Re: [Bitcoin-development] we can all relax now

[Mike Hearn <mike@plan99.net>]

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Once the ASIC race calms down because everyone has one, has more or less
optimal power supplies, process improvements aren't easily reachable
anymore etc then I'd expect people to dissipate from the large pools
because eliminating their fees will become the next lowest hanging fruit to
squeeze out extra profit. There's no particular reason we need only a
handful of pools that control a major fraction of the hashpower.

If we end up with a few hundred pools or lots of miners on p2pool, then a
lot of these theoretical attacks become not very relevant (I don't think ID
sacrifices will be so common or large as to justify a pile of custom mining
code+strategies at any point ...)


On Thu, Nov 7, 2013 at 2:24 PM, Peter Todd <pete@petertodd.org> wrote:

> On Thu, Nov 07, 2013 at 02:56:56PM +1000, Gavin Andresen wrote:
> > > P.S: If any large pools want to try this stuff out, give me a shout.
> You
> > > have my PGP key - confidentiality assured.
> > >
> >
> > If I find out one of the large pools decides to run this 'experiment' on
> > the main network, I will make it my mission to tell people to switch to a
> > more responsible pool.
>
> I hope they listen.
>
> A few months ago ASICMiner could have made use of that attack if my
> memories of their peak hashing power were correct. They certainely could
> have used the selfish miner version, (we need better name for that)
> although development costs would eat into profits.
>
> GHash.IO, 22%, says they're a "private Bitfury ASIC mining pool" - dunno
> what they mean by that, but they're involved with CEX.IO who has
> physical control of a bunch of hashing power so I guess that means their
> model is like ASICMiners. They're a bit short of 30%, but maybe some
> behind-the-scenes deals would fix that, and/or lowering the barrier with
> reactive block publishing. (a better name)
>
> > And if you think you can get away with driving up EVERYBODY's orphan rate
> > without anybody noticing, you should think again.
>
> ...and remember, if you only do the attack a little bit, you still can
> earn more profit, and only drive up the orphan rate a little bit. So who
> knows, maybe the orphans are real, or maybe they're an attack? ASICMiner
> was involved with a bunch of orphans a while back...
>
> You know what this calls for? A witchhunt!
>
> BURN THE LARGE POOLS!
>
> > > P.P.S: If you're mining on a pool with more than, like, 1% hashing
> > > power, do the math on varience... Seriously, stop it and go mine on a
> > > smaller pool, or better yet, p2pool.
> > >
> >
> > That I agree with.
>
> Glad to hear.
>
> --
> 'peter'[:-1]@petertodd.org
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>
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