From http://www.pcworld.com/article/2033809/bitcoin-volatility-caused-by-surge-in-demand-slow-software.html
Bitcoin's roller-coaster price swings on Wednesday were caused by an influx of new buyers and software that couldn't keep up, according to the largest exchange, Mt. Gox.
People trading bitcoin on the Tokyo-based exchange saw its price hit US$266 at one point, then fall to as low as $105 with high lag times for trades. The surge in interest in bitcoin has overwhelmed Mt. Gox.
"We are running like crazy," said Gonzague Gay-Bouchery, who heads marketing for Mt. Gox, on Thursday in an interview. "We are trying to do everything by the book and trying to make everything work smoothly."
Mt. Gox and other exchanges that allow people to buy bitcoin all appeared to have varying degrees of problems on Wednesday, illustrating how small Internet companies often grapple with scaling their services amid rising interest.
Bitcoin, a virtual currency that is transferred by a peer-to-peer network, has been propelled in recent weeks by mainstream media coverage, although the number of transactions remains very small compared to traditional financial networks.
In just two days earlier this month, Mt. Gox gained 75,000 new users, and some 20,000 new ones in the last three days, Gay-Bouchery said. As soon as Mt. Gox credits their accounts with cash, those users jump into trading. Mt. Gox's system has had trouble processing those trades quickly, which has lead to vast price swings as users try to quickly complete trades and anticipate price moves.
"Bitcoin will go up and down," Gay-Bouchery said. "If there is a lag, don't panic."
Last week, Mt. Gox said it fought a massive distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack intended to manipulate the price of bitcoin. Although Mt. Gox's exchange is nearly always under a DDoS attack, Gay-Bouchery said Wednesday's issues were not related to DDoS.
Mt. Gox has spent an "enormous" amount of money on new servers for its bitcoin trading engine. Already, the exchange uses servers with 64GB of RAM each, but it hasn't been enough to keep the site running perfectly. The new servers, which have solid-state drives for faster data input and output, are due to arrive from the U.S. soon, he said.
The exchange has also been recently contacted by major server manufacturers who supply technology to the largest banks in the world, Gay-Bouchery said. The companies said they can solve Mt. Gox's trading woes.
The code for Mt. Gox's trading platform would have to be changed to accommodate new hardware, but it would give the exchange a trading platform comparable to that of a bank, lending more stability, Gay-Bouchery said.
Other exchanges that sell bitcoin were also groaning under the strain. Bit Innovate in Australia wrote on Twitter that is website was under stress due to increased demand. On Wednesday, it appeared at one point to simply run out of bitcoins to sell.
"Due to extremely high demand, we have had to temporarily close our Buy Bitcoins service," Bit Innovate wrote. "Sourcing more. It will be open as soon possible."
BitFloor, the largest U.S. bitcoin exchange based in New York, warned of delays and technical issues with its website. Roman Shtylman, the founder of BitFloor, said his exchange saw its highest trading volume and highest number of users ever.
Shtylman said he was working on some changes to ensure smooth trading following Wednesday's frenzy.
Topic: Mtgox statement on facebook - page 3. (Read 43390 times)
Gox should move out of the garage and start becoming professional. They still have enormous potential despite being the largest already.
Even Apple had to do that eventually
Lol, I think they need more than just a "few" new servers.
Remember that during GoxLag, people panic and sell massive amounts of coin - resulting in higher profits for Gox than a normal day of trading. Their incentive to improve capacity is limited to the threat of people leaving Gox due to the lag. And it looks like not very many people are leaving... big resounding LOL. Everyone's used to the granny nanny socialist state where regulatory bodies attempt to protect them from poorly performing businesses. They don't do their research on gox... it takes like 2 seconds of lurking here to realize that Gox Sux.
Get out of Gox! They're going to be playing "catch up" forever until we send them a powerful message.
Remember that during GoxLag, people panic and sell massive amounts of coin - resulting in higher profits for Gox than a normal day of trading. Their incentive to improve capacity is limited to the threat of people leaving Gox due to the lag. And it looks like not very many people are leaving... big resounding LOL. Everyone's used to the granny nanny socialist state where regulatory bodies attempt to protect them from poorly performing businesses. They don't do their research on gox... it takes like 2 seconds of lurking here to realize that Gox Sux.
Get out of Gox! They're going to be playing "catch up" forever until we send them a powerful message.
Right on comrade! Bitstamp here we come, really blown away by the professionalism of that operation compared to Mt Gox
Gox should move out of the garage and start becoming professional. They still have enormous potential despite being the largest already.
I think DoS'ing them would be for their own good, since they clearly can't understand how to stress test themselves.
