[2018-12-23] Number of Reachable Bitcoin Nodes Fell 19% in 2018

[tyz]

Data from Bitnodes shows that the number of reachable nodes on the bitcoin blockchain fell 18.98 percent in 2018 from 11,845 to 9,597. In the same period, the number of unreachable nodes also fell 33 percent from 98,000 to 65,500. To understand the significance of the data, it is helpful to establish the functions of reachable and unreachable nodes.
https://www.ccn.com/number-of-reachable-bitcoin-nodes-fell-19-in-2018/

[Kakmakr]

I think it is only a direct result of the smaller miners leaving the Bitcoin scene. The profitability of the mining might have paid for the hosting of the node and now those miners are struggling and they might have temporarily shutdown these nodes. <Bandwidth cost and the cost to run a node 24/7 can be expensive for people living in 3rd world countries>

The situation will change as the profitability increase in the future. <We cannot stay at the bottom forever and the difficulty will drop as more miners leave.>     

[stompix]

Let's look at the bright side, two years ago there were only 5k nodes.

Also, the stats destroy another myth, that of Asia leading the way in crypto:




Funny how Kenya who was supposed to be the next big thing in crypto has 2 nodes, and Nigeria 1.
Oh, and Venezuela tops the charts at 4 

[buwaytress]

As stompix points out, this myth should have long been destroyed. China miners making the network decentralized? I don't have screenshots but US has been leading the way for a long time in terms of nodes, even long before miners started switching off their rigs. Far as I know, this trend is repeated even when Segwit was rolled out, and if you look at Lightning Network nodes, it's almost exactly the same reflection. Well done to Singapore. Nary a miner there, yet full of nodes.

[1Referee]

It has to be pointed out that the information provided by Bitnodes is somewhat flawed since it largely depends on their own set of nodes and configurations.

I don't doubt there has been a slight decline in availability of nodes, because that's what you expect to happen during a bear market, but it's not as bad as they want you to believe.

By the time Lightning will take off and becomes an interesting enough way for people to generate passive income, the number of Bitcoin nodes will literally explode. More competition in this field means more funded channels and lower fees, so that's definitely a good thing. Eventually you'll be a sucker if you don't run a Lightning node.

[btyco]

Singapore has a surprisingly high number of nodes for such a small place. I wonder if kucoin has something to do with it. Australia is a massive country and relatively wealthy but doesn't even make it into the list.

[pixie85]

Let's look at the bright side, two years ago there were only 5k nodes.

Also, the stats destroy another myth, that of Asia leading the way in crypto:


https://i.imgur.com/k7ssTsP.png

Funny how Kenya who was supposed to be the next big thing in crypto has 2 nodes, and Nigeria 1.
Oh, and Venezuela tops the charts at 4  

It doesn't mean they don't want to run nodes. Maybe most of them have their connection configured in a way that allows only one way access. Most people, especially in the poor regions, access the Internet via large local networks. There's a lot of one way access nodes in the network and I'm ready two bet that most of those who run them don't even know that they aren't to-way.

[BitHodler]

Funny how Kenya who was supposed to be the next big thing in crypto has 2 nodes, and Nigeria 1.
Oh, and Venezuela tops the charts at 4 

Doesn't say much. They could very well have their nodes hosted outside of the country. Most of the nodes you see hosted in Germany and the US doesn't mean they actually belong to entities in Germany or the US.

People love datacenters because it's cheap, fast and reliable, which their own connections mostly can't provide. I can rent a decent VPS with unlimited bandwidth for €10 a month and there are some foreign datacenters even cheaper.

It's perfectly suitable for hosting nodes.

[hatshepsut93]

By the time Lightning will take off and becomes an interesting enough way for people to generate passive income, the number of Bitcoin nodes will literally explode. More competition in this field means more funded channels and lower fees, so that's definitely a good thing. Eventually you'll be a sucker if you don't run a Lightning node.

I kinda doubt it, it can be pretty inconvenient to run a full node (I myself stopped doing it a year ago) because it negatively affects performance of your machine. It's also impossible to do on mobile platforms and less powerful laptops. Most likely people will be using Lightning together with SPV node.

