Green hackers around the world, let’s destroy Bitcoin • Hacker News Board

Re: Green hackers around the world, let’s destroy Bitcoin

#211

Post by FlyingSnake » Sun, Feb 07, 2021, 6:50 PM UTC

chill1 wrote: post #191

FlyingSnake wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My understanding of the space contradicts each of your points. I am a casual observer and have no investment in BTC and the comments are what I feel based on the news that reaches me. For me the most critical aspect is the energy waste, and the lack of regulation. I know crypto-anarchists distrust the govt, but if I've to choose between the r/WSB like extreme evangelism (HODL!) and Fed, I would chose the later safe…

> I would love to be proven wrong and learn something new about the sector that increases my confidence. That's great. Having an open mind is a good thing. What areas are you specifically interested in? The industry is vast with deep niches and history - mining, exchanges (online/offline/p2p), scripting ("programmable money"), private key security (software/hardware/multi-sig), BIPs/forks/governance, ATMs, end-user a…

There are some things I would like to know more:

1. Energy efficiency of the transactions and the network 2. How democratic the process to mine new coins is. 3. What steps are taken to manage frauds, speculations bubbles etc. to protect malicious actors from gaming the system.

Re: Green hackers around the world, let’s destroy Bitcoin

#212

Post by tsimionescu » Sun, Feb 07, 2021, 7:01 PM UTC

yownie wrote: post #210

tsimionescu wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Bitcoin mining is a rat race to develop efficiency in technology and energy deliverance. The cloud computing companies and EV companies and every other company that spends large amounts of its budget on buying electricity is doing the same thing. The difference is that (at least some of) cloud computing or driving is doing useful work with the energy being consumed, whereas 100% of energy going into bitcoin mining…

>doing useful work with the energy yea is video games useful work? youtube videos perhaps? twitter? It's nice that you have a sliding scale of what utility is that only you can define, you seem completely trustworthy.

Art and entertainment are useful work, yes, obviously.

But it is true and I pointed that out that there is a lot of waste going on in the cloud as well.

Re: Green hackers around the world, let’s destroy Bitcoin

#213

Post by yownie » Sun, Feb 07, 2021, 7:12 PM UTC

tsimionescu wrote: post #212

yownie wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>doing useful work with the energy yea is video games useful work? youtube videos perhaps? twitter? It's nice that you have a sliding scale of what utility is that only you can define, you seem completely trustworthy.

Art and entertainment are useful work, yes, obviously. But it is true and I pointed that out that there is a lot of waste going on in the cloud as well.

>Art and entertainment are useful work, yes, obviously.

why?

Re: Green hackers around the world, let’s destroy Bitcoin

#214

Post by yownie » Sun, Feb 07, 2021, 7:17 PM UTC

NicoJuicy wrote: post #14

Dudideloo wrote: post #4

> If a group of hackers (real or fake) announced an impending attack, the price of Bitcoin would likely collapse. Look further: What would happen after the attacks failed, when not even the green hackers can do anything to their network ? Nobody can currently shut it down, that's also why it is valuable.

There's literally an internet requirement for it, to use it. Also, using it locally has a delay of several days for being "up to date". So in practise, security for most people is dependant on 3rd parties.

>Also, using it locally has a delay of several days for being "up to date".

what even?

Re: Green hackers around the world, let’s destroy Bitcoin

#215

Post by tsimionescu » Sun, Feb 07, 2021, 7:32 PM UTC

yownie wrote: post #208

tsimionescu wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Calling out the BTC network on its energetic inefficiency completely misses the point that the work put into the network is exactly the scarce digital asset, and hence the store of value. Why would that matter? The problem is the huge amount of greenhouse gases getting released because of this store of value. Whether it makes some economic sense or not is irrelevant to the discussion of whether it should be allowed…

>The problem is the huge amount of greenhouse gases getting Really, you mean the huge amount of greenhouse gases we release here in Iceland where our energy is entirely from renewable sources and we mine 11% of the bitcoin network?

