Live data from Hacker News

Coin Carbon Cap – PoW cryptocurrencies ranked by energy efficiency

coincarboncap.com

51–60 of 381 posts

Re: Coin Carbon Cap – PoW cryptocurrencies ranked by energy efficiency

#51
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would argue that auctions (ICOs) are fairer than mining. Devs can give themselves coins directly or they can have a dev tax (e.g. Zcash) or they can fail; I don't think it makes sense to hold crypto devs to a higher standard than, say, startups.

No, an ICO + POS is not fair at all. It might make sense for a crypto startup but not for a layer 1 blockchain currency. The base layer has to be plausibly neutral, or it defeats the purpose and you might as well open a Robinhood account. Censorship resistance, plausible neutrality, decentralization, antifragility, uptime, and security are features of layer 1 blockchain systems like Bitcoin and Ethereum. If a dev tea…

I wonder about an ICO that gets burned...

Re: Coin Carbon Cap – PoW cryptocurrencies ranked by energy efficiency

#52
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not true, you have to run a validator to get rewarded. Rewards will be much less than miners get now, and the whole "rich get richer" is literally how investment works in basically anything, even Bitcoin mining

Yes, running a validator will cost some money. I will explain how I think. If the rich want to get richer he have to make good investment decisions and some work. In POS you don't have to do anything at all, just buy and hold. So in POS, you don't need to innovate your business model. In POW, you always have to innovate to be a leader. Bitcoin ASIC innovation in last years shows how strong competition is. And competi…

This is often claimed to be an advantage of PoS: you can't get an extra increase in rate of profits by being richer (beyond the linear increase you'd expect). With PoW on the other hand, the richest have the best access to the most innovative technology and so you get superlinear profits the richer you are.

Re: Coin Carbon Cap – PoW cryptocurrencies ranked by energy efficiency

#53
From the FAQ Page:

>What about Ripple/IOTA/...?

>As with Proof of Stake we are aware of no existing, alternative protocol that has solved the problem of distributed consensus. Usually these approaches have resulted in some form of centralized authority becoming an important factor in the security model.

>Of course a centralized systems can achieve a far greater energy efficiency. Here we want to compare only distributed systems and their properties.

----------

Everyone should know by now that Ripple is a company not a blockchain. And the XRPL is fully decentral with no authority at all.

See XRPL.org

Re: Coin Carbon Cap – PoW cryptocurrencies ranked by energy efficiency

#54
post #53

From the FAQ Page: >What about Ripple/IOTA/...? >As with Proof of Stake we are aware of no existing, alternative protocol that has solved the problem of distributed consensus. Usually these approaches have resulted in some form of centralized authority becoming an important factor in the security model. >Of course a centralized systems can achieve a far greater energy efficiency. Here we want to compare only distribu…

Ripple is pretty much fully centralised last I checked - there's a list of nodes controlled by the company and a few other companies involved in setting it up which decide which version of transaction history is valid, and nodes outside that list have no say in their decisions. In theory you can use your own list of nodes, but it's a bad idea to ever do so. Since who you choose to trust has no effect on the Ripple-sanctioned set of transactions and you really don't want your version of history to ever diverge from theirs because then you'll disagree with everyone else on the planet about which transactions are valid, diverging from their chosen trusted list has only downsides.

Re: Coin Carbon Cap – PoW cryptocurrencies ranked by energy efficiency

#55
post #53

From the FAQ Page: >What about Ripple/IOTA/...? >As with Proof of Stake we are aware of no existing, alternative protocol that has solved the problem of distributed consensus. Usually these approaches have resulted in some form of centralized authority becoming an important factor in the security model. >Of course a centralized systems can achieve a far greater energy efficiency. Here we want to compare only distribu…

Does XRPL no longer have a unique node list that is mostly under the control of Ripple (because they maintain the default that clients automatically use)?

https://cryptobriefing.com/is-xrp-decentralized-ripples-invo...

Could the system still be decentralized in practice? Sure. But the fact that the Ripple CTO claimed XRP might be more decentralized than BTC or ETH makes me take the rest of their claims with huge buckets of salt.

Re: Coin Carbon Cap – PoW cryptocurrencies ranked by energy efficiency

#56
post #52
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, running a validator will cost some money. I will explain how I think. If the rich want to get richer he have to make good investment decisions and some work. In POS you don't have to do anything at all, just buy and hold. So in POS, you don't need to innovate your business model. In POW, you always have to innovate to be a leader. Bitcoin ASIC innovation in last years shows how strong competition is. And competi…

This is often claimed to be an advantage of PoS: you can't get an extra increase in rate of profits by being richer (beyond the linear increase you'd expect). With PoW on the other hand, the richest have the best access to the most innovative technology and so you get superlinear profits the richer you are.

Real world case: Intel had the most advanced chip and more money, until one day AMD got better. In POS this scenario is impossible. First will always be first.

Re: Coin Carbon Cap – PoW cryptocurrencies ranked by energy efficiency

#57
post #36

As a Bitcoin miner ( https://toom.im ), while I appreciate the work put into it, this particular metric of "transactions per kW" might not work the way you expect. The main point that you should understand is that a PoW blockchain's energy usage is not proportional to its transactions. I'll say that a different way: the transactions themselves do not use any energy in mining. I'll say this in a third way: it takes ex…

I agree about the suggestion to look at transaction capacity, however:

- Bitcoin is operating at capacity and has shown unwillingness to adjust capacity, so the "kWh/tx" is valid for Bitcoin.

- Transaction fees increase the block reward, and as a consequence, the energy that can be used for mining before it becomes unprofitable. This is currently only about 10% of the total reward miners get for mining a block on the Bitcoin (BTC) blockchain, but it is something to consider. The corresponding part of the energy usage would, at a fixed fee, be proportional to transactions.

Re: Coin Carbon Cap – PoW cryptocurrencies ranked by energy efficiency

#58

Note that Bitcoin SV is completely controlled by miners, a 51% attack can change the rules. In the original Bitcoin, a 51% attack can only reverse recent transactions, not change the rules or compromise stored funds.

Yea if you want to spend millions if not billions to 51% attack it and the public nature of bitcoin is such that everyone would know who attacked it leaving them legally liable then be my guest. There is more incentive not to attack it than there is to attack it. when will people realize this.

Re: Coin Carbon Cap – PoW cryptocurrencies ranked by energy efficiency

#59
post #36

As a Bitcoin miner ( https://toom.im ), while I appreciate the work put into it, this particular metric of "transactions per kW" might not work the way you expect. The main point that you should understand is that a PoW blockchain's energy usage is not proportional to its transactions. I'll say that a different way: the transactions themselves do not use any energy in mining. I'll say this in a third way: it takes ex…

Indeed, I'd say this Tx/power is the most misleading metric here. Bitcoin is slow (7tx/s) compared to what for example Algorand boasts they will achieve at the end of the year (25000tx/s).

Re: Coin Carbon Cap – PoW cryptocurrencies ranked by energy efficiency

#60
post #36

As a Bitcoin miner ( https://toom.im ), while I appreciate the work put into it, this particular metric of "transactions per kW" might not work the way you expect. The main point that you should understand is that a PoW blockchain's energy usage is not proportional to its transactions. I'll say that a different way: the transactions themselves do not use any energy in mining. I'll say this in a third way: it takes ex…

I’ve gone back and forth on this myself, but I think it is valid to consider the cost of the entire network as a matter of carbon accounting. After all, one of Bitcoin’s selling points is the difficulty of a double-spend. This wouldn’t be the case if Bitcoin mining was not subsidized from the pool of unmined coins.
Post reply on HN