3 ms·
It's not useless; BitCoin security depends on the majority of hashing power being in the hands of benevolent users. People who invest in ASICs and other mining
by sltkr 14y ago
It's not useless; BitCoin security depends on the majority of hashing power being in the hands of benevolent users. People who invest in ASICs and other mining hardware have an implicit incentive to be benevolent (because a collapse of the system means they won't see a return on their investment). So developments like this strengthen the security of BitCoin.
- tptacek 14y agoYou're missing his point. It's not that people who buy ASIC rigs are evil; it's that the whole system is burning energy on a toy problem, instead of addressing a real scientific problem that needs compute.
- sltkr 14y agoI think you're missing /my/ point, which is that BitCoin is useful as a currency, and these ASICs are strengthening the system, so by extension they are useful too. If you think the BitCoin project is entirely useless, even as a proof-of-concept, then yes, these ASICs are useless, but that's an entirely different discussion. > ... toy problem, instead of addressing a real scientific problem that needs compute. What, like generating Mersenne primes? A lot of these other so-called “real” “scientific” problems have virtually no scientific relevance. I think research into crypto-currencies is just as “real” as finding more optimal Golomb rulers or searching for alien lifesigns in radio noise.
- tptacek 14y agoCircular argument is circular.