Say up to 1% if he chooses a difficulty of 144. (This is to be decided)
The point is, that now, miners need only find 1 block per day, and they will still be paid every block.
AND - if they are looking for harder blocks they will actually make slightly more, but not a lot more. So they are incentivised to do it. Why not.
This way there is lots of room on the chain, for lots of miners. In a perfect world, 144.
From there, new miners may rise, and be able to survive, in the dog-eat-dog blockchain-miner's world.
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