> Cryptomining is a waste of energy and compute resources. As others have pointed out, there is a lot of waste everywhere. If I lived further up north, I would

> Cryptomining is a waste of energy and compute resources. As others have pointed out, there is a lot of waste everywhere. If I lived further up north, I would certainly take advantage of using a compute cluster to heat my house while also generating cash. Yes, there are more efficient ways to heat a house other than 100% electricity, but it is still quite common. But the point is, although it uses energy, it makes you money as well. And there are plenty of other such similar things. Take the financial markets for instance. It seems prior to 1980, if you wanted to create "wealth", you kind of actually had to do something. You know like found a company, invent something, claim a patent, etc. Since Greenspan cut interest rates in the 1980s, all efforts have gone into hedging against the stock market. Outside of semi-conductors, very little tech has been invented for a few decades now. Instead, a ton of manpower (and energy) has gone into inventing financial devices to the point where house mortgages end up being sold five or six times through various lenders until they end up in a pool of mortgages that one would buy slices of. And if you were worried about risk, you could then buy "insurance" to hedge against your slices in either direction. I mean that took a lot of energy, and I'm not sure what society got out of it... Of course there is more regulation now, but still, new ETFs are made every month to fit some niche, and stock options and calls... So in other words, we've spent the last 30 years not really inventing anything but just passing a giant ball of money around through various devices. Edit: and yes I am completely unqualified to make any of these claims. They are opinion, but they seem awfully close to reality.