It's Happening .... The secrets of 21 inc revealed, and its what we hoped for.

[BitUsher]

I wonder how many TH/s it takes to toast bread in 2 minutes   . The idea is good but there aren't enough everyday items we use just for the heat, I can't think of too many.

Yes, but all it takes is one or two products. Personally I think most of the products in the article are non starters including the toaster for ASIC's and the journalists were deliberately misled so they didn't leak the real products which could be competitive in the market.

I can think of a few products that have a chance of working: electric space heaters, coffee/tea warmers, and  hot water heaters are a few examples.

That, you do not know.

You have no idea what are the plans of 21 inc.
maybe they will set up their own pool where these new "miners" will mine.

Agreed. Many scenarios could play out with further competition into appliance creating multiple new pools competing with older pools. A 21 Inc pool, a Samsung pool, a GE mining pool , ect...

... or if our hand is forced we may have to reverse enineer one of their products and create our own crowdfunded ASIC appliances that communicate with p2p pools.

Well, why not hack their appliances (which will be our property since bought) and have them point to any pool that we want?

^^^ That.
What is stopping us from doing that?

Proper design can make chips very difficult to reverse engineer or hack. I am sure they are considering these implications.

[BitUsher]

Yes but is it worth the extra money and time to engineer such blocks when only maybe 2% of the people they give free coffee warmers to even care or know what they're doing?

Yes, because all it takes is a few individuals or one company that offers to buy the free coffee warmer for 10 dollars and to hack and than mine 100% themselves.

Example - It is well known that many console manufacturers subsidize or sell at cost the hardware in hope of recouping profits off the games. When playstation 3 was first released it came with OtherOS which allowed linux to be installed. Hobbyists were buying up consoles in order to get much cheaper hardware and make linux rigs with decent specs. Sony later removed OtherOS support to prevent this from happening and before a few of the hobbyists started a company reselling playstations as cheaper linux desktops.  

[GingerAle]

my favorite lines from that register article:

I've written more than a few business plans in my time and if I'd come up with this one I wouldn't be able to stop giggling long enough to present it. Nor, in fact, stop hugging myself for long enough to type it out. Obviously these people are made of sterner stuff.

Inquiring minds will be able to work out that of course this plan, by definition, loses money for consumers. So the big bet underneath it all is are the general public actually stupid enough to go for it? Here's a free toaster, some bitcoin, and please don't check your electricity meter?

Hmm, toughie really but I'd say probably yes. After all, as the phrase goes, no one has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the American public. By overestimating it, yes, but not under. ®

Re: decentralization, yes and no. ASIC chips will be out in the wild, so sure perhaps. But this doesn't increase full nodes or fix the centralized pooling problem.

And I don't think the idea is to use the waste heat for the appliances purpose. Its just to have an ASIC in there, along with whatever the appliances function is. So your TV? now its burning electricity constantly.

IMO, the waste heat option IS the way to go, and this concept has been presented before, with "data furnaces" etc as someone above probably pointed out.

What 21 Inc is doing, IMO, is just a brilliant scam.

[Alley]

Anybody that has the knowledge to hack this device has the knowledge to also know that even at 100% income there still losing money after electricity cost.  I don't see this as a issue.  I'm smart enough to know I'm going to buy a $20 toaster rather then a $10 asic toaster that raises my electric bill a few bucks a month.  These products are for people that will never look into how mining works.

[acquafredda]

my favorite lines from that register article:

I've written more than a few business plans in my time and if I'd come up with this one I wouldn't be able to stop giggling long enough to present it. Nor, in fact, stop hugging myself for long enough to type it out. Obviously these people are made of sterner stuff.

Inquiring minds will be able to work out that of course this plan, by definition, loses money for consumers. So the big bet underneath it all is are the general public actually stupid enough to go for it? Here's a free toaster, some bitcoin, and please don't check your electricity meter?

Hmm, toughie really but I'd say probably yes. After all, as the phrase goes, no one has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the American public. By overestimating it, yes, but not under. ®

Re: decentralization, yes and no. ASIC chips will be out in the wild, so sure perhaps. But this doesn't increase full nodes or fix the centralized pooling problem.

And I don't think the idea is to use the waste heat for the appliances purpose. Its just to have an ASIC in there, along with whatever the appliances function is. So your TV? now its burning electricity constantly.

IMO, the waste heat option IS the way to go, and this concept has been presented before, with "data furnaces" etc as someone above probably pointed out.

What 21 Inc is doing, IMO, is just a brilliant scam.

Yes, I also agree with you.
Sounds really bad to me.

