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This is a totally misleading calculation for the largest currencies. It's literally quoting the spot price for what's available on NiceHash and then dividing by

This is a totally misleading calculation for the largest currencies. It's literally quoting the spot price for what's available on NiceHash and then dividing by the fraction you'd have of the total hash rate. In reality, as you continued buying up hashing power, the price of the remaining hashing power would go up precipitously. This is basic supply and demand.

xur17 8y ago
That is why I included the NiceHash % for each coin. NiceHash offers fixed price contracts, typically for ~30% of their supply that you can lock in for up to 24 hours. It's definitely a lot less do-able for the larger currencies - I still think PoW is a good option for them honestly. This was more to show that 51% attack risk is problematic for smaller coins, and I'd love to hear a discussion on the best way to fix this.
- contravariant 8y ago
  Oh is that what it was. That wasn't entirely clear to me. It would've made more sense to me to show the required capacity / available NiceHash capacity.
- guy_c 8y ago
  I wonder if we could see a spiral that effectively kills off smaller coins? > Exchanges respond to these `weak` coins by increasing their confirmation requirements. Some of the really small coins would probably need huge numbers of confirmations. > Lots of confirmations, which would likely damage the value of the coin. > Lower price would reduce the miner hashrate > Lower hashrate would further lower cost of 51% attack. > Exchanges increase confirmations further -REPEAT-
- Iv 8y ago
  > I'd love to hear a discussion on the best way to fix this. Proof of stake (still problematic for very small cap) or proof of ID (my favorite) using something like the e-estonia crypto ID system. You can prove every miner is a unique person, award them coins on a deterministic pseudo-random order.
  - xur17 8y ago
    Something like proof of ID would be amazing, but like you said it requires a secure digital id system to exist first, which few countries have. Is there anyone building something like this?
    - Iv 8y ago
      E-estonia will provide a certificate to anyone presenting themselves to an Estonian embassy with a valid passport (and, IIRC, $300). They thought many other nations would provide this service but to my knowledge they are still alone. Estonian citizenship is not required. May crypto-geeks have an estonian ID certificate. If I were still into crypto I would have made one for myself I think.
      - askmike 8y ago
        That is about as far from a decentralised system as I can imagine, we now all have to trust the Estonian government (everyone part of the e-ID chain).
        Iv 8y ago
        For ID systems, I have yet to find a way to do registration in a decentralized way. Until we get cheap unspoofable genome sequencing devices (which may never be a thing), we will have to trust some authorities. Once registered, you don't need to trust the Estonian government at all: you get an IC card and a reader (all open source IIRC) and you can autonomously authenticate. If memory serves, you can even authenticate pseudonymously. Note that you don't have to trust everyone, you have to trust the e-ID registration system as a whole. That is, a single flawed individual won't be enough to corrupt the whole thing.
        askmike 8y ago
        > we will have to trust some authorities Which is fine, but than don't talk about cryptocurrencies. These are supposed to be trustless, not trustless-except-we-all-have-to-trust-the-government. Just talk about some new state system that uses some cryptography somewhere.
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Sir_Substance 8y ago
>This is a totally misleading calculation for the largest currencies. That's not the only way it's misleading. Peercoin is listed as 8,559% available on nicehash, but peercoin is a proof of stake coin. It doesn't use hashpower to secure it's transactions, so it's not vulnerable to a 51% hash power attack (although it is vulnerable to other kinds of 51% attack).
- Passthepeas 8y ago
  yeah Im confused as to why a proof of stake currency is even in the list
  - xur17 8y ago
    I am using hashing rates from minethecoin [0] - if any are inaccurate, please let me know, and I will update them. edit: I've removed Peercoin since it is a PoW + PoS coin as the GP points out, so these numbers are inaccurate. [0] https://minethecoin.com/ https://minethecoin.com/
- thisisit 8y ago
  > Peercoin As per wiki, it uses hybrid of PoW and PoS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peercoin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peercoin
pjc50 8y ago
Is hash ownership transparent enough that you can say that? Given the possibility of shell company ownership..
fanzhang 8y ago
It's still a good proxy for how easy it is to do. The attacker could buy hardware, rent from people not on nicehash, etc. It's like how companies' market caps are determined by the the last few trades, even though the last few trades probably represent .01% (or less) of the shares in the company. Probably best to read the numbers a bit qualitatively. A coin that is 2% nicehashable would require substantial efforts (probably negotiating with a few private pools) to mount an attack; perhaps impossible for a not-connected miner. Wheres coins approaching the double digit percents probably is quite possible if you have even lukewarm connections. And those near 100% or above are likely super vulnerable.
- xur17 8y ago
  For smaller coins it's especially scary because existing miners could easily switch to the coin for a few hours to mount an attack.
- acchow 8y ago
  There's already a GPU and ASIC shortage with prices skyrocketing - even without someone attempting a 51% attack. Being a PC gamer is tought right now - you often can't even find a GPU in stock! Can't imagine how difficult it would be to hoard a ton of hardware.
deleted 8y ago
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xur17 8y ago

