Hashers are not miners, and Bitcoin network doesn't need them.

[Holliday]

Bump..

Why is 'centralization of mining' not the no.1 topic that the community is trying to address everyday?

Any suggestions on how we convince people to become smart miners instead of stupid hashers?

Many of us have been banging our head against this wall for years. After a while one grows tired of banging their head against a wall.

I don't think "force" is the correct way to get people to look out for their own best interests. Unfortunately, people are good at ignoring their own best interests.

[FandangledGizmo]

Bump..

Why is 'centralization of mining' not the no.1 topic that the community is trying to address everyday?

Any suggestions on how we convince people to become smart miners instead of stupid hashers?

Many of us have been banging our head against this wall for years. After a while one grows tired of banging their head against a wall.

I don't think "force" is the correct way to get people to look out for their own best interests. Unfortunately, people are good at ignoring their own best interests.

Hi Holliday, my suggestion in the development section was the following

One of the best current options is for hashers switch to P2Pool, but currently they are not incentivised to do so.

So the question is -  Who is most incentivised to incentivise them to switch?

Isn't the answer, the main Bitcoin Exchanges - BTC-E, Bitstamp, MTGox etc. & Bitpay?

A) Isn't the danger posed by centralisation of mining the biggest threat to their business model and income stream?
B) Couldn't addressing the problem even improve their current income stream?
C) Wouldn't it be the most positive marketing investment they could make?

I think any major Bitcoin business wouldn't mind contributing to a transparent decentralisation fund that made P2Pool more attractive for hashers, even just as a Bitcoin user I woudn't mind paying 0.22% per trade on BTC-E for example vs. 0.20% if the additional funds went towards a P2Pool fund.

Do you know if the Dev's have tried approaching the big Bitcoin businesses and asking them for their solution? Because this is the biggest threat to their business and as far as I know they make a lot more money than the mining pools so they should have the upper hand.

[Holliday]

Bump..

Why is 'centralization of mining' not the no.1 topic that the community is trying to address everyday?

Any suggestions on how we convince people to become smart miners instead of stupid hashers?

Many of us have been banging our head against this wall for years. After a while one grows tired of banging their head against a wall.

I don't think "force" is the correct way to get people to look out for their own best interests. Unfortunately, people are good at ignoring their own best interests.

Hi Holliday, my suggestion in the development section was the following

One of the best current options is for hashers switch to P2Pool, but currently they are not incentivised to do so.

So the question is -  Who is most incentivised to incentivise them to switch?

Isn't the answer, the main Bitcoin Exchanges - BTC-E, Bitstamp, MTGox etc. & Bitpay?

A) Isn't the danger posed by centralisation of mining the biggest threat to their business model and income stream?
B) Couldn't addressing the problem even improve their current income stream?
C) Wouldn't it be the most positive marketing investment they could make?

I think any major Bitcoin business wouldn't mind contributing to a transparent decentralisation fund that made P2Pool more attractive for hashers, even just as a Bitcoin user I woudn't mind paying 0.22% per trade on BTC-E for example vs. 0.20% if the additional funds went towards a P2Pool fund.

Do you know if the Dev's have tried approaching the big Bitcoin businesses and asking them for their solution? Because this is the biggest threat to their business and as far as I know they make a lot more money than the mining pools so they should have the upper hand.

I know of a few devs that have spoken about P2Pool. I don't know anything about them approaching big Bitcoin businesses.

There have been quite visible attempts to make P2Pool more attractive for miners (earlier in the life of P2Pool), but these attempts eventually lost steam. Recently there have been some attempts to reignite this fire, but I don't see any actual funds or bounties being started, only talk.

[FandangledGizmo]

I know of a few devs that have spoken about P2Pool. I don't know anything about them approaching big Bitcoin businesses.

There have been quite visible attempts to make P2Pool more attractive for miners (earlier in the life of P2Pool), but these attempts eventually lost steam. Recently there have been some attempts to reignite this fire, but I don't see any actual funds or bounties being started, only talk.

I guess I can try email some of the big players and see if I get a response.

It would be interesting to work out how much money would have to be added to P2Pool on a regular basis to make hashers switch.

If it's small enough, it might be do-able for one of the big businesses/exchanges to set it up and manage the incentive programme themselves.

[chopsticks]

Wondering about the title of the thread.   Clearly the OP has an opinion that is clearly stated.
Guess my question is: Assuming that hashers are not miner and the bitcoin network doesn't need them.  Is there anything that can be done about it?

Frivolous lawsuits aren't needed by the legal system; lobbyists aren't needed in politics.

[SaraMine]

so you guys think that switching to p2pool will do the job? p2pool script is for small p2pool nodes...when you will connect big cannon you will get to many rejects

[Ekkio]

Is there anything that can be done about it?

First of all it is important to have people understanding the difference between Miners and Hashers, very few know what the difference is and why it is important to decentralize verification process. So at the moment the real question is how to make people understand that those who participate in pool mining are not miners.

