Why ASIC's Should Not Be The Future Of Crypto Currencies

[FLHippy]

I aim to be a socialist but living in a capitalist world requires me to make money to survive.

Can you explain what this means? I've tried to figure it out but every possible interpretation I can think of is either incoherent or malicious.

I agree it is incoherent and malicious.

It's disheartening to want to be something you can never be and to have to do things that are against your ideals.

I've got this addiction to life and it makes me do terrible things.

[1713512176]

1713512176

[1713512176]

1713512176

[1713512176]

1713512176

[kjj]

To be clear, I'm not anti-asic. I'm not anti-greed. I'm not anti-elitism. I aim to be a socialist but living in a capitalist world requires me to make money to survive. Money, greed and elitism are a fact of life in a capitalist society. Sometimes pointing out the obvious makes it appear as if you're complaining.

That puts you in rare company here.  Most of us regard "greed" as a good thing, the force that drives progress.

The OP and many others  claim that bitcoin takes the power away from the elite. There was a time when this was true but it is becoming less true. The introduction of ASIC eliminates quite a lot of people from the mining scene creating an elite class of miners. The BitCoin Foundation is another example of elitism.

ASICs were inevitable.  You might as well complain that the sun sets in the evening.

The few people (Atlas) attempting to have a discussion about this and other issues (or non issues) are marginalized and ridiculed. Again, I'm not anti-bitcoin foundation either.

The only thing I am certainly going on-and-on about is the shut-the-fuck-up-DIAF, attitudes of people who have a dissenting opinion. Bitcoin is most often advertised in a way that suggests elitism is reduced by the ability for any schmuck to be able to be a player. It shouldn't shock anyone that it has attracted people who would be offended by marginalizing or outright elimination of those schmucks.

Atlas is a special case.  He really does need to STFU/DIAF.  Or at least have his psychiatrist adjust his meds.

As to other dissenting opinions, I haven't seen any real hostility.  Sadly, most of the dissenting opinions start with premises that are not widely considered to be true here, and the arguments raised by the dissenters rarely rise above the level of repeating their assumptions.

For example, your opening paragraph makes it pretty clear that you feel that "money, greed and elitism" are bad things.  Most of us disagree, and no matter how self-evident their badness may be to you, if you just assert your position over and over again, we'll get annoyed.  (See Atlas...)

In the end, bitcoin seems doomed to be something more like fiat when viewing it from an end user perspective. Some elite group of people controlling it, manipulating it, and deciding who gets to be a player with the only real advantage being that you can buy drugs online and gamble online with it. That, of course, is a completely different discussion. Would bitcoin survive elimination of these spending avenues?

Money is not wealth.  I bolded it because it is a superbly important concept, and one that most people fail to understand.  Money is a means to facilitate trades of wealth across time and space.  If you were hoping that bitcoin was going to steal the wealth of those that produced it and give it to those that did not, then yeah, bitcoin will be a "failure" in those terms, just as fiat has been.

[bobitza]

To be clear, I'm not anti-asic. I'm not anti-greed. I'm not anti-elitism. I aim to be a socialist but living in a capitalist world requires me to make money to survive. Money, greed and elitism are a fact of life in a capitalist society. Sometimes pointing out the obvious makes it appear as if you're complaining.

...

The OP and many others  claim that bitcoin takes the power away from the elite. There was a time when this was true but it is becoming less true. The introduction of ASIC eliminates quite a lot of people from the mining scene creating an elite class of miners. The BitCoin Foundation is another example of elitism. The few people (Atlas) attempting to have a discussion about this and other issues (or non issues) are marginalized and ridiculed. Again, I'm not anti-bitcoin foundation either.

#1 Same here bro, I hear ya!

#2 It's not the ASIC to be blamed, is the greed part of the human nature, which some may argue is good and some may argue is bad. In the Bitcoin case, the greed does have a "good part" no matter on which side you're arguinmg, the part that brings more efficiency and better technology to the table. However greed's inherent "bad part" is always damaging to the society as a whole if you have liberal views.

[SgtSpike]

Good post kjj.

