No, but only because I have a crappy Internet connection and wouldn't be able to remotely interface with them like I can while they're on a local network. My rigs also aren't space-efficient or rackable... large boxes with lots of "white space," which I guess would cost me a good bit extra.

If I could remotely monitor them, I'd consider up to $.075/KWh after taxes and fees. I'm paying right around $.13/KWh after all's said and done in the US.

You mind looking around while I get my coin expert in here? I mean, you don't even have the coin graded, so I have no idea what it's worth.

Credit card fees by merchants are becoming increasingly common (it recently became legal in the US, though I think only gas stations generally charge them ATM). Credit card companies are effectively bribing consumers to use a credit card, but the irony is that it's factored into the prices at the store, so they aren't really saving that 2% or whatever (if they otherwise wouldn't have used the credit card), but effectively increasing the stores' costs, which goes right back into prices. This doesn't factor in the chargeback and other risks merchants need to factor into their costs, on top of the 30-60 day holding period they may have to wait to actually receive funds, which ends up translated into higher prices. Cash customers have it worst since they're subsidizing the plastic users. This is partially why so many sites offer discounts for paying in BTC (and for many large purchases, merchants/contractors are usually quite willing to offer a substantial discount if the customer pays in cash, too).


From a totally rational self-interest perspective, it is generally reasonable to use credit cards, especially when they have those $100 etc. sign-on bonuses (simply pay the balance off and cancel the account once you get the bonus). All of your transactions are tied to your legal identity and easily retrieved by various organizations, there's significant chance of a data breach compromising personal/financial data (the recent Target case, for example), there are harsh APRs if you don't pay your balance every month, and they sometimes charge you annual fees on top of that. There'll always be a place for credit cards for people using them wisely, though, but I don't think they're generally worth the costs and risks risks, especially for merchants as new options are coming out (even outside cryptocurrencies).

Yeah - and on the first paragraph's points: there are supposedly solutions in the works which will allow orphaned transactions to go through or at least be suspended in the network. Right now, you could "attack" a person or company accepting bitcoins if they accept 0-confirmation transactions and don't thoroughly check their validity by simply not including a fee when required. What happens right now is the network will eventually orphan that transaction, dropping it from the queue (I don't recall the exact amount of time this usually happens in -- 1-2 weeks, I think). One of the proposed solutions involve the receiver being able to attach a fee to the transaction after it's been broadcast. The other "solution" is basically just an attempt to disincentive the activity by permitting clients to keep certain no-fee transactions alive in the network indefinitely.

So - say you send 100BTC to BitInstant, you require fees for it to be mined, but you attached none. We'll say BitInstant was testing a program of allowing 0-confirmation transactions without checking whether or not they'll go through. BitInstant would credit your account, say, $60K, but they'd never receive the bitcoins because it required a fee. Currently, that transaction would be totally orphaned by the network in 1-2 weeks. Through proposed solutions, BitInstant could either attach a fee on the transaction to ensure it's mined or force the transaction to stay in the network by broadcasting some type of "keep alive" argument on the transaction so at least the "attacker" never gets his coins back. The "attacker" does take on some risks if he's not careful. First, there may be a mining pool out there which includes his block at no fee. Second, the transaction may eventually not require a fee because the inputs have aged, increasing the transaction's priority and potentially removing the requirement for a fee by default rules.

This is just the mining fee side of things. If a minimum relay fee is required and not included, the transaction won't really be orphaned, it'll simply be blocked by peers (the vast majority of which operate on default rules) and never reach miners. All of this sounds really complicated, and it is, which is why it's so awesome that transactions manage to propagate across the majority of the network in a matter of seconds.

bump

No reason not to, I guess, but they probably won't release information directly to you without a demand from a law enforcement agency.

Worth considering the scammer is using another person's identity. I've had a case where someone comes many months later and wants something removed on the forum due to it being the first result on Google (and allegedly, their identity was stolen by some type of online game griefer who thought it'd be funny to scam in their name).

Imagine if Joey was not Joey but Bob, and Bob dislikes Joey. Everyone was sending unpaid pizza deliveries to Joey who did nothing wrong (except piss Bob off).

File a police report and have them demand it.

There was a payout ~4.5 hours ago.

The formula recently changed, it's quite complex, and I honestly have no idea what it currently is. Just a few months ago, the usual fee to include (if necessary) was .0005BTC. It's now generally .0001BTC. You may choose to increase your fee to increase the transaction's "priority" (its position in the network transaction queue). If blocks were frequently filled, only the transactions which have high-enough priority would be included. Some transactions (usually small in kilobyte size and with old "inputs") do not require a fee. This is only the "mining" fee, and it is based on default settings. It is technically possible for miners and Bitcoin users to change the fee they want to include, whether this is because they want a higher-priority transaction (not currently an issue) or because they don't want to include a fee and hope a miner out there is willing to include fee-free transactions.

