4 ms·
> Therefore, isn't it more accurate to say that the resource-cost expended is up-to-the-value-of BtC for each participant? That's the same. Each participant is
by rspeer 10y ago
> Therefore, isn't it more accurate to say that the resource-cost expended is up-to-the-value-of BtC for each participant?
That's the same. Each participant is getting bitcoins. Otherwise they wouldn't be mining.
But other than that, I agree with you that Truthcoin's argument is incredibly contorted. They're considering the fact that some people can profit from financial services to be as "wasteful" as spending actual fuel.
- pfraze 10y agoI'm unsure whether the cost of resource expenditure really tracks that closely with the BtC value. Let's just assume BtC trade value against USD stays stable forever. For the BTC-value to equal the value of mined resources, If a BtC is worth $100 at time of mining, then the entire network would only be allowed to spend $100 trying to mine it. Let's say there's only 100 miners right now. If they all had equal mining power, then they'd mine a coin 1/100th of the time, and be incentivized to spend only $1 each per coin. Then this premise would hold. The problem is, each miner can increase its odds by increasing the resources spent. So, everybody is incentivized to drive their expenditure higher than $1. Any time a miner makes a short term gamble, or finds a way to externalize their resource cost, they'll spend more than $1, and win. For that matter, would a miner have enough information to know that $1 is the correct upper bound? Not only does that require a perfect measure of the entire network's computing power, it assumes BtC is value-stable. The fact that BtC keeps gaining value against the dollar means that miners ought to be speculating their gamble against a potential future value.