I think it is only a direct result of the smaller miners leaving the Bitcoin scene. The profitability of the mining might have paid for the hosting of the node and now those miners are struggling and they might have temporarily shutdown these nodes. <Bandwidth cost and the cost to run a node 24/7 can be expensive for people living in 3rd world countries>

The situation will change as the profitability increase in the future. <We cannot stay at the bottom forever and the difficulty will drop as more miners leave.>     

This isn't about miners, it's about users who run full nodes to support the network and verify the blockchain themselves. As blockchain grows, it becomes harder and harder to keep doing it for hobbyists with their home computers, especially if they don't upgrade their hardware frequently. Also, it might be caused by the bear market, as people tend to give Bitcoin less attention during these periods, even those  who are involved.

[Carlton Banks]

By the time Lightning will take off and becomes an interesting enough way for people to generate passive income, the number of Bitcoin nodes will literally explode. More competition in this field means more funded channels and lower fees, so that's definitely a good thing. Eventually you'll be a sucker if you don't run a Lightning node.

I kinda doubt it, it can be pretty inconvenient to run a full node (I myself stopped doing it a year ago) because it negatively affects performance of your machine. It's also impossible to do on mobile platforms and less powerful laptops. Most likely people will be using Lightning together with SPV node.e computers, especially if they don't upgrade their hardware frequently. Also, it might be caused by the bear market, as people tend to give Bitcoin less attention during these periods, even those  who are involved.

It's much more convenient to setup something like a Raspberry Pi as a dedicated Bitcoin/Lightning node instead of your laptop/dektop. Then you can point your mobile wallet at your node.

It might take a while, but I expect this kind of thing to become more common. There are alot of reasons to setup a little mini server at home, and the number of reasons are growing.

[1Referee]

I kinda doubt it, it can be pretty inconvenient to run a full node (I myself stopped doing it a year ago) because it negatively affects performance of your machine. It's also impossible to do on mobile platforms and less powerful laptops.

I'm all in favor at looking at the numbers, and when you see that nearly half of all Bitcoin's nodes are Lightning ready, and that without any financial incentive, and how it's still more or less a technical thingy, it tells me that when it starts to get easier to set up a node, and financially more rewarding, we'll see an explosion in Lightning nodes pop up.

Every time I look at the stats, I see an increase in nodes and channels. It's a bull run in terms of growth, and one that will continue to rush forward for many more years to come.

Most likely people will be using Lightning together with SPV node.

The very average user will indeed end up using a third party node to connect to, but that's perfectly fine. People have all the freedom to choose which node they want to connect to.

[stompix]

Doesn't say much. They could very well have their nodes hosted outside of the country. Most of the nodes you see hosted in Germany and the US doesn't mean they actually belong to entities in Germany or the US.

People love datacenters because it's cheap, fast and reliable, which their own connections mostly can't provide. I can rent a decent VPS with unlimited bandwidth for €10 a month and there are some foreign datacenters even cheaper.

It's perfectly suitable for hosting nodes.

Oh but it says a lot!
And you said it yourself, in those countries you can't even run a node so you're looking at better countries in term of infrastructure to run those.
Now, and this is the interesting part, why would a business in Nigeria run a node in the US?
Second, what kind of business are you running in that country that you can't even host a full node?

It doesn't mean they don't want to run nodes.

Again, I wasn't talking about how people feel and what people want!
Cause people think Nigeria is a crypto hub and they want to think Argentina is the new US in terms of bitcoin usage but...reality is pretty different.
Reality shows us that the entire African Continent has fewer nodes ...than...Lithuania.
And I'm willing to bet that 90% of this forum are having real trouble pointing Lithuania on the map!!!!

[BitHodler]

Now, and this is the interesting part, why would a business in Nigeria run a node in the US?
Second, what kind of business are you running in that country that you can't even host a full node?

I guess it's all related to how stable a certain country is. In case of Nigeria and countries like that, it makes sense to run your site elsewhere because it significantly reduces the possibility of being raided by your local authorities.

Don't forget that another important factor is bandwidth. It's safe to say that African and certain South American countries can't provide you unlimited data combined with a reliable connection, and if they do, it's outrageously expensive.

There is too much risk and cost involved. By simply renting US or EU servers you work around all the problems effortlessly. Unstable governments are a problem so it's definitely not worth trying to push their buttons.

[stompix]

I guess it's all related to how stable a certain country is. In case of Nigeria and countries like that, it makes sense to run your site elsewhere because it significantly reduces the possibility of being raided by your local authorities.

Don't forget that another important factor is bandwidth. It's safe to say that African and certain South American countries can't provide you unlimited data combined with a reliable connection, and if they do, it's outrageously expensive.

There is too much risk and cost involved. By simply renting US or EU servers you work around all the problems effortlessly. Unstable governments are a problem so it's definitely not worth trying to push their buttons.