There is also a minimum relay fee. I believe this one is also configurable, though in practice (like the mining fee), it generally isn't. With certain transactions (unsure of formula again), peers (other Bitcoin clients you're connected to) will demand a certain fee to relay your transaction to other nodes (and eventually, miners). This is very small, IIRC.

Users don't have to know much about fees because ideal fees to include are automatically calculated by all major Bitcoin clients and online wallet services. As the software develops and blocks become full (again), clients will automatically determine the ideal fee (in this case, they're more like bids) for inclusion of the user's transaction into the next block.

Both ways.

Transaction fees are rewarded to miners (unless the pool they're mining on pockets tx fees), and block subsidies are also included. Block subsidies are, to some extent, paid for by all holders of bitcoin through inflation. Since this inflation rate is fairly accurately known, though, it's hard to say whether or not it has a significant effect.

Block subsidies decrease with time in what's known as a "halving." The Bitcoin block subsidy halved last year, I think it was, from 50 coins per block mined to 25 coins. The next one is scheduled for 2016. In earlier years, mining had a substantial impact on price (it created a relatively high amount of selling pressure when a miner decided to dump), but this impact seems to be fairly trivial anymore, which makes sense since the reward is not only decreasing nominally at halvings, but also decreasing as a % of bitcoins in the wild (it used to be that daily block subsidies would make up maybe 2% of the total day's trading volume on exchanges, but this is now some e-x number).

Transaction fees are supposed to make up a substantial portion of mining rewards, but this currently isn't the case. In fact, transaction fees are currently insignificant. This will hopefully change with time. Right now, the devs are decreasing fees and increasing block sizes (increasing the number of transactions which can be fit into a block). If block sizes were not increased, transaction fees would increase based on how much the sender values them going through and operate on free market principles instead of whatever the devs decide people should pay.
^I'm not trying to state an opinion on this matter (outside of transaction fees eventually needing to amount to something significant). It's deserving of its own thread (and has quite a few if you google for it). There's a careful balancing act going on.

I've been thinking the Next Big Thing will be minority coins. LGBTcoin, for example. Just imagine the uproar you could cause if an exchange like Cryptsy (or a functional altcoin exchange) refused to allow them on.

Buying a miner is effectively buying coins, just in a slightly different format, and has the benefit of not requiring equiv. of AML/KYC/BSA crap (and a bank account) or a local seller.

The community built around Dogecoin is so massive, I actually think it may have a shot. Unlike Bitcoin or even Litecoin, where the community is all about utility, ideology, and other boring shit, I think Dogecoin has created an appealing community centered around a fun atmosphere which can be found at pretty much every website supporting the coin. I'm not so sure it'll simply be abandoned one day.

-Or maybe the marketing's just starting to get to me. The dog's pretty darn cute.

Wish I could say "9," but I'm paid entirely in BTC, invest just about everything I possibly can in BTC and related plays, spend most of my time doing something related to BTC, spend hours a week evangelizing, heat the house with miners, buy in BTC... I may name next offspring "Bitcoin" just so I don't have to remember another name and potentially lose memory space for something related to cryptocurrency.

If cryptocurrency were to somehow totally fail on the global level, I wouldn't even know what to do.

Just realized OP is going to be clearing $20k/mo in fees pretty soon. Congrats, guy - you've earned it.

(Once you start clearing $100k/mo, though, it'd be nice if the fees halved - just so it doesn't become too easy for you. )

ETA: Going by last few days - if status quo is maintained, ~$85k/mo. (if he's bullish and holds, probably double+ that)

They've provided no evidence they'll pay or even that they have ability to pay. Smells like a scam.

Received. https://blockchain.info/tx/acb1100ab7cb59478f34744183b73e591891e9ba62340d5b6cb10469777c9683

Incidentally, have been considering buying some with BTC. Locking clip would be desirable and would command a premium, but not a deal-breaker. I'd guess 4-pin molex would be easier to work with (I don't think I've ever actually seen one powered with SATA connection and have no preference).

Have never seen one using USB 3.0 cabling. Thought they always used IDE-like ribbon cable. That's pretty cool (ribbon cables are an unwieldy, ugly mess unless rig is in a bench with graphics cards suspended directly above).

ETA: BTW, have been wondering if it's possible to do a USB 3.0 -> PCI-e adapter for mining. I'd guess special mining software would be required to detect and interface, and may need special drivers. Would be extremely useful. Unsure if feasible.

Whoa. Wasn't expecting nearly as detailed an answer. Sounding like there's not much reason to bother with it (has run relatively fine for ~1yr), but worth the education. Tipped about the max I could as someone driving that.