HashFast announces specs for new ASIC: 400GH/s

[Bitcoinorama]

The problem with making less chips is that nobody will quite believe that they are not going to make more in the future, so they will be nervous at spending 1000 per chip when they might end up competing with people who paid a third of that in a couple of short months... (AM schooled a lot of people with that methinks)

The problem with making more chips is total market saturation and the whole bitcoin world pissed off at you, because it's practically holding a gun to your head and saying "Buy our chip or give up mining" because it's gonna turn everything else into doorstops in short order.

At Hashfast we know that the best thing for bitcoin is a healthy, strong mining ecosystem. We are working on a pricing and release strategy to make sure miners make money (including the smaller guys), and the ecosystem remains vibrant. Without this bitcoin is damaged, and value is lost for everyone. By releasing capacity at a limited rate and reasonable price we help defend the network against the large, centralized secret mines that are surely coming. This is the best result for everyone.

+1. That's def what we all want to hear.

On a side, Simon can you please put that Twitter account thing to bed, and explain what that was all about? Esp after the Gridfinty hiccup.

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The problem with making less chips is that nobody will quite believe that they are not going to make more in the future, so they will be nervous at spending 1000 per chip when they might end up competing with people who paid a third of that in a couple of short months... (AM schooled a lot of people with that methinks)

The problem with making more chips is total market saturation and the whole bitcoin world pissed off at you, because it's practically holding a gun to your head and saying "Buy our chip or give up mining" because it's gonna turn everything else into doorstops in short order.

At Hashfast we know that the best thing for bitcoin is a healthy, strong mining ecosystem. We are working on a pricing and release strategy to make sure miners make money (including the smaller guys), and the ecosystem remains vibrant. Without this bitcoin is damaged, and value is lost for everyone. By releasing capacity at a limited rate and reasonable price we help defend the network against the large, centralized secret mines that are surely coming. This is the best result for everyone.

How do you defend against "large, centralized secret mines"?  By matching & surpassing their hashrate every step of the way?  Or are you willing to hurt your investors by letting your mining gear lose value by letting it idle?

[Flashman]

At Hashfast we know that the best thing for bitcoin is a healthy, strong mining ecosystem. We are working on a pricing and release strategy to make sure miners make money (including the smaller guys), and the ecosystem remains vibrant. Without this bitcoin is damaged, and value is lost for everyone. By releasing capacity at a limited rate and reasonable price we help defend the network against the large, centralized secret mines that are surely coming. This is the best result for everyone.

Good to hear, thanks.

[Flashman]

 Or are you willing to hurt your investors by letting your mining gear lose value by letting it idle?

Sounds like they are committing to the "middle way" as it were, if they sell too much too soon it becomes quickly worthless. It's like putting a swimming pool in your backyard and trying to sell a "share" to everyone in town, by the time you sold a few hundred and people noticed a queue round the block on hot days, the remaining shares would be worthless. If you based your business model on 2x profit on 50,000 shares, you've lost money. If however you had charged more for the shares, $10 vs a dime and sold a few hundred, you'd get your money and occupancy ratio of the pool might be reasonable enough that the shares actually retain value. It's a poor analogy, but not many actually work for the bitcoin situation.

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Or are you willing to hurt your investors by letting your mining gear lose value by letting it idle?

Sounds like they are committing to the "middle way" as it were, if they sell too much too soon it becomes quickly worthless. It's like putting a swimming pool in your backyard and trying to sell a "share" to everyone in town, by the time you sold a few hundred and people noticed a queue round the block on hot days, the remaining shares would be worthless.

There's a factor you're ignoring -- a variant of Prisoner's Dilemma.  They are not the sole manufacturer of hashpower, there are others willing to dump chips on the market, or hash with those chips (the evil "secret mines").  There's no practical way to reconcile:
1.  Protecting the network (requires dumping as much hashpower as needed to make "secret mines" irrelevant --> Miners (their customers) baw).
2.  Protecting your customers (not hashing/flooding market with hashpower --> competitors steal profits, network not protected from evil "secret mines").
3.  Maximizing profitability (haspower is hashpower, there's no reason for customers to buy brandX if brandY offers the same (Gh/s)/jule, competitors will ramp up the arms race to the (profit-->0) point).

If you based your business model on 2x profit on 50,000 shares, you've lost money. If however you had charged more for the shares, $10 vs a dime and sold a few hundred, you'd get your money and occupancy ratio of the pool might be reasonable enough that the shares actually retain value. It's a poor analogy, but not many actually work for the bitcoin situation.