[whenhowwho]

I find all these threads about ASIC bringing about the downfall of bitcoin and/or crushing profit potential hilarious. Back when you could only mine with CPU everyone would freak out if someone had a gazillion cpus hashing away. Then along comes the ability to hash with gpu and everyone would cry OMG all the time and effort i spent setting up my awesome cpu mining farm have been for nothing. Now here comes the asic and everyone is doing the same thing that has been done everytime a new tech become available. If you want to mine with an asic go buy one. They really arent that expensive when you consider how much it costs to start a rig from scratch using gpus. Will the rich kids have an advantage? Of course dont they always? Does that mean you cannot even the field a bit? Of course you can. Im willing to bet that when tech changes again there will be a ton of threads once again complaining about everyones asics not being up to snuff because i can use this new and improved widget to hash at 4000Th/s or something. It is all a race to get to the end of the block reward. Enjoy the journey

[markm]

And yet so many bitcoiners try to discourage newbies from applying their CPUs and GPUs to altcoins that such hardware can still manage to mine some of so they can get involved in the cryptocurrencies scene from that small-change angle to get a taste for mining and see if they think they might want to move up to the big leagues by buying an ASIC (only $150 fergoshsakes), setting up p2pool and merged-mining all the coin types they can...

-MarkM-

[justusranvier]

It's disheartening to want to be something you can never be and to have to do things that are against your ideals.

I've got this addiction to life and it makes me do terrible things.

I'm trying to figure out what your ideals are because what you originally said reads like "I want other people to give me stuff for free but unfortunately they won't unless I trade them something of equal value".

[mrb]

ASIC's are not a natural technological generation leap like going from CPU to GPU was. ASIC's are simply specialized processing units made specifically for Bitcoin. Which i do not beleive is following the original intentions of Satoshi, for many reasons.

Satoshi was an intelligent man. He was well aware of the possibility of a hardware mining development arms race. Also one can make the following observation:

There was only 1 GPU chip manufacturer who dominated mining farms: AMD.
Today there are 2 FPGA chip manufacturers who are at the basis of all FPGA farms: Altera (in the BFL Single), and Xilinx (Spartan6-LX150 in all others).
And soon there will be 3 vendors of ASIC mining chips: BFL, Tom's, and nghzang's companies.
So we are actually becoming more decentralized over time.

IMHO the number of owners of the IP (intellectual property) of the technologies at the core of Bitcoin mining is a better indicator of how resilient (which is what you mean by decentralized I think) Bitcoin mining can be, assuming hypothetical scenarios where hostile parties would try to take control of, or negatively affect, this technology. It is not the number of resellers or distributors that matters (like you point out there are many AMD graphics cards resellers).

[Syke]

Mining will become a specialty business at that point. Miners will be drawn from either existing users that are continuing their mining hobby or incredibly insightful entrepreneurial types willing to gamble on the possible payoff of a costly devise that will have very limited value after Bitcoin.

Quite true. There's a lot of overhead to running a mining operation. Uptime, installing new releases, always on Internet connection, etc. Mining isn't for everyone. You don't see everyone who owns gold also running a gold mining operation. Bitcoin users don't need to mine.

How will this effect Bitcoin? I don’t know but I can speculate that the outcome might be negative.

It will strength the security of the network. Professional miners will be more diligent in keeping their systems up-to-date and running optimally. That is what keeps the network healthy. Not amateur miners.

[FLHippy]

It's disheartening to want to be something you can never be and to have to do things that are against your ideals.

I've got this addiction to life and it makes me do terrible things.

I'm trying to figure out what your ideals are because what you originally said reads like "I want other people to give me stuff for free but unfortunately they won't unless I trade them something of equal value".

I'm not sure how you read that into anything I typed.

And, without being dismissive, I think that this thread isn't really the place to discuss the perfect world according to FLHippy. If you are truly interested in reading about a fantasy society I'll post it in off-topic.

[bobitza]

Also one can make the following observation:

There was only 1 GPU chip manufacturer who dominated mining farms: AMD.
Today there are 2 FPGA chip manufacturers who are at the basis of all FPGA farms: Altera (in the BFL Single), and Xilinx (Spartan6-LX150 in all others).
And soon there will be 3 vendors of ASIC mining chips: BFL, Tom's, and nghzang's companies.
So we are actually becoming more decentralized over time.

Nicely put mrb.

Also, what do you guys think it helps becoming more and more decentralized?

