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This would not disrupt Bitcoin for too long. I'd just move the blockchain to a different algorithm and BOOM your ASICs are worthless and Bitcoin will still go o

by kaoD 14y ago

This would not disrupt Bitcoin for too long. I'd just move the blockchain to a different algorithm and BOOM your ASICs are worthless and Bitcoin will still go on. $1.2M will shutdown Bitcoin for, at most, a couple days... and then you're left with a bunch of useless ASICs. And all that assuming that nobody else will get ASICs, which will make the attack more expensive. It's just not worth it.

Drakim 14y ago
Don't you have to get all other bitcoin users to also migrate over to this new algorithm? And even if it's just down for a couple of days, that's terrible. Bitcoin is still pretty small in the grand scheme of things, but imagine if regular money stopped working for a couple of days.
- kaoD 14y ago
  Miners WILL switch (for their own benefit). Something like this has happened before[1] (though the mining algorithm didn't change) and the community did cooperate. Some miners will be happy about it, specially the ones with GPUs which will be thrown off the game once ASICs arrive (and will get back in the game once ASICs are killed). Well, if I can get a government to spend $1.2 M just to shutdown a currency for a couple days, I guess we won (specially hardware manufacturers). Also: Bitcoin will never replace regular money, and it isn't meant to. IMHO this attack will not kill Bitcoin, only ASICs. [1] http://bitcoin.org/chainfork.html http://bitcoin.org/chainfork.html
  - swinglock 14y ago
    The algorithm was not replaced, then it wouldn't be BitCoin anymore. https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/List_of_alternative_cryptocurrencies https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/List_of_alternative_cryptocurrenc...
    - kaoD 14y ago
      It will still be Bitcoin, with a different algorithm... Bitcoin is not just a protocol and some algorithms behind it. Bitcoin is a community and a currency. Your Bitcoins will still be called Bitcoin, you'll have the same wallet and the same number of BTC in your accounts. The webpage will still be www.bitcoin.org and we'll talk in #bitcoin as we used to do. Changing Bitcoin to scrypt will not magically turn Bitcoin into Litecoin. This scenario has been envisioned before. Nothing new here. Bitcoin will prevail.
      - rubinelli 14y ago
        I think the fact that Bitcoin is a community is its main problem. Miners have acted altruistically a few times in the past, but as the pool grows, getting them to do anything beyond the Nash Equilibrium will get progressively harder. Bitcoin may prevail, but it will have to go through a painful 2.0 evolution at some point.
        kaoD 14y ago
        Economic majority will ALWAYS win by definition.
        rubinelli 14y ago
        And a smart agent with enough resources can lead the economic majority like lemmings down a cliff once it reaches a certain size and becomes dumb. While your miners are mostly hobbyists that you can access via Skype, it's easy to say "hey guys, let's stop this chain and switch to that other one." Once you have large companies with dedicated ASIC racks in the game, and any change that could impact the short-term bottom line has to go through four levels of management, you are SOL.
DanBC 14y ago
Bitcoin has had several value crashing events. It takes less than a few days for Bitcoin to go from $X to $Y (where Y is very much less than X). These events don't kill bitcoin, but they do make uptake among regular people slower. > It's just not worth it Governments are not rational. Look at any government and it's easy to find them doing something very expensive and very stupid. I agree that it's unlikely, but "crypto" usually implies "rigorous".
- kaoD 14y ago
  > but they do make uptake among regular people slower. Which is not a problem at all! In fact it's good and a sign of bitcoin's success: a free market is self-regulated. > Governments are not rational. Well, even if they succeed killing bitcoin (which I doubt) bitcoin won by making a government spend millions of dollars (bear in mind $1.2M is the current price even before ASICs got mainstream) and a lot of time/effort killing a currency that will probably just migrate to an alternate blockchain in a couple days without much effort.

by kaoD 14y ago

Drakim 14y ago

Don't you have to get all other bitcoin users to also migrate over to this new algorithm? And even if it's just down for a couple of days, that's terrible. Bitcoin is still pretty small in the grand scheme of things, but imagine if regular money stopped working for a couple of days.

kaoD 14y ago
Miners WILL switch (for their own benefit). Something like this has happened before[1] (though the mining algorithm didn't change) and the community did cooperate. Some miners will be happy about it, specially the ones with GPUs which will be thrown off the game once ASICs arrive (and will get back in the game once ASICs are killed). Well, if I can get a government to spend $1.2 M just to shutdown a currency for a couple days, I guess we won (specially hardware manufacturers). Also: Bitcoin will never replace regular money, and it isn't meant to. IMHO this attack will not kill Bitcoin, only ASICs. [1] http://bitcoin.org/chainfork.html http://bitcoin.org/chainfork.html
- swinglock 14y ago
  The algorithm was not replaced, then it wouldn't be BitCoin anymore. https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/List_of_alternative_cryptocurrencies https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/List_of_alternative_cryptocurrenc...
  - kaoD 14y ago
    It will still be Bitcoin, with a different algorithm... Bitcoin is not just a protocol and some algorithms behind it. Bitcoin is a community and a currency. Your Bitcoins will still be called Bitcoin, you'll have the same wallet and the same number of BTC in your accounts. The webpage will still be www.bitcoin.org and we'll talk in #bitcoin as we used to do. Changing Bitcoin to scrypt will not magically turn Bitcoin into Litecoin. This scenario has been envisioned before. Nothing new here. Bitcoin will prevail.
    - rubinelli 14y ago
      I think the fact that Bitcoin is a community is its main problem. Miners have acted altruistically a few times in the past, but as the pool grows, getting them to do anything beyond the Nash Equilibrium will get progressively harder. Bitcoin may prevail, but it will have to go through a painful 2.0 evolution at some point.
      - kaoD 14y ago
        Economic majority will ALWAYS win by definition.
        rubinelli 14y ago
        And a smart agent with enough resources can lead the economic majority like lemmings down a cliff once it reaches a certain size and becomes dumb. While your miners are mostly hobbyists that you can access via Skype, it's easy to say "hey guys, let's stop this chain and switch to that other one." Once you have large companies with dedicated ASIC racks in the game, and any change that could impact the short-term bottom line has to go through four levels of management, you are SOL.

DanBC 14y ago

Bitcoin has had several value crashing events. It takes less than a few days for Bitcoin to go from $X to $Y (where Y is very much less than X). These events don't kill bitcoin, but they do make uptake among regular people slower. > It's just not worth it Governments are not rational. Look at any government and it's easy to find them doing something very expensive and very stupid. I agree that it's unlikely, but "crypto" usually implies "rigorous".

kaoD 14y ago
> but they do make uptake among regular people slower. Which is not a problem at all! In fact it's good and a sign of bitcoin's success: a free market is self-regulated. > Governments are not rational. Well, even if they succeed killing bitcoin (which I doubt) bitcoin won by making a government spend millions of dollars (bear in mind $1.2M is the current price even before ASICs got mainstream) and a lot of time/effort killing a currency that will probably just migrate to an alternate blockchain in a couple days without much effort.