Your example falls apart as soon as there's another player offering *the same shares* (hashpower).  After the R&D & tooling up's done, the rest is gravy -- sell as many as you can to maximise profit, even wen per unit profit plummets.  If this is not self evident, i could single-step you through my reasoning.

Edit:  Don't start with the premise that ASIC manufacturers are doing what they do for the good of bitcoin, assume for a second that they're in it to make money.  With that axiomatic, anything that happens to the bitcoin ecosystem is secondary.  Any "mission statements" are, therefore nothing but wind.

[Bitcoinorama]

Or are you willing to hurt your investors by letting your mining gear lose value by letting it idle?

Sounds like they are committing to the "middle way" as it were, if they sell too much too soon it becomes quickly worthless. It's like putting a swimming pool in your backyard and trying to sell a "share" to everyone in town, by the time you sold a few hundred and people noticed a queue round the block on hot days, the remaining shares would be worthless. If you based your business model on 2x profit on 50,000 shares, you've lost money. If however you had charged more for the shares, $10 vs a dime and sold a few hundred, you'd get your money and occupancy ratio of the pool might be reasonable enough that the shares actually retain value. It's a poor analogy, but not many actually work for the bitcoin situation.

It's basically what KnC agreed to do the other week as well. Although this all depends on who else appears from the sidelines. I'm sure Hashfast won't be the only new entrants, but they are selling to the public and being open about their intentions. The worry as Yifu stipulated at Bitcoin 2013 in April are the unknown private entities we won't know about until they switch themselves online, and with respect to R&D and fabrication Yifu stated if they started around Feb, you'd be looking at this Autumn before you know of their existence. So in a way it's good that we are concerned and focusing in getting as much of the hardware distributed in and amongst as many individual miners as poss, as GPU mining was, as soon as we can, despite the effect on profit, but that was never going to be as lucrative as the old mining calcs suggested, it was always a case of meeting points of saturation where upon electricity costs became a factor. The next and most important step, and most lucrative will be concentrating on getting Bitcoin to gain mainstream public acceptance as electronic cash and undermine Visa, MasterCard and Paypal, who will have to respond competitively by concentrating on secure protects payments and customer service as their compelling offers, something Paypal and Banks are often awful at if you have ever had to call and be given their scripted fluff instead of reaching a mutually agreeable solution. By focusing on this and gaining acceptance and media attention beyond curiosity the BtC value will undoubtedly increase, meaning greater profits for mined coins and freedom from usarious banking charges.

[trigeek]

There's a factor you're ignoring -- a variant of Prisoner's Dilemma.  They are not the sole manufacturer of hashpower, there are others willing to dump chips on the market, or hash with those chips (the evil "secret mines").  There's no practical way to reconcile:
1.  Protecting the network (requires dumping as much hashpower as needed to make "secret mines" irrelevant --> Miners (their customers) baw).
2.  Protecting your customers (not hashing/flooding market with hashpower --> competitors steal profits, network not protected from evil "secret mines").
3.  Maximizing profitability (haspower is hashpower, there's no reason for customers to buy brandX if brandY offers the same (Gh/s)/jule, competitors will ramp up the arms race to the (profit-->0) point).

You say there's no way to reconcile those three things, but there most certainly is.  If there is a price per gh that they can sell their devices for that will cause them to profit and satisfy all those three requirements, then the business has a future.  #1 and #2 are not either/or, there is a divide between fully flooding the market and artificial scarcity.  And as for #3, it all comes down to their costs. After covering R&D, I really don't think it's $10/gh or even $1/gh, if they really have a single die that can do 400gh/s. There's a lot of meat on that bone.

Edit:  Don't start with the premise that ASIC manufacturers are doing what they do for the good of bitcoin, assume for a second that they're in it to make money.  With that axiomatic, anything that happens to the bitcoin ecosystem is secondary.  Any "mission statements" are, therefore nothing but wind.

Why would they not do things for "the good of bitcoin"? It's in their best interest to keep the golden goose as healthy and happy for as long as possible.  Clearly these are businesses who are doing things to make a profit, but if you want a sustainable model you have to keep the market you are selling to healthy.

[Flashman]

There's a factor you're ignoring -- a variant of Prisoner's Dilemma.  