[louise123]

my favorite lines from that register article:

I've written more than a few business plans in my time and if I'd come up with this one I wouldn't be able to stop giggling long enough to present it. Nor, in fact, stop hugging myself for long enough to type it out. Obviously these people are made of sterner stuff.

Inquiring minds will be able to work out that of course this plan, by definition, loses money for consumers. So the big bet underneath it all is are the general public actually stupid enough to go for it? Here's a free toaster, some bitcoin, and please don't check your electricity meter?

Hmm, toughie really but I'd say probably yes. After all, as the phrase goes, no one has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the American public. By overestimating it, yes, but not under. ®

Re: decentralization, yes and no. ASIC chips will be out in the wild, so sure perhaps. But this doesn't increase full nodes or fix the centralized pooling problem.

And I don't think the idea is to use the waste heat for the appliances purpose. Its just to have an ASIC in there, along with whatever the appliances function is. So your TV? now its burning electricity constantly.

IMO, the waste heat option IS the way to go, and this concept has been presented before, with "data furnaces" etc as someone above probably pointed out.

What 21 Inc is doing, IMO, is just a brilliant scam.

Yes, I also agree with you.
Sounds really bad to me.

I will agree with that also.
Besides, once the people get informed, I doubt they will go for it.

[louise123]

my favorite lines from that register article:

I've written more than a few business plans in my time and if I'd come up with this one I wouldn't be able to stop giggling long enough to present it. Nor, in fact, stop hugging myself for long enough to type it out. Obviously these people are made of sterner stuff.

Inquiring minds will be able to work out that of course this plan, by definition, loses money for consumers. So the big bet underneath it all is are the general public actually stupid enough to go for it? Here's a free toaster, some bitcoin, and please don't check your electricity meter?

Hmm, toughie really but I'd say probably yes. After all, as the phrase goes, no one has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the American public. By overestimating it, yes, but not under. ®

Re: decentralization, yes and no. ASIC chips will be out in the wild, so sure perhaps. But this doesn't increase full nodes or fix the centralized pooling problem.

And I don't think the idea is to use the waste heat for the appliances purpose. Its just to have an ASIC in there, along with whatever the appliances function is. So your TV? now its burning electricity constantly.

IMO, the waste heat option IS the way to go, and this concept has been presented before, with "data furnaces" etc as someone above probably pointed out.

What 21 Inc is doing, IMO, is just a brilliant scam.

Yes, I also agree with you.
Sounds really bad to me.

I will agree with that also.
Besides, once the people get informed, I doubt they will go for it.

I disagree if you're able to buy a TV with the same specs of another for 20 -30% cheaper because it's running an asic are you really going to care? Even though there might be a few dollar difference in electric use?

Yes, if I know about the extra charges, and let's not forget the potential dangers, then I wont.
I would rather pay that little extra and know that I can sleep more peaceful.

[gentlemand]

So The Register writes an article about an article from the Financial Times.

One of the opening lines from the FT is "All we do know is that the company, headed by Matthew Pauker, has raised more than $116m worth of venture funding"

There are no facts, no quotes from anyone from 21 or anyone who has a bleeding clue.

Their guesswork sounds like a pretty dumb idea. It's worth calling it a dumb idea if the people they're guessing about actually confirm it.

[Kaneki]

my favorite lines from that register article:

I've written more than a few business plans in my time and if I'd come up with this one I wouldn't be able to stop giggling long enough to present it. Nor, in fact, stop hugging myself for long enough to type it out. Obviously these people are made of sterner stuff.

Inquiring minds will be able to work out that of course this plan, by definition, loses money for consumers. So the big bet underneath it all is are the general public actually stupid enough to go for it? Here's a free toaster, some bitcoin, and please don't check your electricity meter?

Hmm, toughie really but I'd say probably yes. After all, as the phrase goes, no one has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the American public. By overestimating it, yes, but not under. ®

Re: decentralization, yes and no. ASIC chips will be out in the wild, so sure perhaps. But this doesn't increase full nodes or fix the centralized pooling problem.

And I don't think the idea is to use the waste heat for the appliances purpose. Its just to have an ASIC in there, along with whatever the appliances function is. So your TV? now its burning electricity constantly.

IMO, the waste heat option IS the way to go, and this concept has been presented before, with "data furnaces" etc as someone above probably pointed out.

What 21 Inc is doing, IMO, is just a brilliant scam.

Yes, I also agree with you.
Sounds really bad to me.

I will agree with that also.
Besides, once the people get informed, I doubt they will go for it.

I disagree if you're able to buy a TV with the same specs of another for 20 -30% cheaper because it's running an asic are you really going to care? Even though there might be a few dollar difference in electric use?