[2tights]

Is there anything that can be done about it?

First of all it is important to have people understanding the difference between Miners and Hashers, very few know what the difference is and why it is important to decentralize verification process. So at the moment the real question is how to make people understand that those who participate in pool mining are not miners.

Please elaborate on what you believe to be a sound resolution. Specifically, one that maximizes earning potential for individuals as well as bitcoin network security.

[smooth]

Do you know if the Dev's have tried approaching the big Bitcoin businesses and asking them for their solution? Because this is the biggest threat to their business and as far as I know they make a lot more money than the mining pools so they should have the upper hand.

Donating coins to p2pool is certainly possible and there is a donation address for it, but it shouldn't really be necessary because p2pool already does better than centralized pools by reducing orphans, paying out transaction fees to miners, allowing merged mining and not charging any fees. So hashers who adopt it and become full miners should already increase their earnings.

The bigger issues are: 1) awareness, 2) easy of setup/management, 3) compatibility with some mining setups (some specific ASICs don't work well and very small miners won't get consistent earnings).  If you want to help with decentralization, contribute to working on one of these three items. Anyone who is interested, even without any programming or scripting ability, can help with 1).

[2tights]

Do you know if the Dev's have tried approaching the big Bitcoin businesses and asking them for their solution? Because this is the biggest threat to their business and as far as I know they make a lot more money than the mining pools so they should have the upper hand.

Donating coins to p2pool is certainly possible and there is a donation address for it, but it shouldn't really be necessary because p2pool already does better than centralized pools by reducing orphans, paying out transaction fees to miners, allowing merged mining and not charging any fees. So hashers who adopt it and become full miners should already increase their earnings.

The bigger issues are: 1) awareness, 2) easy of setup/management, 3) compatibility with some mining setups (some specific ASICs don't work well and very small miners won't get consistent earnings).  

What are your thoughts on p2pool and KNC Neptune

[smooth]

Do you know if the Dev's have tried approaching the big Bitcoin businesses and asking them for their solution? Because this is the biggest threat to their business and as far as I know they make a lot more money than the mining pools so they should have the upper hand.

Donating coins to p2pool is certainly possible and there is a donation address for it, but it shouldn't really be necessary because p2pool already does better than centralized pools by reducing orphans, paying out transaction fees to miners, allowing merged mining and not charging any fees. So hashers who adopt it and become full miners should already increase their earnings.

The bigger issues are: 1) awareness, 2) easy of setup/management, 3) compatibility with some mining setups (some specific ASICs don't work well and very small miners won't get consistent earnings).  

What are your thoughts on p2pool and KNC Neptune

KNC Neptune doesn't even exist yet right? I don't think we know whether it will work yet with p2pool, but if you are buying one or considering buying one you can certainly ask KNC to make sure p2pool is well supported.

[2tights]

Do you know if the Dev's have tried approaching the big Bitcoin businesses and asking them for their solution? Because this is the biggest threat to their business and as far as I know they make a lot more money than the mining pools so they should have the upper hand.

Donating coins to p2pool is certainly possible and there is a donation address for it, but it shouldn't really be necessary because p2pool already does better than centralized pools by reducing orphans, paying out transaction fees to miners, allowing merged mining and not charging any fees. So hashers who adopt it and become full miners should already increase their earnings.

The bigger issues are: 1) awareness, 2) easy of setup/management, 3) compatibility with some mining setups (some specific ASICs don't work well and very small miners won't get consistent earnings).  

What are your thoughts on p2pool and KNC Neptune

KNC Neptune doesn't even exist yet right? I don't think we know whether it will work yet with p2pool, but if you are buying one or considering buying one you can certainly ask KNC to make sure p2pool is well supported.

sure thing. I'll let you know if I get a response, but if you know anything about them....

[Ekkio]

Is there anything that can be done about it?

First of all it is important to have people understanding the difference between Miners and Hashers, very few know what the difference is and why it is important to decentralize verification process. So at the moment the real question is how to make people understand that those who participate in pool mining are not miners.

Please elaborate on what you believe to be a sound resolution. Specifically, one that maximizes earning potential for individuals as well as bitcoin network security.

The main purpose of this thread is to create a healthy discussion of the problem by using better definitions. So I don't have an opinion about what would be a sound solution, but what I do know is that current agenda of Bitcoin Foundation and involved core devs will give us centralized mining.

The next statement requires leap on intuition, I predict that centralized mining will have regulatory safeguards built around it and Bitcoin will become Banking 2.0 system, and I would like to hear why or why not it could be true.

[FandangledGizmo]

The main purpose of this thread is to create a healthy discussion of the problem by using better definitions. So I don't have an opinion about what would be a sound solution, but what I do know is that current agenda of Bitcoin Foundation and involved core devs will give us centralized mining.

When you say 'agenda', do you mean that, you believe that the Bitcoin Foundation and involved core devs are deliberately not trying to give us decentralised mining? If so, do you have any simple proof of that, that I would understand?