That is why I included the NiceHash % for each coin. NiceHash offers fixed price contracts, typically for ~30% of their supply that you can lock in for up to 24 hours. It's definitely a lot less do-able for the larger currencies - I still think PoW is a good option for them honestly. This was more to show that 51% attack risk is problematic for smaller coins, and I'd love to hear a discussion on the best way to fix this.

contravariant 8y ago
Oh is that what it was. That wasn't entirely clear to me. It would've made more sense to me to show the required capacity / available NiceHash capacity.
guy_c 8y ago
I wonder if we could see a spiral that effectively kills off smaller coins? > Exchanges respond to these `weak` coins by increasing their confirmation requirements. Some of the really small coins would probably need huge numbers of confirmations. > Lots of confirmations, which would likely damage the value of the coin. > Lower price would reduce the miner hashrate > Lower hashrate would further lower cost of 51% attack. > Exchanges increase confirmations further -REPEAT-
Iv 8y ago
> I'd love to hear a discussion on the best way to fix this. Proof of stake (still problematic for very small cap) or proof of ID (my favorite) using something like the e-estonia crypto ID system. You can prove every miner is a unique person, award them coins on a deterministic pseudo-random order.
- xur17 8y ago
  Something like proof of ID would be amazing, but like you said it requires a secure digital id system to exist first, which few countries have. Is there anyone building something like this?
  - Iv 8y ago
    E-estonia will provide a certificate to anyone presenting themselves to an Estonian embassy with a valid passport (and, IIRC, $300). They thought many other nations would provide this service but to my knowledge they are still alone. Estonian citizenship is not required. May crypto-geeks have an estonian ID certificate. If I were still into crypto I would have made one for myself I think.
    - askmike 8y ago
      That is about as far from a decentralised system as I can imagine, we now all have to trust the Estonian government (everyone part of the e-ID chain).
      - Iv 8y ago
        For ID systems, I have yet to find a way to do registration in a decentralized way. Until we get cheap unspoofable genome sequencing devices (which may never be a thing), we will have to trust some authorities. Once registered, you don't need to trust the Estonian government at all: you get an IC card and a reader (all open source IIRC) and you can autonomously authenticate. If memory serves, you can even authenticate pseudonymously. Note that you don't have to trust everyone, you have to trust the e-ID registration system as a whole. That is, a single flawed individual won't be enough to corrupt the whole thing.
        askmike 8y ago
        > we will have to trust some authorities Which is fine, but than don't talk about cryptocurrencies. These are supposed to be trustless, not trustless-except-we-all-have-to-trust-the-government. Just talk about some new state system that uses some cryptography somewhere.

deleted 8y ago

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Sir_Substance 8y ago

>This is a totally misleading calculation for the largest currencies. That's not the only way it's misleading. Peercoin is listed as 8,559% available on nicehash, but peercoin is a proof of stake coin. It doesn't use hashpower to secure it's transactions, so it's not vulnerable to a 51% hash power attack (although it is vulnerable to other kinds of 51% attack).

Passthepeas 8y ago
yeah Im confused as to why a proof of stake currency is even in the list
- xur17 8y ago
  I am using hashing rates from minethecoin [0] - if any are inaccurate, please let me know, and I will update them. edit: I've removed Peercoin since it is a PoW + PoS coin as the GP points out, so these numbers are inaccurate. [0] https://minethecoin.com/ https://minethecoin.com/
thisisit 8y ago
> Peercoin As per wiki, it uses hybrid of PoW and PoS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peercoin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peercoin

pjc50 8y ago

Is hash ownership transparent enough that you can say that? Given the possibility of shell company ownership..

fanzhang 8y ago

It's still a good proxy for how easy it is to do. The attacker could buy hardware, rent from people not on nicehash, etc. It's like how companies' market caps are determined by the the last few trades, even though the last few trades probably represent .01% (or less) of the shares in the company. Probably best to read the numbers a bit qualitatively. A coin that is 2% nicehashable would require substantial efforts (probably negotiating with a few private pools) to mount an attack; perhaps impossible for a not-connected miner. Wheres coins approaching the double digit percents probably is quite possible if you have even lukewarm connections. And those near 100% or above are likely super vulnerable.

xur17 8y ago
For smaller coins it's especially scary because existing miners could easily switch to the coin for a few hours to mount an attack.
acchow 8y ago
There's already a GPU and ASIC shortage with prices skyrocketing - even without someone attempting a 51% attack. Being a PC gamer is tought right now - you often can't even find a GPU in stock! Can't imagine how difficult it would be to hoard a ton of hardware.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]