Actually despite what others have said, it's not out of the realm of possibility that this is in fact broadly what happened - that all ASIC manufacturers did mine on their products for some time before shipping them out. (Though three months is definitely ruled out as too long. Three weeks... perhaps)

First off, we know that's exactly what ASICMINER did and is doing, since it was their explicitly stated business model all along. Secondly, this is consistent with the properties of an exponential graph. Shifting an exponential curve to the left is mathematically equivalent to shifting it up.

It's all fun and games until someone has an epileptic fit.

Idiot. That's not how truth works, and it's not how persuasion works. Here let me illustrate:

Fact: Evil Toshiba corporation invented time machine, killed Gandhi, Jesus and unicorns.

Here's Sony's website
www.sony.com

And here's Samsung's
www.samsung.com


...


See?

Well I wouldn't say it disproves that hypothesis, it simply does not provide good evidence for or against it. (In addition to the problems of unknown sample quality, and the disparity between 'having a brain' and 'being scientifically literate', as FirstAscent implied)

 

In the main, the people the Occupy movement are fighting against are the people who are bankrolling the Tea Party. So, no.
Now, if you're talking about the Tea Party realising that they SHOULD be biting the hand that feeds them... well, that's a different story.

Meanwhile, to the study itself: it does indeed have something to say about how people's preconceptions colour their interpretation of data. But not what everyone is saying. On the contrary, it's all rather meta, the interesting thing is how people are trumpeting this study that really DOESN'T say anything useful at all.

Here's why I say that:


Ahem. In case you didn't catch that,


That's practically noise, and the p=0.05 doesn't really mitigate that. (Actually I dismiss p=0.05 for completely different reasons - it's a long story, but the TLDR version is I'm a Bayesian).

This happens to me too. Really something the developers should check out if we're all seeing it. Sure, workarounds are nice, but fixing the problematic behaviour is better.

"2, 3, 5 and 7 are the first four prime numbers."

"Maybe. We'll see."

Jesus.

I will add that, apart from electric heating, there is one other reason one might wish to mine at a loss - to play one's part in securing the bitcoin network. If the electricity bill for the miner is sufficiently small (which it will be for a low-end asic, such as a USB miner or 1st gen AM blade, jalapeno, BFL single), one may wish to simply keep it going to contribute to the network hash rate. In that case one should view the electricity bill as a fee for participating in Bitcoin, and any mining proceeds as a partial subsidy or rebate on the fee. Anyway this is probably what I'll be doing with my 1st gen AM blade when the inevitable happens (which looks like Jan/Feb 2014 at the rate things are going).

I have one word for you, just one word:

Equilibrium.

(though Buffer Overflow's is also a pretty good word)

I'd be happy to. What's the private key?

Actually, I'm going to bed now. You'd better PM me. Oh wait, I've also got to poison all the board's admins and mods. Shit, did I say that out loud?

To the OP: as you surmised, this is a topic that comes up again and again. You can also see the reaction to it: a very few in favour, most opposed, with the opposition ranging from people who calmly state that it is not necessary, to people who shriek that you have an ulterior motive (or worse, quietly and slyly insinuate that you have an ulterior motive in the guise of 'just asking questions') or that you just want to steal bitcoins.

I'm one of the few who agree with you. Rather than repeat myself ad nauseam, I'll just link here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=295011.

Short version: the only valid concern naysayers should have is that if such a change were adopted, some peeps might not get the memo, to which I have four responses:
1) Shouting about such a change from the rooftops, well in advance, big red letters on every piece of client software, and so on.
2) Recycling time should be sufficiently long that everyone has a chance to learn about it. But not long enough to forget all about it. Thinking 5-10 years is about right.
3) Wallet software can and probably should be made to generate new wallets and shovel the funds automatically.
4) If after all the above, somebody still manages to lose their coins through neglect... GOOD. That hypothetical person would be an imbecile.



ETA: and after reading the thread a bit more carefully, I see you're only proposing a one-time readjustment, not a continual reissue of the old coins. Well, so be it. I still agree with you, even though I now think you're not going far enough!

I see others have already explained to you how 'markets' work. Next up...


... is finding out what the phrase '51% attack' actually means.

I wasn't talking about the technical difficulty-or-not of doing the hack - I'm a complete ignoramus re running web services - rather the timing of it. It's the simplest explanation to account for the *timing* of the hack. Well, there was also the other possibility I mentioned - non-gov hackers pissed off at the forum's role in bringing down DPR.

I voted positive. For one thing, it makes bitcoin more 'respectable' in the eyes of Joe "I'm sure I'd never touch drugs" Public. For another thing, it's actually good in the long term for the black market in drugs. Other sites will mushroom up (probably they already have done), with a bit of luck there'll be several, not just one, and hopefully the people running them will be smarter than DPR, more careful in their online habits, less willing to trumpet their achievements and goad the powers that be.

Aaaaand I do now realise I've signed up to this forum with my email address derived from my real name, no less.  Oh well, it's still not illegal (yet) to state one's opposition to the WoD, and moral support of those who wish to undermine it. So yeah, NSA, DEA, GCHQ and NCA, I hate you guys, blow me.

To the OP: well maybe they're done for now, but I'm sure they'll start again whenever another need comes up. Also, 'Hole seekers'?  

To surebet: 'Obummer'.   Grow up. But as for how we can be fairly sure (not certain, granted) that this was the US government, well I think Occam's razor works here. Though another possibility is: we all know that the forum admins will have had to cooperate with the USG in some form to bring DPR down. Presumably some peeps with leet haxxor skillz won't have been happy with this, and possibly it was some form of retaliation. But I still think USG is most likely.

I conjecture that the OP is suggesting that miners use a rewritten form of mining software, that allows bitcoins from that address (you all know what I mean) to be spent without signing with the private key. Procedurally, I don't see this working. Firstly it's not so much miners, as mining pool operators, that would have to agree to this. Can't see them doing it. Secondly I don't think it's just the mining effort that would need to be on board with this. It would also be all those nodes that are validating transactions. That's even less likely to happen.

That's the 'how-to' side of things. The 'why-to' side of things, i.e. the ethics of it... no. Just no.

ETA: Steal Team 6. Nice 

Since first hearing about bitcoins in October 2011, I have spent around £7000, give or take, on various mining adventures. GPU rigs, an AM blade, a yet-to-arrive BFL single, AM shares, an aborted big buy of Klondike boards with Avalon chips... I've done it all.
I'm currently sitting on bitcoins worth maybe £20000.

By any non-bitcoin measures that's a fantastic investment. But my regret is, well exactly what you'd expect. WHY oh WHY didn't I just BUY the fucking bitcoins?

(insert pathetic self-backpatting rationalisation about 'helping secure the network' here)

Well said.

Hey, thanks!  I will try harder to bring the funneh in future.