Bitcoin Forum

:)  So I've decided to get into mining with a couple of decent laptops and they're downloading the blocks of transaction history now, thing is, it says 134,813 blocks of 208,537 blocks downloaded, now remember there's only going to be 21 million bit coins unless they add more or do something to increase coin capacity, n there's 50 coins paid per block solved... 

   208,537  ---  (total blocks)
  x       50  ---  (bit coins paid per block)
   {equals}
_________

10,426,850 bit coins

that's almost half of the bit coins, and judging by some of these $30,000 gpu's built specifically for bit coin mining that put out forgot how many ghz (but it's alot), that people are preordering that release next month, thinking they'll be able to mine to their hearts content, and the current amount of mining farms constantly being upgraded with higher end gear, along with people pouring into bit coin mining because of the success of bit coin mining, I'd say we got 2 to 4 months tops to do something about the 21 million bit coin cap.  I always pondered why there was a cap, and the only reason I can conjure up based on the fact that the world turns for money, there will be another system fired up and ready to go with no cap, similar to bit coin programs, that is probably already developed, but ya save your mining gear cause there's just too much money in mining for something like bit coin to lose value, and we already know people aren't going to do anything about it or laws would have already been passed.  I'd give it 3 months to get in full gear then start mining, mind you, there could be several bit coin program clones along with the first alternative.  That's why I'm waiting 3 months for them to show their true colors.  Anyways just a suggestion if people want to keep the system alive I suggest you figure out a way to increase the cap without inflation hapening and all the other things that make bubbles go pop.  If anyone needs an extra idealist and programmer on the team to create a system that won't pop, feel free to pm me, although i haven't really pondered much as I have been developing a  self reliant renewable energy source and machine that uses hydrogen, and really it's a no brainer, just increase the cap!  We're half way there! !  Man the cap torpedos  !  :)

Not all blocks contain 50 bitcoins... Couple days it will be 25 bitcoins per block... after so many more mined blocks it will half the reward again...

all blocks contain more then 50 bitcoins, because of tx fees  :P

now i'm wondering wats the avg tx fee per block

right but the reward. OP is claiming that the majority of coins will be mined in a very short amount of time because of ASIC's or whaetver.


meh.

I'm worried about this aspect as well. My hope is that an ever increasing amount of fees per transaction and the rising value of coins can effectively compensate for the halving of blocks.

That's not how bitcoin works.  You miht want to learn a bit more about it before offering an opinion.  Opinions based on fact can be useful and spark interesting conversation, opinions based on wild uneducated speculation tend to be rather ridiculous.

In this particular case, you need to understand that no matter how much mining power gets added to the network, blocks take on average a bit less than 10 minutes to "mine".  If more processing is added, then the network increases the difficulty to increase the time back up to 10 minutes.  If people start shutting down their miners due to lack of profitablility, then the network decreases the difficulty to decrease the time back down to 10 minutes.

The blocks are 50 BTC each for the first 4 years, then 25 BTC each for the next 4 years, then 12.5 BTC each for the next 4 years, then 6.25 BTC, then 3.125, etc. So bitcoin was designed to mine the first half of the coins in the first 4 years, then the next quarter, in the next 4 years, then the next eighth in the next 4 years and so on for well over 100 years.



That won't happen anytime soon. I suspect it won't happen ever, and if it somehow does then I wouldn't expect it in my lifetime. There may be other coin types that have no cap, but if you get rid of the cap, you can't really consider it bitcoin any longer. The cap is an intrinsic part of what bitcoin is.


Your lack of logical and analytical thought doesn't really instill a lot of confidence in my regarding your skills as a programmer.

Well, I suppose that is rather vague and could mean a lot of things, but my first impression is that you may need to spend some time studying the laws of thermodynamics.

Hmm, as I type that last sentence, I suddenly come to wonder if I'm just responding to a troll.  I hate when I do that.

Our friend needs to read moar, especially if he just dove in mining with few decent notebooks.
Just sayin.

You do know that difficulty adjusts to keep the rate of blocks at ~ 1 per 10 minutes over the long run?   It will be over 130 years before all coins are mined.  Hell it will be over 10 years before 90% of the coins are mined.  In the short run (say 1000 or so blocks) miners can mine faster than the generation rate but difficulty soon catches up and over the long run generation rate will be very close to 52,560 blocks per year regardless of what the hash rate is.

Not so sure if serious...

Totally, a lot moar.

lol

For God's sake, learn how to write properly.

I hope you didn't buy the laptops with the intention of using them to mine. You won't even make enough BTC to pay for the electricity, and there is a chance that unless they are more than just "decent", your laptops won't earn any BTC at all.


I hope you aren't one of those people that claim to be able to use water as fuel (by burning it).

Go read about difficulty (https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Difficulty#What_network_hash_rate_results_in_a_given_difficulty.3F) and Bitcoin's currency supply (https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Controlled_Currency_Supply), and come back when you understand why the cap won't be reached until the year 2140 (which is slightly more than "2 to 4 months" away).

Impossible. Increasing the cap on the money supply is the very definition of inflation, and a fixed cap is the only way to stop inflation happening, by definition. Limiting inflation is whole reason bitcoin production is capped in the first place.

That's an oxymoron, since not only is hydrogen not renewable, it doesn't even exist in a form usable as an energy source anywhere on Earth. (There are oil wells and natural gas wells and water wells, but there ain't no such thing as a hydrogen well (and even if there were, it's not renewable). And producing hydrogen from any source other than a non-existent hydrogen well requires more energy than you would get by burning the hydrogen.)

Unless, of course, you're talking about a "self reliant renewable energy source" and "machine that uses hydrogen" as two completely different things, though the former is impossible and the latter is not very impressive as we already have several such machines.

right moar?

Atlas?

Nah. Atlas uses periods.

Yeah and Atlas trolling was more on the "meta" level (the theoretical risks of this, the danger of that person being the lead developer, the conflict of interest in the Foundation, etc).   To his (small) credit Atlas showed enough technical knowledge to avoid mistakes like this.

No the OP is a "sub-Atlas troll". 

I liked this incarnation of Atlas: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=124125.0

Always bearing the weight of the world on his shoulders, even if it means to win a Wikipedia edit war by thievery.

Maybe he's deliberately changing his MO so he isn't caught so quick.

Nah. Say what you may about Atlas, he's annoying, he's clueless about a lot of nonBTC stuff while talking with an air of authority, he doesn't know when to shut up, all that, but he wouldn't make a mistake like ignoring the block halving.

That's probably true.  He does have his pride.

The amount of hardware and mining processing power of the entire network combined, has virtually NO influence whatsoever on the speed at which bitcoins will be mined.

So people can buy $30K ASIC renderfarms all they want, it won't cause bitcoins to be mined any faster. Only the people who do have expensive mining hardware, will RELATIVELY mine more coins than people who don't. But the rate of 50 BTC per 10 minutes (soon to be reduced to 25 BTC per 10 mins) remains constant.

Afraid so! He claimed to do it, then disappeared after only one post. Proof that the government reads this forum. Poof! And he's gone. Next, please!

If we increase the total number of BTC beyond 21 million. I would sell my coins immediately. Bitcoin would be dead in my opinion. The inability of any authority to create more coins is one of the most powerful things about the protocol. 

This is simply not possible by the very definition of Bitcoin.

I thought the OP was suggesting changing the protocol to allow this? It comes up in threads now and then. It is possible if we fork bitcoin.

But then it wouldn't be bitcoin, it'd be something else.

Came here expecting the title to refer to something entirely obvious that will catch no one off guard and has already been prepared for. Wasn't disappointed.

/thread