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Mining Bitcoin with pencil and paper: 0.67 hashes per day (2014)

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Re: Mining Bitcoin with pencil and paper: 0.67 hashes per day (2014)

#381

Post by vkou »

shawnz wrote: post #282
vkou wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Transaction rate is the only possible way to judge the value of a monetary system. A system where you essentially can't transact is economically dead. The health of an economy is measured by how quickly money flows in it, not in how wealthy a dragon sitting on a pile of gold can get. It can be a speculative system, but that's far less useful than being a monetary system. Bitcoin is a terrible currency in the same way…

Not true. For example a monetary system might be valuable because it supports high transaction volumes even at a low rate, or because it has high costs to attack. > The health of an economy is measured by how quickly money flows in it Bitcoin isn't an economy. It is just a small part of the overall economy

The cost to attack bitcoin is a lot lower than the cost to attack the euro, the usd, the yen, or even the rouble.

That's because you don't need a 50% attack to destroy bitcoin. You just need the stroke of a pen, and it's price, and utility would collapse.

Re: Mining Bitcoin with pencil and paper: 0.67 hashes per day (2014)

#382

Post by shawnz »

vkou wrote: post #381
shawnz wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not true. For example a monetary system might be valuable because it supports high transaction volumes even at a low rate, or because it has high costs to attack. > The health of an economy is measured by how quickly money flows in it Bitcoin isn't an economy. It is just a small part of the overall economy

The cost to attack bitcoin is a lot lower than the cost to attack the euro, the usd, the yen, or even the rouble. That's because you don't need a 50% attack to destroy bitcoin. You just need the stroke of a pen, and it's price, and utility would collapse.

> The cost to attack bitcoin is a lot lower than the cost to attack the euro, the usd, the yen, or even the rouble.

Those things should ought to have a much higher cost to attack since they hold significantly more value than Bitcoin currently.

> You just need the stroke of a pen, and it's price, and utility would collapse.

Then simply valuate it on what it will be worth in a post-regulation future rather than its current value. If you really believe that will happen, then it presents a great shorting opportunity for you and you would be helping to price in risks such as that.

Re: Mining Bitcoin with pencil and paper: 0.67 hashes per day (2014)

#383

Post by Consultant32452 »

xur17 wrote: post #342
trident5000 wrote: post #300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah because Ill never buy food and housing until I die because my currency is deflationary. That logic is so tired. Also the fact that you can convert US dollars to investments instantly instead of consuming basically extends the same situation, yet we still spend when we need to.

> Also the fact that you can convert US dollars to investments instantly instead of consuming basically extends the same situation, yet we still spend when we need to. I've actually wondered about this -> why not use the SP500 as a form of currency? It seems like this would fit somewhere in between the US dollar and Bitcoin - store of value, increases in price over time (or at least historically does), pays dividends…

This would be a massive wealth transfer to the companies on SP500 because demand for the stocks would go up and those companies would basically get infinite zero interest loans by issuing more stock, which would inflate your currency.

Re: Mining Bitcoin with pencil and paper: 0.67 hashes per day (2014)

#384

Post by vkou »

shawnz wrote: post #382
vkou wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cost to attack bitcoin is a lot lower than the cost to attack the euro, the usd, the yen, or even the rouble. That's because you don't need a 50% attack to destroy bitcoin. You just need the stroke of a pen, and it's price, and utility would collapse.

> The cost to attack bitcoin is a lot lower than the cost to attack the euro, the usd, the yen, or even the rouble. Those things should ought to have a much higher cost to attack since they hold significantly more value than Bitcoin currently. > You just need the stroke of a pen, and it's price, and utility would collapse. Then simply valuate it on what it will be worth in a post-regulation future rather than its cur…

Market cap of the Ruble is 800 billion USD, market cap of BTC is currently 900 billion USD.

Depending on the kind of regulation, its value would either be roughly the same (if the regulation is of the KYC form), or would go into free-fall (if the regulation is of the 'this is illegal, starting 30 days from now').

But that's not my point. My point is that the much touted BTC resilience to a 49% attack is a solution to a problem that nobody has.

