As I understand uncle reward in Ether mining is like getting silver medal in olimpic games. It is reward given for someone, who is very close, but not first at block finding.
I just think loud, what is it really for? Because statistically on average, each should get reward on the level of his mining power. This is true, of course, if everybody is determined to mine so long to be satisfied the principle of large numbers (when statistical bias is very small).
Could you correct me if I am wrong, that if we reward only the best and many small miners could not even think of solo mining (like on bitcoin) the statistical bias is so large, that the risk is much larger than potential profit. In this case risk is equall:
Risk = [energy costs] + [mining devices cost] + [statistical bias, that he will close mining never getting any reward]
Profit = [reward from mining block]
As I understand such a statistical bias, especialy for small miners, is very high, so they never even thing of start mining.
This is my understanding that, why gold and silver medal is rewarded (main block reward and uncle also) to encourage small miners to start.
If so, why it is not linearly diminishing rewarding, means 1st - 10 ETH, 2nd - 9 ETH, 3rd - 8 ETH etc.? It was only the problem with coding such more complicated function?
Can one explain in simple words: how it is written in code such an uncle reward in Ethereum? Maybe it is possible to rid of mining farm and everybody would be than mining solo, getting very little portion of being 100-th in block finding?
Wishing all the best