Why yes, they have. They purchased Bitomat after it collapsed because the servers crashed and Amazon couldn't do data recovery because it was in the cloud. So yes, they are well aware of cloud services.
I'm not even sure where to start.
You think that if a server crashes 'in the cloud' that the data is unrecoverable?
You don't think that the particular people at Bitomat might have just not known what they were doing?
'In the cloud' isn't some magical meta-space where things don't exist and the data is unrecoverable, it just means the machines are somewhere else and you can programatically request more of them, for you know, like, proper load balancing.
This stuff has been figured out like 10 years ago buddy MtGox just don't know what they are doing.
Have they not heard of Amazon EC2? Google Compute Engine? Heroku? Azure?!
"Adding more servers" - what is it, the 90s? Amateurs..
We've learnt that you can never add enough servers to cope with an unpredictable and quickly-changing demand curve. That's why they invented elastic computing. They add 3 servers now, next month those 3 servers can't handle. So they add 3 more, and so on and so on.
Why yes, they have. They purchased Bitomat after it collapsed because the servers crashed and Amazon couldn't do data recovery because it was in the cloud. So yes, they are well aware of cloud services. "Adding more servers" - what is it, the 90s? Amateurs..
We've learnt that you can never add enough servers to cope with an unpredictable and quickly-changing demand curve. That's why they invented elastic computing. They add 3 servers now, next month those 3 servers can't handle. So they add 3 more, and so on and so on.
I would have more sympathy if this was not part of a historic pattern of lackadaisical malfeasance on their part. Gox has sucked for as long as I can remember and has absolutely NO incentive to improve.
Quote
Also please note that we may have to close the exchange for two hours in the next 12 to 24hrs to add several new
servers hamsters to our system.
It is so ironic, bitcoin is supposed to be the new new thing, but some infrastructure is so "old"(No flexible cloud based server)
But since bitcoin is about security, they may have some concern about the cloud.
But since bitcoin is about security, they may have some concern about the cloud.
Have they not heard of Amazon EC2? Google Compute Engine? Heroku? Azure?!
"Adding more servers" - what is it, the 90s? Amateurs..
We've learnt that you can never add enough servers to cope with an unpredictable and quickly-changing demand curve. That's why they invented elastic computing. They add 3 servers now, next month those 3 servers can't handle. So they add 3 more, and so on and so on.
"Adding more servers" - what is it, the 90s? Amateurs..
We've learnt that you can never add enough servers to cope with an unpredictable and quickly-changing demand curve. That's why they invented elastic computing. They add 3 servers now, next month those 3 servers can't handle. So they add 3 more, and so on and so on.
You're telling me THAT happened because of normal trading volume?
Geezus.
Quite Bullish I'd say.The Gox also has 19,000 more accounts to verify so I think this is going to be an interesting ride. Geezus.
You're telling me THAT happened because of normal trading volume?
Geezus.
Geezus.
As I said in another thread, they need to get 10 times more servers than they think they need. Gox never seems to be up to par, its like they are ALWAYS playing catch up.
They did. In fact, they had much more than that. As they said, in just the last day the number of trades tripled! It's truly amazing that they scaled as well as they did.As I said in another thread, they need to get 10 times more servers than they think they need. Gox never seems to be up to par, its like they are ALWAYS playing catch up.
They did. In fact, they had much more than that. As they said, in just the last day the number of trades tripled! It's truly amazing that they scaled as well as they did. 
I've noticed the lags and price drops every day about the same time. Perhaps it would be a good idea to go offline for an hour of maintenance every day to refresh and update everything.
Lol, I think they need more than just a "few" new servers.
Remember that during GoxLag, people panic and sell massive amounts of coin - resulting in higher profits for Gox than a normal day of trading. Their incentive to improve capacity is limited to the threat of people leaving Gox due to the lag. And it looks like not very many people are leaving... big resounding LOL. Everyone's used to the granny nanny socialist state where regulatory bodies attempt to protect them from poorly performing businesses. They don't do their research on gox... it takes like 2 seconds of lurking here to realize that Gox Sux.
Get out of Gox! They're going to be playing "catch up" forever until we send them a powerful message.
Remember that during GoxLag, people panic and sell massive amounts of coin - resulting in higher profits for Gox than a normal day of trading. Their incentive to improve capacity is limited to the threat of people leaving Gox due to the lag. And it looks like not very many people are leaving... big resounding LOL. Everyone's used to the granny nanny socialist state where regulatory bodies attempt to protect them from poorly performing businesses. They don't do their research on gox... it takes like 2 seconds of lurking here to realize that Gox Sux.
Get out of Gox! They're going to be playing "catch up" forever until we send them a powerful message.
Great News.
Let the Rally Begin (again) !
Let the Rally Begin (again) !
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