A. Buy a small $150 device that you can just "plug and play" via its one and only USB cable

B. Buy video cards that you need to put inside your computer, check if you have free slots, upgrade MB if not, create racks as wooden scaffolds, have a lot of noise and heat, etc.

[whenhowwho]

I find all these threads about ASIC bringing about the downfall of bitcoin and/or crushing profit potential hilarious. Back when you could only mine with CPU everyone would freak out if someone had a gazillion cpus hashing away. Then along comes the ability to hash with gpu and everyone would cry OMG all the time and effort i spent setting up my awesome cpu mining farm have been for nothing. Now here comes the asic and everyone is doing the same thing that has been done everytime a new tech become available. If you want to mine with an asic go buy one. They really arent that expensive when you consider how much it costs to start a rig from scratch using gpus. Will the rich kids have an advantage? Of course dont they always? Does that mean you cannot even the field a bit? Of course you can. Im willing to bet that when tech changes again there will be a ton of threads once again complaining about everyones asics not being up to snuff because i can use this new and improved widget to hash at 4000Th/s or something. It is all a race to get to the end of the block reward. Enjoy the journey

I think you’re missing the point. Have you ever seen this thread? https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=21112.0 It’s in the Newbie’s section.

It’s made up of new users to Bitcoin that are showing what they are hashing at using equipment they already have or they wouldn’t be posting there.

These people already had CPUs and GPUs when they showed up here. How many will have an application-specific integrated circuit devise customized for Bitcoin when they first arrive here? No one! Newbie’s will never come to this forum again asking for help setting up mining software because a friend told them how they were mining for Bitcoins using their computer and earning money from their computers down-time.

Mining will become a specialty business at that point. Miners will be drawn from either existing users that are continuing their mining hobby or incredibly insightful entrepreneurial types willing to gamble on the possible payoff of a costly devise that will have very limited value after Bitcoin. How will this effect Bitcoin? I don’t know but I can speculate that the outcome might be negative.

Of course newbies use what they have. Doesn't everyone? I mean it isnt really possible to use that which you do not possess. New people will always start hashing. Last year when the best gpu for hashing was a 6990 people didnt stop mining because they got all sold out. They continued with whatever they had or whatever they could get their hands on. Many new people try it with what they have and whenever they purchase something with their bitcoins or convert them to fiat they either decide to continue with what they have or they upgrade. That is another thing that will always remain true.

 Im pretty sure you completely missed my  point so i will restate it. Everytime the technology changes people complain and squeal doom and gloom. Yet the reality is people still mine with cpu's even though gpu's are so much better. People still mine with gpus even though fpga's are better or at least more efficient. Asics will come along whenever they finally start shipping and people will still mine with cpu's gpu's and fpga's. The difficulty will go up the network hash rate will go up but it wont matter people will still mine. Almost anyone can afford an ASIC of one type or another as they are not expensive and they are actually much much cheaper than building a gpu rig especially if you want to build one with comparable hash rates.

As for your statement mining will be a specialty business. It already is. Otherwise everyone would be doing it already. There will always be hobby miners and there will always be more profit minded miners. This will be true no matter what the difficulty rises to or how many times the block reward halves.   

[Ja¥1337]

Thank you everyone for adding your opinion!

*bump*  

[SgtSpike]

http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/sq7cy/iama_a_malware_coder_and_botnet_operator_ama/
Without ASIC's, this botnet operator earns $67.58/day.
With ASIC's, this botnet operator would earn around $5.00/day.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/zk24s/i_earn_over_500_bitcoinmonth_by_mining_on_a/
Without ASIC's, this botnet operator earns $129.50/day
With ASIC's, this botnet operator would earn around $10/day.

Etc, etc, etc.

Enough said.

[Ja¥1337]

Don't see why botnet operators have anything to do with this??

Even with ASIC, botnets will still exist. 

If they want to make the same amount of money as they were before ASIC's, they will just have to add more nodes to their botnet. 

So that doesn't change anything for anyone really..

[SgtSpike]

Don't see why botnet operators have anything to do with this??

Even with ASIC, botnets will still exist. 

If they want to make the same amount of money as they were before ASIC's, they will just have to add more nodes to their botnet. 

So that doesn't change anything for anyone really..