Why not sell that energy to other countries then, or put it to use to produce goods and services that people need? Maybe move a data center from a more polluting country to Iceland?

There are many things that people actually need which could be done with that energy, but that would probably bring less money than burning it away on Bitcoin.

And make no mistake, these things are still being done, just soemwhere else in the world with more polluting energy. The energy supply of the world is limited, so mobile use cases will often move around.

Re: Green hackers around the world, let’s destroy Bitcoin

#216

Post by tsimionescu » Sun, Feb 07, 2021, 7:35 PM UTC

yownie wrote: post #213

tsimionescu wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Art and entertainment are useful work, yes, obviously. But it is true and I pointed that out that there is a lot of waste going on in the cloud as well.

>Art and entertainment are useful work, yes, obviously. why?

Because they bring enjoyment to people, and all that truly matters is the happiness of people.

Money is only useful in so far as it can buy the things that people need, but making those things still requires energy in addition to money. Burning energy to make money when you can literary just will money into existence is completely absurd.

Re: Green hackers around the world, let’s destroy Bitcoin

#217

Post by thejynxed » Sun, Feb 07, 2021, 7:41 PM UTC

nnx wrote: post #109

Bitcoin is actually a (if not the) great accelerator for cheap renewable energy (hydro, solar, etc) by being a market incentive. Even helps reducing methane emissions flaring from oil fields by putting that flaring to productive use (hashing) instead of releasing it into atmosphere, see https://gam.ai/ for instance.

Except it hasn't been, instead places like China (the largest crypto mining market on the planet) has instead opted to open new coal plants to feed their state operated mining centers.

Re: Green hackers around the world, let’s destroy Bitcoin

#218

Post by thejynxed » Sun, Feb 07, 2021, 7:47 PM UTC

shawnz wrote: post #198

inter_netuser wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

because all that will do is just entrench the existing banking oligopoly. proof of work is the only thing that maintains unforgeable costliness. Every proof of stake system eventually centralized and failed.

What about proof-of-space? And of course proof-of-work isn't necessarily immune to wealth centralization either.

PoW is far from immune to it as the Chinese have proven, as they hold roughly 49% of all BTC and 65% of all mining capacity on the planet.

Re: Green hackers around the world, let’s destroy Bitcoin

#219

Post by Jommi » Sun, Feb 07, 2021, 8:01 PM UTC

FlyingSnake wrote: post #85

Controversial opinions below: Feeling might be hurt. - Bitcoin is popular in the west and the US specifically because it lacks the cutting edge financial networks rest of the world has. Citizens in China, India, Kenya etc can do transactions in a jiffy using their existing bank accounts, whereas ACH clearance takes longer time. - The digital Gold-rush aspect, HODLing, and no regulation makes it more lucrative to play…

It's less controversial and more flat out wrong.

I am very surprised people that frequenting HN are still this misinformed about BTC.

Where are you reading that BTC is focused in US? Where are you reading that BTC is supposed to be used for fast transactions?

Re: Green hackers around the world, let’s destroy Bitcoin

#220

Post by effie » Sun, Feb 07, 2021, 8:06 PM UTC

tsimionescu wrote: post #164

effie wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If BTC mining and related operations were halted right now as you wish, by what percentage would the CO2 production decrease? By 0.1%, inconsequential. We need to focus on decomissioning coal/gas power plants and combustion motors for transport. That will get us at least 60%.

> We need to focus on decomissioning coal/gas power plants and combustion motors for transport. Bitcoin is actively working against that. By increasing the energy demand from the network, it makes it harder to simply stop producing energy. It doesn't matter if miners are directly buying only from renewable sources (as some claim), they are still likely out-bidding someone else, who then has to go to a fossil fuel pla…

The energy consumption of BTC is minuscule when compared to total electric consumption and its physical/economic effect on power networks is similarly minuscule. Yes, it consumes and contributes to CO2. So do other electric energy consumers, like big companies like Amazon, Google. So do, orders of magnitude more than BTC, consumers of fossil fuels. BTC is just an easy inconsequential scapegoat.