[Tirapon]

I have read several of these threads now, sparked I presume by the recent scare with Ghash.io acquiring nearly 50% of the network hashrate. This is a good thing: please keep making these threads to get the message across.

This is actually quite hypocritical of me to say, because I haven't been doing my part towards this issue - Its just more convenient to pick one of the well known pools and then you end up sticking with it, plus you have the interface to check your hashrate and auto payout options etc. From now on I will only point hashing power towards P2Pool, which I have know about and advocated for a while but not actually been using I'm ashamed to admit...

[Ekkio]

The main purpose of this thread is to create a healthy discussion of the problem by using better definitions. So I don't have an opinion about what would be a sound solution, but what I do know is that current agenda of Bitcoin Foundation and involved core devs will give us centralized mining.

When you say 'agenda', do you mean that, you believe that the Bitcoin Foundation and involved core devs are deliberately not trying to give us decentralised mining? If so, do you have any simple proof of that, that I would understand?

As far as I can tell there is no significant resources allocated from Bitcoin Foundation group to make mining more decentralized and they say that mining pools are ok as long as they don't misbehave, is that what you mean by "deliberately not trying to give us decentralised mining" ?

[smooth]

I have read several of these threads now, sparked I presume by the recent scare with Ghash.io acquiring nearly 50% of the network hashrate. This is a good thing: please keep making these threads to get the message across.

This is actually quite hypocritical of me to say, because I haven't been doing my part towards this issue - Its just more convenient to pick one of the well known pools and then you end up sticking with it, plus you have the interface to check your hashrate and auto payout options etc. From now on I will only point hashing power towards P2Pool, which I have know about and advocated for a while but not actually been using I'm ashamed to admit...

be careful that you are really using p2pool (p2pool.info). The web site p2pool.org has nothing to do with the actual p2pool and is in fact a centralized pool.

[FandangledGizmo]

I have read several of these threads now, sparked I presume by the recent scare with Ghash.io acquiring nearly 50% of the network hashrate. This is a good thing: please keep making these threads to get the message across.

This is actually quite hypocritical of me to say, because I haven't been doing my part towards this issue - Its just more convenient to pick one of the well known pools and then you end up sticking with it, plus you have the interface to check your hashrate and auto payout options etc. From now on I will only point hashing power towards P2Pool, which I have know about and advocated for a while but not actually been using I'm ashamed to admit...

be careful that you are really using p2pool (p2pool.info). The web site p2pool.org has nothing to do with the actual p2pool and is in fact a centralized pool.

Thank you for switching Tirapon!

The main purpose of this thread is to create a healthy discussion of the problem by using better definitions. So I don't have an opinion about what would be a sound solution, but what I do know is that current agenda of Bitcoin Foundation and involved core devs will give us centralized mining.

When you say 'agenda', do you mean that, you believe that the Bitcoin Foundation and involved core devs are deliberately not trying to give us decentralised mining? If so, do you have any simple proof of that, that I would understand?

As far as I can tell there is no significant resources allocated from Bitcoin Foundation group to make mining more decentralized and they say that mining pools are ok as long as they don't misbehave, is that what you mean by "deliberately not trying to give us decentralised mining" ?

Hmm yes that is suspicous. Ekkio, do you think the Bitcoin Foundation should

A) Make the issue of 'centralisation of mining' a higher priority
B) Make it the no.1 priority
C) Literally stop everything else and just focus on that alone, till there is some solution in place?  

[Ekkio]

Ekkio, do you think the Bitcoin Foundation should

A) Make the issue of 'centralisation of mining' a higher priority
B) Make it the no.1 priority
C) Literally stop everything else and just focus on that alone, till there is some solution in place?  

I certainly would like to see people spending more time looking for a political or technical solution to the problem but it can't be number one priority for Bitcoin Foundation because it's an academics and it's almost impossible to speed up the process no matter the amount of additional resources.

[markm]

I have a KnC Jupiter and I usually have it using two pools, first my own p2pool merged mining node that merges all eight merged mined coins, second, in case of problems (like the motherboard currently being blown) with my p2pool it uses mmpool at bitparking as backup.

When using mmpool it correctly shows in its dashobard web system its hashrate.

When mining on my p2pool though it shows a hashrate about half what the p2pool is actually getting from it according to p2pool itself.

So this problem seems to be cosmetic, somehow the Jupiter's web system is extracting wrong information from the cgminer instance it is using.

But it took me some time to finally migrate to having my p2pool as first choice pool because at first it did seem like it had real problems trying to use p2pool.

One thing miners stand to gain by using p2pool instead of centralised pools is control over which coins to merge.

Until recently no public pool I knew of merged I0C, GRP, CLC nor XGG.

A while ago mmpool reinstated I0Coin and at the same time also added GRP.

But as far as I know you still miss out on both CLC and XGG if you use any centralised pool instead of running your own p2pool node.

As more blockchains implement merged mining, people using centralised pools will likely miss out on more and more merged mined blockchains.

-MarkM-