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China says it wants to eliminate Bitcoin mining

reuters.com

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Re: China says it wants to eliminate Bitcoin mining

#91

Post by nostrademons »

thefounder wrote: post #89
nostrademons wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's value in competition, though. Bitcoin doesn't eliminate trust, but it does commoditize that function. Commoditization necessarily means "many producers", so there's no way to achieve that without duplication of effort - but I guarantee that one Bitcoin ASIC has a lot less environmental impact than one human.

Many producers are actually few with specialised hardware(i.e bitmain)

But to enter the market, you just need to buy those Bitmain ASICs and find a cheap power source. That's what makes it a commodity market: barriers to entry are low, so if a big player gets too dominant, a bunch of new entrants with money but not necessarily expertise can take them down. You can't really do that to say Goldman Sachs or Wells Fargo, where a large portion of the competitive advantage they've built up is the trust (har har) and relationships they've developed over the past 150 years.

There's perhaps worries that Bitmain could get too big and poison the chain, but they're hamstrung in that by Bitcoin being an open protocol. If they did that the network would fork, and despite the higher hash rate in the Bitmain fork, holders would dump the Bitmain coins and buy the original fork, since they wouldn't trust the poisoned chain.

Re: China says it wants to eliminate Bitcoin mining

#92

Post by jayd16 »

keymone wrote: post #85
jayd16 wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except for, you know, all the miners wastefully vying for a chance to be the middleman for a given block.

your understanding of bitcoin is very lacking. miners never waste any energy, they spend it to acquire proof that they spent it. that proof has value and while value of the proof is larger than market value of bitcoin rewarded for the proof - miners will keep mining. also miners are not middlemen - they don't control transactions, they don't control the peer to peer network. they are there to publish the proof and ge…

Miners are literally there to skim value out of a transaction. They're middlemen.

And it is a waste. There are plenty of more efficient ways to make a transaction. I get that bitcoin is designed around this waste but that's hardly an excuse.

Re: China says it wants to eliminate Bitcoin mining

#93

Post by jraedisch »

jayd16 wrote: post #78
127 wrote: post #73

When people realize that Bitcoin mining is a mechanism to prevent fraud, the energy consumption suddenly makes a lot more sense. How much waste in the world is the result of fraud and lack of trust? Quite a lot of it. That said, reducing the energy consumption of Bitcoin should be an absolute priority. Lightning Network and other such technologies help.

It doesn't really prevent fraud that isn't already a solved problem. When was the last time you had to deal with wire transfer fraud? If you buy counterfeit goods with bitcoin there's not much you can do. A credit card protects you from fraud over $50. What exactly is this bitcoin waste getting us?

I would not call it preventing fraud, rather simplifying global money supply and making it more transparent, which in turn could prevent fraud due to smaller attack surface and more eyeballs.

Re: China says it wants to eliminate Bitcoin mining

#94

Post by tudorizer »

Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #79

As a techie and a math lover, I was initially excited with Bitcoin, and did a bit of mining, transactions, etc. But after learning about the environmental impact, I no longer support Bitcoin. It's just not worth the cost, a very beautiful idea but with a serious flaw (which I hope can be fixed in the future). So this sounds quite sensible to me.

As a techie, you should still apprectiate the fact that Bitcoin mining is the first financial system that can be measured in terms of energy impact.

Existing systems, banks and all adjacent institutions and companies, are close to impossible to track and measure.

Re: China says it wants to eliminate Bitcoin mining

#95

Post by jayd16 »

nostrademons wrote: post #84
jayd16 wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except for, you know, all the miners wastefully vying for a chance to be the middleman for a given block.

There's value in competition, though. Bitcoin doesn't eliminate trust, but it does commoditize that function. Commoditization necessarily means "many producers", so there's no way to achieve that without duplication of effort - but I guarantee that one Bitcoin ASIC has a lot less environmental impact than one human.

We already use computers in traditional banking in a much more efficient way than bitcoin.

Re: China says it wants to eliminate Bitcoin mining

#96

Post by drak0n1c »

Commenters are applauding the environmental implications of this policy, but I’m curious why no one is considering the human side of this ban. There are a billion people living under authoritarianism who are stuck with an increasingly devalued Yuan and steadily losing the ability to obtain other currencies.

Is that not also a problem that can result in humanitarian disaster? I don’t think we should be comfortable with blanket bans just because they are accompanied by government greenwashing PR.

Re: China says it wants to eliminate Bitcoin mining

#97

Post by Dylan16807 »

crimsonalucard wrote: post #71
Dylan16807 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humans are at risk of resource shortages. Many species are facing extinction. Nothing bad will happen to the dirt, but if 'planet' means 'biosphere' then it's at the most risk.

Unlikely Life as we know it is at risk. The planet has been through many extinctions.

The risk level is nowhere near "everything is wiped out", but the risk level for species in general is higher than the risk level for humans.

Re: China says it wants to eliminate Bitcoin mining

#98

Post by jayd16 »

jraedisch wrote: post #93
jayd16 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't really prevent fraud that isn't already a solved problem. When was the last time you had to deal with wire transfer fraud? If you buy counterfeit goods with bitcoin there's not much you can do. A credit card protects you from fraud over $50. What exactly is this bitcoin waste getting us?

I would not call it preventing fraud, rather simplifying global money supply and making it more transparent, which in turn could prevent fraud due to smaller attack surface and more eyeballs.

But this is just a pipe dream. You would just have fraud hidden away in Swiss bitcoin accounts and wallets in the Cayman islands. Isn't it just less privacy for the naive user and business as usual for the fraudster?

Re: China says it wants to eliminate Bitcoin mining

#99

Post by rocqua »

127 wrote: post #73

When people realize that Bitcoin mining is a mechanism to prevent fraud, the energy consumption suddenly makes a lot more sense. How much waste in the world is the result of fraud and lack of trust? Quite a lot of it. That said, reducing the energy consumption of Bitcoin should be an absolute priority. Lightning Network and other such technologies help.

If it would 'prevent fraud' it should be possible to e.g. retrieve stolen funds. Instead, it is a mechanism to ensure money is only spent once.

Cash solves this rather cheaply (because it is physical). Electronic money does it a lot more efficiently that bitcoin. Perhaps the power usage of all banks is higher than bitcoin, but power per transaction is a lot better.

Re: China says it wants to eliminate Bitcoin mining

#100

Post by rocqua »

This should help a little against centralization. With the cheaper electricity out of the game, more locations might become viable as sites for bitcoin mining.

We're still stuck with two Chinese ASIC manufacturers, but at least more of the actual mining will be outside china.

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