It changes quite a lot.

Botnets cost a certain amount, and are valued at a certain amount.

If a $500/monthly botnet rental brings in $2,027.40/month of bitcoins, then it is a worthwhile investment.
If the same botnet (after ASICs are released) bring in $150/month of bitcoins, then it's a waste of the botnet renter's time.

Likewise, if a botnet owner can mine $2,027.40/month of bitcoins, but only rent it out at $500/month, then it makes sense to mine on that botnet instead of renting it out.  But if ASICs are released, and the same botnet would only bring in $150/month worth of Bitcoins, then it makes sense to rent it out instead of mine bitcoins with it.

Most botnets are already at their max size.  In other words, they can't just "add more nodes" to their botnet - the nodes are being added at precisely the rate that people's computers are infected.  An operator couldn't just increase the infection rate - if they could, they would have already done so.  For some reason, you seem to think it is as easy as the click of a button and doesn't cost anything.

[BitSyncom]

What gives you the impression ASIC will not be mass produced?

In addition, Avalon will be the only company so far to have an option to purchase ASIC chips directly from us if you wish to design your own PCB and controller. the details will be revealed in a later time.

(disclaimer: The following message express the opinion of Yifu G. and Yifu alone. It does not reflect Avalon ASIC in any way or form.)
I personally got into the ASIC game in the first place for network contingency. Business and profits aside, I realized the community was practically beat in the head and robbed blind by the existing competition after I gotten our ASIC simulation results.

before Avalon announced our unit, the market looked like this,  ~$1000 for 27Gh/s and ~$1300 for 40Gh/s
Avalon announcs their unit $1300 for 60Gh/s.
after Avalon announced their unit, the market looked like this within a week, ~$1000 for 54Gh/s(+200%) and ~$1300 for 60Gh/s(+150%)

It really makes me wonder what our competitors' profit margin was before, and what would have happened if Avalon decided against the ASIC project.

[Carlton Banks]

In addition, Avalon will be the only company so far to have an option to purchase ASIC chips directly from us if you wish to design your own PCB and controller. the details will be revealed in a later time.

Although I support you guys (most of the time, lol), I believe that Tom cablepair did say that he was considering licensing his company's ASIC chip out to a 3rd party manufacturer, although there has been no confirmation of who the 3rd party could be, or any additional information. But the intention was announced, and it hasn't been retracted.

[Syke]

before Avalon announced our unit, the market looked like this,  ~$1000 for 27Gh/s and ~$1300 for 40Gh/s
Avalon announcs their unit $1300 for 60Gh/s.
after Avalon announced their unit, the market looked like this within a week, ~$1000 for 54Gh/s(+200%) and ~$1300 for 60Gh/s(+150%)

Competition is a wonderful thing. Thank you for bringing it.

[Inaba]

What gives you the impression ASIC will not be mass produced?

In addition, Avalon will be the only company so far to have an option to purchase ASIC chips directly from us if you wish to design your own PCB and controller. the details will be revealed in a later time.

(disclaimer: The following message express the opinion of Yifu G. and Yifu alone. It does not reflect Avalon ASIC in any way or form.)
I personally got into the ASIC game in the first place for network contingency. Business and profits aside, I realized the community was practically beat in the head and robbed blind by the existing competition after I gotten our ASIC simulation results.

before Avalon announced our unit, the market looked like this,  ~$1000 for 27Gh/s and ~$1300 for 40Gh/s
Avalon announcs their unit $1300 for 60Gh/s.
after Avalon announced their unit, the market looked like this within a week, ~$1000 for 54Gh/s(+200%) and ~$1300 for 60Gh/s(+150%)

It really makes me wonder what our competitors' profit margin was before, and what would have happened if Avalon decided against the ASIC project.

Revise history!  GO!

You offered a "pre-order" of $1300 with a "regular" price of $1900!  There was no magnanimity there; if you could have stuck to your original $1900 price point, I have absolutely no doubt you would have.  It was Cablepair and BFL that forced you to stick to your "preorder" price just to compete.

To be perfectly honest, the Avalon pricing played basically no part in our pricing structure and I'm pretty confident that it played very little if any part in Tom's either.  We responded to Tom's offering, as Avalon is frankly not really competitive due to power consumption issues.