And doesn't this all:
-stable country
-oppressive regime
-limited bandwidth (actually you don't need that much  ) and expensive
-risks
-costs
-unstable government

Simply prove my point that none of the African countries are the new crypto hubs of the world and will never be till all the above and much more changes?

[bbc.reporter]

I think it is only a direct result of the smaller miners leaving the Bitcoin scene. The profitability of the mining might have paid for the hosting of the node and now those miners are struggling and they might have temporarily shutdown these nodes. <Bandwidth cost and the cost to run a node 24/7 can be expensive for people living in 3rd world countries>

The situation will change as the profitability increase in the future. <We cannot stay at the bottom forever and the difficulty will drop as more miners leave.>     

This isn't about miners, it's about users who run full nodes to support the network and verify the blockchain themselves. As blockchain grows, it becomes harder and harder to keep doing it for hobbyists with their home computers, especially if they don't upgrade their hardware frequently. Also, it might be caused by the bear market, as people tend to give Bitcoin less attention during these periods, even those  who are involved.

Agreed. But the more important question. Would a bull market increase the count and get back those nodes online that were shutdown?

I reckon it is hard to be charitable if that person is forced to pay for the cost hehehe.

[figmentofmyass]

By the time Lightning will take off and becomes an interesting enough way for people to generate passive income, the number of Bitcoin nodes will literally explode. More competition in this field means more funded channels and lower fees, so that's definitely a good thing. Eventually you'll be a sucker if you don't run a Lightning node.

how much money do you think operating a lightning node can make? i have no idea myself but it never sounded particularly profitable, particularly for regular folks who aren't likely to have the best-connected nodes or the most liquid channels. i'd personally be hesitant to leave too much in lightning channels just because i'd have to keep the keys online.

[Coin-1]

I think that the Chinese mining pools with a lot of ASICs took a big chunk of the entire Bitcoin mining market. A mining pool looks like an ordinary full node but it is very powerful and has a huge hashrate.

In my opinion, -19% is a significant fall. Probably these full nodes didn't mine sufficient Bitcoin blocks and didn't get enough rewards to cover the expenses this year, therefore their administrators decided to shut them down so as not to incur losses.

Actually, this is not a good sign. Decentralization is needed for crypto currencies.

[hatshepsut93]

I kinda doubt it, it can be pretty inconvenient to run a full node (I myself stopped doing it a year ago) because it negatively affects performance of your machine. It's also impossible to do on mobile platforms and less powerful laptops.

I'm all in favor at looking at the numbers, and when you see that nearly half of all Bitcoin's nodes are Lightning ready, and that without any financial incentive, and how it's still more or less a technical thingy, it tells me that when it starts to get easier to set up a node, and financially more rewarding, we'll see an explosion in Lightning nodes pop up.

Every time I look at the stats, I see an increase in nodes and channels. It's a bull run in terms of growth, and one that will continue to rush forward for many more years to come.

Well, of course the number Lightning nodes is going to explode, there's no place to go but up and Lightning is still not even officially released. And it will likely contribute to some growth of Bitcoin nodes (like you've said in first post), but I still don't think that an average Bitcoin user is going to run a full node. SPV Lightning clients will probably trigger an explosion of Lightning adoption.

[jademaxxiss012]

This because of the market for cryptocurrency that relatively had a huge drop and besides more and more project now is being introduce in the forum and more and more scam projects also being made and run by the scammers. I do believe that there are few projects here that are really doing their best to make the project successful and useful in the utilization of their crypto.

[1Referee]

how much money do you think operating a lightning node can make? i have no idea myself but it never sounded particularly profitable, particularly for regular folks who aren't likely to have the best-connected nodes or the most liquid channels. i'd personally be hesitant to leave too much in lightning channels just because i'd have to keep the keys online.

At this point it's definitely not profitable. I'm sure that like +90% of the nodes don't even make $1 per month. It will all come down to volume in the later phases of Lightning. If you have thousands of transactions running through your node on a daily basis at like 10-50 sats per transaction, it will add up if you look at what you made after 30 days.

If you have more than one node running, you'll make even more money. Eventually I think that one single node should be able to generate $50-$100 on average per month, especially when the price moves closer to its high in the forthcoming years. Renting a server or running something like a RPI at home will definitely be more than worthwhile in that case.

You help the network become more secure, liquid, and you make a bit of money on top of it. Doesn't sound bad.