5 ms·
Minimum? 1. That is, however, not the problem. The problem is that in the event of sudden loss of significant fraction of compute power block times skyrocket,
by friendzis 6y ago
Minimum? 1.
That is, however, not the problem. The problem is that in the event of sudden loss of significant fraction of compute power block times skyrocket, because significantly reduced compute power still has to solve problem of previous difficulty. As a consequence block times become so high that transactions are effectively blocked and the only solution to keep the network functional is a fork. Unless you imagine a scenario where everyone goes offline except for a small group and everyone slowly reconnects to the small group, most likely there would be highly partitioned network with its own bitcoin fork with enough of transaction history that a reconnect would mean collapse of local-economy.
- hanniabu 6y agoThe difficulty will adjust for the reduced compute power
- ulrikrasmussen 6y agoAFAIK it adjusts after a fixed number of blocks have been mined. So if 99.999% of your compute power is gone, you won't be mining enough blocks to adjust the difficulty for a very long time.
- monokh 6y agoThe adjustment happens every 2 weeks. It's unlikely that miners would go offline simultaneously across the globe to the extent that it would completely grind the network to a halt.
- 0x0 6y agoNo, the adjustment happens every 2016 blocks. If you lose 99.99% of global hash rate, those 2016 blocks will take a million years, instead of two weeks, to compute.
- hanniabu 6y agoLike Unbreakablecoin lmao
- sv0 6y agoIt will take about 400 years to adjust difficulty in such case, but not a million years.
- monokh 6y agoGood point, I had taken the mechanism for granted. So the scenario is that miners drop off at a pace where you don't reach the next adjustment? Taking that into account, the "mining death spiral" theory doesn't seem too far fetched? In bad circumstances, if the network drops a substantial amount of hash rate early in the adjustment, and price took a hit, you could see some major disruption from the miners following suit.
- dragonwriter 6y ago> The adjustment happens every 2 weeks. ...assuming very slow change in hash rate, yes. A rapid increase makes it happen sooner, a rapid loss can stretch it out.
- friendzis 6y ago1. Block times adjust, but there is an upper limit to adjustment per block. Low-pass filter, sort of. 2. In the event of compute power loss, prior to adjustment you still have to mine blocks of previous difficulty. 3. In the event of compute power loss, block times increase and there is no other solution than to wait it out or fork. 4. In the event of sudden and significant compute power loss block times increase to such a level that running the network under previous difficulty and waiting it out becomes impractical, therefore the only practical solution is a fork.