I see what you're getting at, but the prisoners dilemma is all or nothing... they have the advantage of playing this incrementally and seeing results of other "prisoners" decisions on the the network.

So while it may have the same inevitable result, it can be slowed down a lot, and if it's paced as slow as possible, then there's a chance that bitcoin adoption may expand such that there's actual profit in mining (and transaction processing for the network) at difficulties in the multiple billions. A non paced release of hashpower would be like suddenly giving every unemployed person a McDonalds franchise.

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There's a factor you're ignoring -- a variant of Prisoner's Dilemma.  They are not the sole manufacturer of hashpower, there are others willing to dump chips on the market, or hash with those chips (the evil "secret mines").  There's no practical way to reconcile:
1.  Protecting the network (requires dumping as much hashpower as needed to make "secret mines" irrelevant --> Miners (their customers) baw).
2.  Protecting your customers (not hashing/flooding market with hashpower --> competitors steal profits, network not protected from evil "secret mines").
3.  Maximizing profitability (haspower is hashpower, there's no reason for customers to buy brandX if brandY offers the same (Gh/s)/jule, competitors will ramp up the arms race to the (profit-->0) point).

You say there's no way to reconcile those three things, but there most certainly is.  If there is a price per gh that they can sell their devices for that will cause them to profit and satisfy all those three requirements, then the business has a future. 

Stop.  You're wrong in several ways already.  First is trivial to explain:  
A company owes more to its shareholders than *a* profit.  It *must maximise* the profit.  At least them's the laws IRL.  If you're satisfied when your investment makes a satoshi after a year, you're in the minority.

Second, you're not justified in assuming that selling X chips @$Y ( "all the chips" -- a nonsensical number considering how chips are made) will be possible if other players flood the market with cheaper chips / raise the difficulty level to a point making your chips *unprofitable at any price*.  Please consider *all* the variables.

#1 and #2 are not either/or, there is a divide between fully flooding the market and artificial scarcity.

If by "artificial" you mean "not selling all the chips capable of being produced at a profit," then yes they are.  If you mean something else, what???

And as for #3, it all comes down to their costs. After covering R&D, I really don't think it's $10/gh or even $1/gh, if they really have a single die that can do 400gh/s. There's a lot of meat on that bone.

My point exactly, meat that has a very short shelf life -- sell it cheap, sell it fast, or pay to have it hauled away & deal with the stench & maggots.
 

Edit:  Don't start with the premise that ASIC manufacturers are doing what they do for the good of bitcoin, assume for a second that they're in it to make money.  With that axiomatic, anything that happens to the bitcoin ecosystem is secondary.  Any "mission statements" are, therefore nothing but wind.

Why would they not do things for "the good of bitcoin"? It's in their best interest to keep the golden goose as healthy and happy for as long as possible.  Clearly these are businesses who are doing things to make a profit, but if you want a sustainable model you have to keep the market you are selling to healthy.

If it is in their best interest to keep the goose alive, they're not guided by goose's welfare, but by profitability.  What's the difference?  The difference is when the bottom line dictates it is more profitable to kill the goose, take off your hat.  
 

[ProfMac]

Stop.  You're wrong in several ways already.  First is trivial to explain:  
A company owes more to its shareholders than *a* profit.  It *must maximise* the profit.  At least them's the laws IRL.  If you're satisfied when your investment makes a satoshi after a year, you're in the minority.

Can you point to such a law?

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There's a factor you're ignoring -- a variant of Prisoner's Dilemma.  

I see what you're getting at, but the prisoners dilemma is all or nothing... they have the advantage of playing this incrementally and seeing results of other "prisoners" decisions on the the network.

If it is more intuitive for you, picture it as a series of Prisoner's Dilemmas, as finely granular as you wish -- the result is the same.

So while it may have the same inevitable result, it can be slowed down a lot, and if it's paced as slow as possible, then there's a chance that bitcoin adoption may expand such that there's actual profit in mining (and transaction processing for the network) at difficulties in the multiple billions. A non paced release of hashpower would be like suddenly giving every unemployed person a McDonalds franchise.

You're preaching to the quire if you're trying to convince me -- i get it.  Nobody wants an arms race, but everyone wants profit.  That's why i brought up Prisoner's Dilemma -- no one wants to go to prison either, and yet...

[Flashman]

Can you point to such a law?

Look up Dodge Brothers Vs Ford for that one.