Re: Mining Bitcoin with pencil and paper: 0.67 hashes per day (2014)

#385

Post by AlphENsign_Tech »

hnrodey wrote: post #248
kens wrote: post #53

Author here; I was surprised to see this on HN today. Let me know if you have any questions!

Fantastic set of articles. Best stuff I've read on the internet recently. Thank you.

I would say the entire Ken Shirriff's blog site is amazing. A lot of very interesting system's articles there.

Re: Mining Bitcoin with pencil and paper: 0.67 hashes per day (2014)

#386

Post by shawnz »

vkou wrote: post #384
shawnz wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The cost to attack bitcoin is a lot lower than the cost to attack the euro, the usd, the yen, or even the rouble. Those things should ought to have a much higher cost to attack since they hold significantly more value than Bitcoin currently. > You just need the stroke of a pen, and it's price, and utility would collapse. Then simply valuate it on what it will be worth in a post-regulation future rather than its cur…

Market cap of the Ruble is 800 billion USD, market cap of BTC is currently 900 billion USD. Depending on the kind of regulation, its value would either be roughly the same (if the regulation is of the KYC form), or would go into free-fall (if the regulation is of the 'this is illegal, starting 30 days from now'). But that's not my point. My point is that the much touted BTC resilience to a 49% attack is a solution to…

Well interestingly, the cost to maintain the Russian military is only about 10x higher than the cost to maintain Bitcoin (and obviously the Russian military is defending more than just the currency).

> My point is that the much touted BTC resilience to a 49% attack is a solution to a problem that nobody has.

If nobody has the problem, then nobody will buy it.

Re: Mining Bitcoin with pencil and paper: 0.67 hashes per day (2014)

#387

Post by vmception »

varjag wrote: post #136
vmception wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the same amount of bitcoin would have been mined. what did you mean?

Performance per watt energy was a lot worse a decade prior.

just likely means the same amount of energy would be used with lower hashrate, the same amount of bitcoin would be generated

Re: Mining Bitcoin with pencil and paper: 0.67 hashes per day (2014)

#388

Post by adriancr »

solosoyokaze wrote: post #377
adriancr wrote: post #354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

one example: 500$ to 1M in 1 year on tesla calls. 50k to 15M in GME calls in less then 1 month if you were lucky. It's all gambling but to say bitcoin is the best source of wealth/gambling shows your lack of experience. Where would you put your money now that bitcoin is 50k? I want to compare that to my stock + calls on random meme stocks. (also vs s&p)

Ridiculous examples. BTC has been consistently up for a decade (or USD has been plummeting that long, depends how you look at it). > Where would you put your money now that bitcoin is 50k? BTC of course. USD is only going to continue to drop.

Let me give you an example:

I invested a nice sum of money in November 2019.

Option 1: BTC from 9300 to 48000 means 5x

Option 2: TSLA from 62 (pre-split) to 796 means 12x. (much much more via calls)

Which do you think I went for? Which strategy do you think will continue to make reliable money in the future?

Re: Mining Bitcoin with pencil and paper: 0.67 hashes per day (2014)

#389

Post by trident5000 »

Griffinsauce wrote: post #360
trident5000 wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Comparing BTC mining to a small country is just absurd. You could do the same with hundreds of other applications aside from YouTube like all social media servers, gaming, existing banking infrastructure, etc. Also Bitcoin arguably replaces gold which uses more energy and is more destructive to land (while using fossil fuels instead of mostly renewable energy like BTC). Lastly how much energy do we think the dollar w…

Your last statement is based on exactly zero data points. Let me provide one counter though: I couldn't give a rats ass whether you outmanouver me financially, I do care whether my child has a livable planet for his lifetime.

Sure thing ;)

Re: Mining Bitcoin with pencil and paper: 0.67 hashes per day (2014)

#390

Post by mrb »

fifilura wrote: post #145
mrb wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is still a single dam. A whole country could be powered by a single dam.

The number of places where you can build a dam is limited, and when you find one it is not unlikely that you have to relocate > 1 million people to build it (Three Gorges Dam). That is on the other side of the scale you are talking about.

The point is about making a comparison. When Bitcoin's energy consumption is equaled to that of a single dam, it just doesn't seem that impressive.
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