7 ms·

Sorry for a silly question, but can someone explain for does it mean?

arnauddri 11y ago
The hash rate represents the total computational power used by the miners to secure the Bitcoin Network. The more miner, the more secure it is but the less it is profitable for them to mine. For more information about mining, you can refer to this description: https://kaiko.com/learn/mining-blockchain https://kaiko.com/learn/mining-blockchain
- schmichael 11y ago
  > The more miner, the more secure This isn't totally accurate. You need a lot of different miners and a high hash rate for security. The least secure place bitcoin can be is when a single miner controls most of the hash rate.
  - arnauddri 11y ago
    You're perfectly right, thanks for clarifying!
  - riprowan 11y ago
    This is exactly correct. All the hashpower in the world provides zero security if 51%+ of it is not "honest". http://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf http://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf
  - hasch 11y ago
    good point, but a mining monopoly would destroy the value and hence it's in the self-interest of miners to be diversified. that's an economical self-correcting mechanism on top of this technical mining/reward feedback mechanism.
    - schmichael 11y ago
      AFAIK this is the conventional wisdom but not a proven fact. A smart 51% attacker could profit and go unnoticed: > And contrary to commonly-repeated assertions, a monopolist can engage in subtle attacks that are hard to detect. http://hackingdistributed.com/2014/06/16/how-a-mining-monopoly-can-attack-bitcoin/ http://hackingdistributed.com/2014/06/16/how-a-mining-monopo...
schmichael 11y ago
More electricity is being burned to do the same amount of work. I know that sounds snarky, but it's how proof-of-work systems like bitcoin work: "miners" all attempt to generate a specific hash which just means lots and lots of computation. The number of transactions per second the bitcoin protocol can handle is essentially capped and completely unrelated to hash rate as the difficulty of producing a correct hash is adjusted based on the hash rate.
- JoeAltmaier 11y ago
  And still no discussion on the value of pissing away our planets energy reserves, just to create imaginary points in a paranoid game. In one view, all the electricity burned to make bitcoins is a crime against the planet.
  - eganist 11y ago
    Well, unless you replace furnaces with bitcoin mining hardware. But then again, I'd rather replace a furnace with a more productive set of hardware anyway.
    - toomuchtodo 11y ago
      Heat pump. EDIT: Unless you live somewhere where the ambient temp goes below ~0F, get a heat pump.
      - eganist 11y ago
        Hence furnaces. Unless someone's managed to create servers which become cooler upon load, I'd assume these boxes wouldn't be able to substitute for heat pumps. But in general, I agree with you. :)
      - martindevans 11y ago
        What's special about 255K (0F) in relation to heat pumps?

The hash rate represents the total computational power used by the miners to secure the Bitcoin Network. The more miner, the more secure it is but the less it is profitable for them to mine. For more information about mining, you can refer to this description: https://kaiko.com/learn/mining-blockchain https://kaiko.com/learn/mining-blockchain

schmichael 11y ago
> The more miner, the more secure This isn't totally accurate. You need a lot of different miners and a high hash rate for security. The least secure place bitcoin can be is when a single miner controls most of the hash rate.
- arnauddri 11y ago
  You're perfectly right, thanks for clarifying!
- riprowan 11y ago
  This is exactly correct. All the hashpower in the world provides zero security if 51%+ of it is not "honest". http://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf http://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf
- hasch 11y ago
  good point, but a mining monopoly would destroy the value and hence it's in the self-interest of miners to be diversified. that's an economical self-correcting mechanism on top of this technical mining/reward feedback mechanism.
  - schmichael 11y ago
    AFAIK this is the conventional wisdom but not a proven fact. A smart 51% attacker could profit and go unnoticed: > And contrary to commonly-repeated assertions, a monopolist can engage in subtle attacks that are hard to detect. http://hackingdistributed.com/2014/06/16/how-a-mining-monopoly-can-attack-bitcoin/ http://hackingdistributed.com/2014/06/16/how-a-mining-monopo...

schmichael 11y ago

More electricity is being burned to do the same amount of work. I know that sounds snarky, but it's how proof-of-work systems like bitcoin work: "miners" all attempt to generate a specific hash which just means lots and lots of computation. The number of transactions per second the bitcoin protocol can handle is essentially capped and completely unrelated to hash rate as the difficulty of producing a correct hash is adjusted based on the hash rate.

JoeAltmaier 11y ago
And still no discussion on the value of pissing away our planets energy reserves, just to create imaginary points in a paranoid game. In one view, all the electricity burned to make bitcoins is a crime against the planet.
- eganist 11y ago
  Well, unless you replace furnaces with bitcoin mining hardware. But then again, I'd rather replace a furnace with a more productive set of hardware anyway.
  - toomuchtodo 11y ago
    Heat pump. EDIT: Unless you live somewhere where the ambient temp goes below ~0F, get a heat pump.
    - eganist 11y ago
      Hence furnaces. Unless someone's managed to create servers which become cooler upon load, I'd assume these boxes wouldn't be able to substitute for heat pumps. But in general, I agree with you. :)
    - martindevans 11y ago
      What's special about 255K (0F) in relation to heat pumps?