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BTC Endgame

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Re: BTC Endgame

#131

Post by pk_kinetic »

nostrademons wrote: post #17

You don't need a DoS attack under the assumptions of this project. It's already assumed that you control ~80% of hash rate, so you execute a 51% attack that mass double-spends coins and destroy all confidence in the integrity of the currency. Poof, nobody uses it. Note that China already controls ~65% of Bitcoin hash rate, so if they wanted to execute this right now, they probably could. That they haven't is one reas…

I wonder if at some point Bitcoin might become important enough that nation states will work together to ensure that no one state has more than a 51% hashrate as a matter of national security.

Re: BTC Endgame

#132

Post by hertzrat »

swader999 wrote: post #114
mrits wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've posted here before about it. I'm of the opinion that it currently is not decentralized. There is such a shortage of hardware that can be competitive right now and there are only a few organizations that can get their hands on them. I think this problem is just going to get worse when the manufactures start to realize it doesn't make sense to sell any of their miners at all.

Agree, the electricity for the mining is even more centralised. That really is the point of control on this whole thing.

Electricity is a big deal even without crypto. Look at Texas right now - people have more to worry about than their mining rigs being offline

Re: BTC Endgame

#133

Post by jpollock »

nostrademons wrote: post #17

You don't need a DoS attack under the assumptions of this project. It's already assumed that you control ~80% of hash rate, so you execute a 51% attack that mass double-spends coins and destroy all confidence in the integrity of the currency. Poof, nobody uses it. Note that China already controls ~65% of Bitcoin hash rate, so if they wanted to execute this right now, they probably could. That they haven't is one reas…

I thought that while there's data now, the sample is _extremely_ skewed to Chinese hashers:

https://news.bitcoin.com/65-of-global-bitcoin-hashrate-conce...

Re: BTC Endgame

#134

Post by danlugo92 »

pk_kinetic wrote: post #131
nostrademons wrote: post #17

You don't need a DoS attack under the assumptions of this project. It's already assumed that you control ~80% of hash rate, so you execute a 51% attack that mass double-spends coins and destroy all confidence in the integrity of the currency. Poof, nobody uses it. Note that China already controls ~65% of Bitcoin hash rate, so if they wanted to execute this right now, they probably could. That they haven't is one reas…

I wonder if at some point Bitcoin might become important enough that nation states will work together to ensure that no one state has more than a 51% hashrate as a matter of national security.

This will happen

Re: BTC Endgame

#135

Post by inopinatus »

generalizations wrote: post #51
pvarangot wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Note that China already controls ~65% of Bitcoin hash rate, so if they wanted to execute this right now, they probably could. When you say "China" do you mean like an actor that can make coordinated decisions? Or just a geographic region? I'm asking out of curiosity because yeah there's a lot of miners in China across many geographic regions but I never saw any evidence that they even talking to each other, even le…

I'd make a wild guess that when parent is talking about 'control', they mean that if a miner is located within China, the Chinese government has the ability to put a gun to that miners head and tell them what to do.

The implication, that no other nation-state may use force to assert control of a strategic economic resource, is in contradiction with both history and common sense.

GP is ipso facto calling out lazy casual racism, but framed constructively because they’re better at it than me.

Re: BTC Endgame

#136

Post by usrusr »

swader999 wrote: post #100
gavrif wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With that kind of control, they could just put a gun to anyone's head and ask them to start mining bitcoin and do it the way they want them to. It wouldn't have to depend on how many bitcoin miners are in China at the moment.

I'd wager the way China would exert control on miners there would be to regulate their access to electricity.

And exert that control in subtle ways. "We know you, we watch you. You can do what you are doing because we permit it. When we come asking for a favor you won't think twice"

Re: BTC Endgame

#137

Post by jacksnipe »

inopinatus wrote: post #135
generalizations wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd make a wild guess that when parent is talking about 'control', they mean that if a miner is located within China, the Chinese government has the ability to put a gun to that miners head and tell them what to do.

The implication, that no other nation-state may use force to assert control of a strategic economic resource, is in contradiction with both history and common sense. GP is ipso facto calling out lazy casual racism, but framed constructively because they’re better at it than me.

Uh, no, other countries don’t have 65% of the hashing capacity. The USA could put a gun to miners heads, but it wouldn’t give them 51%, so there’s no point.

Re: BTC Endgame

#138

Post by nzmsv »

nostrademons wrote: post #93
gavrif wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With that kind of control, they could just put a gun to anyone's head and ask them to start mining bitcoin and do it the way they want them to. It wouldn't have to depend on how many bitcoin miners are in China at the moment.

It's a lot easier to point a gun to someone's head and say "Switch your equipment over to the network pipe that we give you" rather than point a gun to someone's head and say "Build a datacenter, secure an extremely large source of power, buy a few thousand Bitcoin mining boards, hook them all up in this extremely technical way, and then switch it over to the network pipe we give you." The gun in the head strategy wo…

Relatively well is, well, relative :)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sharashka

Re: BTC Endgame

#139

Post by inopinatus »

jacksnipe wrote: post #137
inopinatus wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The implication, that no other nation-state may use force to assert control of a strategic economic resource, is in contradiction with both history and common sense. GP is ipso facto calling out lazy casual racism, but framed constructively because they’re better at it than me.

Uh, no, other countries don’t have 65% of the hashing capacity. The USA could put a gun to miners heads, but it wouldn’t give them 51%, so there’s no point.

Uh-huh. The agencies of, let’s say, the US federal government, or the Kremlin, or similarly those of governments in the UK, France, Germany, all have no history of overseas intervention or onshore direct action to preserve economic interests. Got it.

Re: BTC Endgame

#140

Post by gruez »

StavrosK wrote: post #124
Laforet wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No PoS algorithm has yet managed to solve the Nothing-at-stake problem, nor are they any more resistant to the abovementioned kind of hostile takeover by the nation state player compared to PoW. I can't speak for every PoS coin out there but Cardano/Ouroborous explicitly assumes partial synchrony which is arguably never a good idea for a supposedly permissionless blockchain.

So PoS is vaporware because it hasn't solved a problem where the miners can act against their economic best interests and mine a fork? How does "there's a theoretical issue, and also it shares a problem with PoW" follow from "PoS is vaporware"?

> So PoS is vaporware because it hasn't solved a problem where the miners can act against their economic best interests and mine a fork?

Not exactly. The point of "nothing as stake" attack is that you can pull off the attack while having... "nothing a stake".

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