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Stop.  You're wrong in several ways already.  First is trivial to explain:  
A company owes more to its shareholders than *a* profit.  It *must maximise* the profit.  At least them's the laws IRL.  If you're satisfied when your investment makes a satoshi after a year, you're in the minority.

Can you point to such a law?

Are you saying that there is no such law?  How specific would you like the wording of the law to be?

Edit:  Thanks, Flashman.

[Flashman]

If it is more intuitive for you, picture it as a series of Prisoner's Dilemmas, as finely granular as you wish -- the result is the same.

It's the same and not the same, if the prisoners dilemma as sometimes described was for a capital crime, then there would be benefit in using any and all available delaying tactics to stay alive as long as possible, even if you had 2 chances out of three of getting hung in the end.

There's a benefit here to holding up difficulty rise as long as possible, it's as if there's a campaign to repeal capital punishment going on while you're "stalling".

[ProfMac]

Stop.  You're wrong in several ways already.  First is trivial to explain:  
A company owes more to its shareholders than *a* profit.  It *must maximise* the profit.  At least them's the laws IRL.  If you're satisfied when your investment makes a satoshi after a year, you're in the minority.

Can you point to such a law?

Are you saying that there is no such law?  How specific would you like the wording of the law to be?

Edit:  Thanks, Flashman.

I read at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodge_v._Ford_Motor_Company the following language:

Code:

"Among non-experts, conventional wisdom holds that corporate law requires boards of directors to maximize shareholder wealth. This common but mistaken belief is almost invariably supported by reference to the Michigan Supreme Court's 1919 opinion in Dodge v. Ford Motor Co."[1]

"Dodge is often misread or mistaught as setting a legal rule of shareholder wealth maximization. This was not and is not the law. Shareholder wealth maximization is a standard of conduct for officers and directors, not a legal mandate. The business judgment rule [which was also upheld in this decision] protects many decisions that deviate from this standard. This is one reading of Dodge. If this is all the case is about, however, it isn’t that interesting."[2]

[Bitcoinorama]

Stop.  You're wrong in several ways already.  First is trivial to explain:  
A company owes more to its shareholders than *a* profit.  It *must maximise* the profit.  At least them's the laws IRL.  If you're satisfied when your investment makes a satoshi after a year, you're in the minority.

Can you point to such a law?

Are you saying that there is no such law?  How specific would you like the wording of the law to be?

Edit:  Thanks, Flashman.

I read at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodge_v._Ford_Motor_Company the following language:

Code:

"Among non-experts, conventional wisdom holds that corporate law requires boards of directors to maximize shareholder wealth. This common but mistaken belief is almost invariably supported by reference to the Michigan Supreme Court's 1919 opinion in Dodge v. Ford Motor Co."[1]

"Dodge is often misread or mistaught as setting a legal rule of shareholder wealth maximization. This was not and is not the law. Shareholder wealth maximization is a standard of conduct for officers and directors, not a legal mandate. The business judgment rule [which was also upheld in this decision] protects many decisions that deviate from this standard. This is one reading of Dodge. If this is all the case is about, however, it isn’t that interesting."[2]

Sorry Prof, gotta re-post the quotes you have locked as code, as they seem to disappear off screen. At least on the screen I'm looking at;

"Among non-experts, conventional wisdom holds that corporate law requires boards of directors to maximize shareholder wealth. This common but mistaken belief is almost invariably supported by reference to the Michigan Supreme Court's 1919 opinion in Dodge v. Ford Motor Co."[1]

"Dodge is often misread or mistaught as setting a legal rule of shareholder wealth maximization. This was not and is not the law. Shareholder wealth maximization is a standard of conduct for officers and directors, not a legal mandate. The business judgment rule [which was also upheld in this decision] protects many decisions that deviate from this standard. This is one reading of Dodge. If this is all the case is about, however, it isn’t that interesting."[2]

[trigeek]

Stop.  You're wrong in several ways already.  First is trivial to explain:  
A company owes more to its shareholders than *a* profit.  It *must maximise* the profit.  At least them's the laws IRL.  If you're satisfied when your investment makes a satoshi after a year, you're in the minority.

Man, you're awfully good at putting words in people's mouths.  I never said anything about not maximizing profit.  My point is that a measured strategy that doesn't decimate the bitcoin network would reap more rewards over the long term, both for the company and by extension its investors.  Secondly, those laws only speak to the allocation of profits. They don't say anything about how the company is run.  So stop.  You're wrong in several ways already.