Yes, if I know about the extra charges, and let's not forget the potential dangers, then I wont.
I would rather pay that little extra and know that I can sleep more peaceful.

if this stupid idea to materialize, it has the potential to worsen the reputation of Bitcoin in people's

[futureofbitcoin]

i see too many assumptions in this thread. Or maybe you guys know something I don't.


1. Are the applicances going to make use of the heat generated by the ASIC, or, are they just bundling an ASIC with a random appliance?

2. Can you turn it off whenever you want?

It seems that people automatically assume that you can't turn it off or something. Which, in a sense is obviously not true since you can just unplug it. But assuming it's something that shouldn't be unplugged often like, I dunno, lights or something, you guys are assuming that it'll run forever costing you electricity.

If you can just turn it off whenever you want, then it's not really costing you electricity, since you would've spent that electricity anyway. Unless, of course, the ASIC uses additional electricity than what the appliance otherwise would use.

Anyway, too many assumptions, too many unknowns.

[louise123]

i see too many assumptions in this thread. Or maybe you guys know something I don't.


1. Are the applicances going to make use of the heat generated by the ASIC, or, are they just bundling an ASIC with a random appliance?

2. Can you turn it off whenever you want?

It seems that people automatically assume that you can't turn it off or something. Which, in a sense is obviously not true since you can just unplug it. But assuming it's something that shouldn't be unplugged often like, I dunno, lights or something, you guys are assuming that it'll run forever costing you electricity.

If you can just turn it off whenever you want, then it's not really costing you electricity, since you would've spent that electricity anyway. Unless, of course, the ASIC uses additional electricity than what the appliance otherwise would use.

Anyway, too many assumptions, too many unknowns.

Well, I suppose you can say that we are speculating based on what we know so far.
Then again, only time will tell what this thing truly is.

[johnyj]

How do they marketing this toaster ?  I have never used any toaster since 10 years ago 

There is a great potential in heating devices at least 2000W or more, but that will raise the difficulty in winter and drop it in summer 

[TheRealSteve]

There is a great potential in heating devices at least 2000W or more, but that will raise the difficulty in winter and drop it in summer  

I think you'll find there's miners in South America, Africa, Australia and New Zealand, too  Not sure about Antarctica.  Could be a nice PR stunt for Bitmain though

[ebliever]

Hard to see how this idea will work for them. It really only makes sense for devices that we _want_ to produce heat (toasters, water heaters, space heaters, hair dryers, etc.) Getting a cheap TV that spews out excess heat during the summer months, driving up AC costs, would be silly.

Now for heat producing appliances, how many are used a high percentage of the time? In my household of six I doubt we average even 3 minutes/day using the toaster since we don't use it that often. Hard to believe that any ASICs packed into it will ever ROI if they are barely ever on (and network difficulty keeps going up).

So that leaves things like space heaters and water heaters. I guess I could conceivably see those making sense, if they can convince the consumer to go through the hassle of setting up the wireless connections or whatever that will be required to run them. I suspect when real world trials start they are going to be _very_ disappointed by the hashrate they get from their big giveaways.

It was a fascinating idea though....

[SpanishSoldier]

It was a fascinating idea though....

....and the idea has got sold to raise anough money for them. The question is... will we see an execution or see the same fate as of ethereum ? If they come to public to raise more money without the product then I'd doubt their intention.

[NattyLiteCoin]

I don't know why everyone's hung up heating shit is even in the discussion. I doubt the intent is to integrate a 2Th/s miner in a fuckin' toaster, moreso a collection of 20GH/s devices in multiple appliances in households across the world. Imagine living in a world where literally every one of your neighbors and friends is contributing to the security of the BTC network and not even thinking about it.

I'm for this.  I really hope this happens.

[R2D221]

There is a great potential in heating devices at least 2000W or more, but that will raise the difficulty in winter and drop it in summer  

I think you'll find there's miners in South America, Africa, Australia and New Zealand, too  Not sure about Antarctica.  Could be a nice PR stunt for Bitmain though

I don't think Antarctica has cheap electricity, though.

[futureofbitcoin]

What about getting that free TV, or whatever, then rip out the ASIC?


If they gave out free laptops, I'd totally get one.

[gentlemand]

Is there any proof that any of this is true? I can't find a shred of it.

[TheRealSteve]

Is there any proof that any of this is true? I can't find a shred of it.

Nope.

Then again, this is all still based on an FT blog entry and not hard data.  I'll wait for the Chinese interview to get published.

It was actually discussed before - but I guess this thread gained better traction   Gotta use clickbaity titles.. "You Won't Believe What 21 Inc. Are Planning For Bitcoin!"