If folks are interested in the old Monero PoW function (and, uh, the reason they changed it), I wrote up a thing about it a long time ago: https://da-data.blogspot.com/2014/08/minting-money-with-mone... The history of people trying to design GPU or ASIC-resistant proof-of-work functions is long and mostly unsuccessful. I haven't looked into RandomX; it's possible they've succeeded here (or possible that with the alt-…
I partially heat my home by running the default Monero client on old Xeons (heat ejects near my desktoes). As I only mine when it's cold outside (otherwise using resistive heating), there is no actual net electricity cost. IMHO it's not "worth it" for an individual to buy equipment specifically to mine crypto... but if you already have an old machine AND you heat without a heatpump, it's a free hobby/heater. ---- To…
How Monero’s proof of work works
101–110 of 244 posts
Re: How Monero’s proof of work works
#102If folks are interested in the old Monero PoW function (and, uh, the reason they changed it), I wrote up a thing about it a long time ago: https://da-data.blogspot.com/2014/08/minting-money-with-mone... The history of people trying to design GPU or ASIC-resistant proof-of-work functions is long and mostly unsuccessful. I haven't looked into RandomX; it's possible they've succeeded here (or possible that with the alt-…
There was a proposal on Ethereum that didn't succeed (progpow) since they were already in the late stage of transitionning to PoS. Ethereum did quite a good job at keeping asic advantage moderate (the speedup was 100% max - not orders of magnitude). RandomX is basically progpow that succeeded. You might be interested in Chia's Proof of Space and Time... and how it collapsed!
Re: How Monero’s proof of work works
#103I never quite understand this stuff, maybe someone can help. Are cryptocurrencies supposed to be a potential replacement for real life cash? This was my understanding of the motivation behind Bitcoin, at least. If so, why does it make sense that people can "generate" cash by proving some amount of work done? This of course cannot be done with normal cash. Is the main functionality of these cryptocurrencies supposed t…
yes, Bitcoin was hijacked by the company, Blockstream and they injected the SegWit and RBF attacks to kill it as a currency, Bitcoin Cash still functions as Bitcoin however. Monero is similar to Bitcoin Cash, a useful replacement for cash in most cases.
Re: How Monero’s proof of work works
#104Re: How Monero’s proof of work works
#105Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because it's designed to be hard to execute on anything that is not a CPU.
Right, but the program is generated by the miner. So the miner could just generate a program that has no branching, and run it on a GPU.
Re: How Monero’s proof of work works
#106[flagged]
Re: How Monero’s proof of work works
#107Earlier quoted context omitted.
I’d argue that this is more of a feature than a bug. The assumption behind the “deflation is bad” argument is that spending itself is the goal. But spending is not automatically good. Productive spending and productive investment are good. Wasteful consumption, speculation, and forced risk-taking are not. If money holds its value, people become more selective. They still buy food, housing, tools, entertainment, exper…
In a deflationary system, rich people just hold money, and earn more in interest from holding the money, than everyone else earns combined. They use that interest to buy things from the poor while not producing or investing themselves. Poor people realize if they switch currencies they can have more things because they don't have to give a percentage of everything to the rich. This makes the system unstable. Bitcoin…
“Holding money and earning interest from holding it” is a category error. Holding Bitcoin pays zero yield. No coupon, no dividend, no debtor, no tax stream, and no mechanism by which poor people pay holders a percentage. If someone earns interest, they are not merely holding money; they are lending it, which means they are taking risk and providing capital.
The “numbers on a spreadsheet” objection is also just an objection to money itself. Money exists so someone can produce value today, save the claim, and exchange it later for real goods and services. That is not a bug. That is saving.
A non-inflationary currency is actually a better representation of real value, because the unit is not constantly being diluted. Inflationary money lets nominal wealth rise even when no real value was created. Hard money makes the test harsher: did you actually create value, or did the measuring stick just get worse?
And no, people would not “just sit on Bitcoin.” People still eat, rent, travel, build, compete, seek status, start companies, buy homes, and take risks to outperform others. The only thing that changes is the hurdle rate: an investment has to be better than simply holding money. That is not economic failure. That is discipline.
The fair criticism of Bitcoin is volatility and unequal distribution, not this imaginary mechanism where holders magically receive interest from the poor by owning spreadsheet entries. That mechanism does not exist.
EDIT: The rich/poor angle is almost backwards. In an inflationary system, holding money is a guaranteed loss, so ordinary people are forced to become amateur investors just to avoid being debased. Rich people are already positioned for that: they own assets, businesses, real estate, equities, and can borrow cheaply against them.
In a non-inflationary or hard-money system, simply holding money is not a guaranteed losing strategy. You keep your share unless you voluntarily take risk to increase it. That is a very different game. The rich can still get richer, but they have to outperform by allocating capital well, not merely by being closest to the asset-inflation machine.
Same with wages. Under inflation, your employer can cut your real salary without saying anything: they just give you a raise below inflation, or no raise at all. You have to fight constantly just to stay even.
Under hard money, that hidden pay cut is much harder. If prices are falling or money is appreciating, keeping the same nominal salary can mean your real wage rises. To reduce your real compensation, the employer has to make the cut explicit or offset it with benefits. That is a completely different power dynamic.
So no, inflation is not obviously pro-poor. Very often it is a quiet tax on people least able to escape cash and wages.
Re: How Monero’s proof of work works
#108Earlier quoted context omitted.
You'll get nothing but up votes here on HN, a lot are still angry they missed the boat. But solving the problem of how to transfer value trustlessly and anonymously, instantly anywhere in the world is one of the biggest breakthroughs since the Internet. Amazing how in a few short years kids started growing up with Bitcoin and don't understand how it work or why it exists :(
There was a boat to jump on? To gain what?
Re: How Monero’s proof of work works
#109If folks are interested in the old Monero PoW function (and, uh, the reason they changed it), I wrote up a thing about it a long time ago: https://da-data.blogspot.com/2014/08/minting-money-with-mone... The history of people trying to design GPU or ASIC-resistant proof-of-work functions is long and mostly unsuccessful. I haven't looked into RandomX; it's possible they've succeeded here (or possible that with the alt-…
The brilliant part of Bitcoin is that it uses very widely known crypto primitives - verification is the same as getting the right seed (you just happen to be told what the right seed is, rather than having to pay for it to be discovered).
Re: How Monero’s proof of work works
#110If folks are interested in the old Monero PoW function (and, uh, the reason they changed it), I wrote up a thing about it a long time ago: https://da-data.blogspot.com/2014/08/minting-money-with-mone... The history of people trying to design GPU or ASIC-resistant proof-of-work functions is long and mostly unsuccessful. I haven't looked into RandomX; it's possible they've succeeded here (or possible that with the alt-…
There was a proposal on Ethereum that didn't succeed (progpow) since they were already in the late stage of transitionning to PoS. Ethereum did quite a good job at keeping asic advantage moderate (the speedup was 100% max - not orders of magnitude). RandomX is basically progpow that succeeded. You might be interested in Chia's Proof of Space and Time... and how it collapsed!