Second, you're not justified in assuming that selling X chips @$Y ( "all the chips" -- a nonsensical number considering how chips are made) will be possible if other players flood the market with cheaper chips / raise the difficulty level to a point making your chips *unprofitable at any price*.  Please consider *all* the variables.

Who ever said "all the chips"? Yet again, putting words into my mouth.  More to the point, name me any other entity that has announced a chip with similar or better performance within the power limits ("under 1 joule per gh") that they have announced.  No? Well then how the hell is some other entity selling more expensive chips going to price them out of the market?  Please consider *all* the variables.

If by "artificial" you mean "not selling all the chips capable of being produced at a profit," then yes they are.  If you mean something else, what???

What I meant to say is that there's a divide between flooding the market and releasing product at a very, very slow pace.  It's not either/or.  So yes, it is "artificial scarcity", but not to the level you are painting it out to be.
 

If it is in their best interest to keep the goose alive, they're not guided by goose's welfare, but by profitability.  What's the difference?  The difference is when the bottom line dictates it is more profitable to kill the goose, take off your hat.  

Well then clearly they think it's better to keep the goose alive. Which was my point all along.

[crumbs]

Stop.  You're wrong in several ways already.  First is trivial to explain:  
A company owes more to its shareholders than *a* profit.  It *must maximise* the profit.  At least them's the laws IRL.  If you're satisfied when your investment makes a satoshi after a year, you're in the minority.

Can you point to such a law?

Are you saying that there is no such law?  How specific would you like the wording of the law to be?

Edit:  Thanks, Flashman.

I read at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodge_v._Ford_Motor_Company the following language:

"Among non-experts, conventional wisdom holds that corporate law requires boards of directors to maximize shareholder wealth. This common but mistaken belief is almost invariably supported by reference to the Michigan Supreme Court's 1919 opinion in Dodge v. Ford Motor Co."[1]

"Dodge is often misread or mistaught as setting a legal rule of shareholder wealth maximization. This was not and is not the law. Shareholder wealth maximization is a standard of conduct for officers and directors, not a legal mandate. The business judgment rule [which was also upheld in this decision] protects many decisions that deviate from this standard. This is one reading of Dodge. If this is all the case is about, however, it isn’t that interesting."[2]

...And this is why i asked you how specific you wish the wording to be.  Is your objection qualitative, or are we going to swap wikip links in a pedantic back & forth? 

[ProfMac]

Stop.  You're wrong in several ways already.  First is trivial to explain:  
A company owes more to its shareholders than *a* profit.  It *must maximise* the profit.  At least them's the laws IRL.  If you're satisfied when your investment makes a satoshi after a year, you're in the minority.

Can you point to such a law?

Are you saying that there is no such law?  How specific would you like the wording of the law to be?

Edit:  Thanks, Flashman.

I read at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodge_v._Ford_Motor_Company the following language:

"Among non-experts, conventional wisdom holds that corporate law requires boards of directors to maximize shareholder wealth. This common but mistaken belief is almost invariably supported by reference to the Michigan Supreme Court's 1919 opinion in Dodge v. Ford Motor Co."[1]

"Dodge is often misread or mistaught as setting a legal rule of shareholder wealth maximization. This was not and is not the law. Shareholder wealth maximization is a standard of conduct for officers and directors, not a legal mandate. The business judgment rule [which was also upheld in this decision] protects many decisions that deviate from this standard. This is one reading of Dodge. If this is all the case is about, however, it isn’t that interesting."[2]

...And this is why i asked you how specific you wish the wording to be.  Is your objection qualitative, or are we going to swap wikip links in a pedantic back & forth? 

I have never heard of such a law.  I almost asked for a pointer.  When I Googled Ford Dodge Brothers maximize profit, I immediately found language that disagrees with the assertion, and I reported that back.
I just want to be informed, and to avoid drama I used short simple words with their common meanings in a clinically dry question.

[trigeek]

...And this is why i asked you how specific you wish the wording to be.  Is your objection qualitative, or are we going to swap wikip links in a pedantic back & forth? 

The law needs to be specific enough to support your assertion.  You made the assertion that it exists, the responsibility is on you is to prove that it truly does. You have yet to do so, so your assertion is merely just an argument from ignorance.

I'll refrain from cluttering the thread any further, as it's clear you're just trolling everyone here with your nonsensical statements.