Is there a fatal flaw in bitcoin?

[Florida-Man]

As I'm diving deeper into crypto, I have found a fatal flaw.  The value of the bitcoin is derived from the power the network creates.  The hashing, is basically the decentralization of the currency. As the crypto becomes more available it means halfing has occurred more frequently.  This makes Bit coin for example more energy intense to mine. It also decreases the rate of which one can accumulate bitcoins.

As the hashing rate is reduced, transactions will slow. 

People will do with crypto rigs as they do with gold rigs, set up shop where the paydirt is, and not try to get every last ounce.  Ironically, the thing that built the network and kept it running, is the bitcoin mining.  Bitcoin IS the fuel that runs the rigs.  When they leave for another currency, that leaves less hashing power to be devoted to the mining bitcoin.  The paradox, is the amount of "currency" available to be circulated won't have the hashing power to maintain the network transactions.   

When the last bitcoin is mined, there will be no more hashing power dedicated to the currency.

Am I missing something?

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[jackg]

Miners are paid via a reward for finding a block yes, but they're also paid transaction fees - you pay a fee whenever you send bitcoin and this gets rewarded to miners.

This fee on it's own has been fairly big, the last block had 0.023btc in fees - which seems smaller than it has been: https://btc.com/btc/block/711888
That's still $1.5k (today, potentially a lot more if bitcoin continues into the 2100s) and an incentive enough for some people to mine/keep mining.

[Florida-Man]

Miners are paid via a reward for finding a block yes, but they're also paid transaction fees - you pay a fee whenever you send bitcoin and this gets rewarded to miners.

This fee on it's own has been fairly big, the last block had 0.023btc in fees - which seems smaller than it has been: https://btc.com/btc/block/711888
That's still $1.5k (today, potentially a lot more if bitcoin continues into the 2100s) and an incentive enough for some people to mine/keep mining.

That's not what I'm saying.  The computing power that guarantees your bitcoin is authentic is what the hashing power used to "mine"  the bitcoin is doing.  

Every transaction is part of the block chain.

Every miner is verifying the blockchain is intact and complete.

Every transaction that gets processed is crunched so the entire bitcoin network knows how many bitcoins are in which wallet.  It is how the bitcoin network prevents "counterfeit" coins.  It is also what prevents a coin from being spent twice by the same owner.  That is what the hashing is doing.

Once their is no more reason to mine, the hashing stops.

The transaction, the transfer of one bitcoin to another is what the hashing is doing by the miners.  The miners are the ones that keep the network moving.  When the hashing stops, when the mining stops, when there is no more bitcoins to mine, the system falls apart.  

[jackg]

Once their is no more reason to mine, the hashing stops.

The transaction, the transfer of one bitcoin to another is what the hashing is doing by the miners.  The miners are the ones that keep the network moving.  When the hashing stops, when the mining stops, when there is no more bitcoins to mine, the system falls apart.  

Unless bitcoin doesn't get used for a while though, there would be no reason to stop mining collectively as miners can still collect fees from people sending funds across the network (as they already do now).

Also full nodes propagate the blockchain across the network and verify transactions.

[Charles-Tim]

The value of the bitcoin is derived from the power the network creates.

You meant the mining hashes generated by miners? This is to secure the blockchain to make 51% attack impossible as the hashrate is increasing. The value of bitcoin is derived from demand (adoption).

The hashing, is basically the decentralization of the currency.

Just a part of it. How about non-custodial wallet used for it, or the decentralized Bitcoin Core. How about its censorship resistant and no subjection to governmental control. All these makes bitcoin to be a decentralized currency.

As the crypto becomes more available it means halfing has occurred more frequently.

Not all cryptocurrencies halve, cryptocurrencies have different makeup. About halving, there are some but many cryptocurrencies that halve, taking bitcoin as an example. But, yet, there is nothing halving has to do with coin availability in the way you meant it, it deals with coin supply reduction.

This makes Bit coin for example more energy intense to mine. It also decreases the rate of which one can accumulate bitcoins.

This is not coherent with your other post contents.

When the last bitcoin is mined, there will be no more hashing power dedicated to the currency.

Miners gained not only from mined bitcoin, in the block that a mining pool mined, it consists of a newly bitcoin reward (which is currently 6.25 BTC) and bitcoin transactions. Miners gained from the mining reward (currently 6.25 BTC) and transaction fees. If all bitcoin are mined, miners will continue to mine while they are gaining from transaction fees. Transaction fee is gradually replacing the mining reward.

So mining continues after all bitcoin are mined.

[adaseb]

Yes you are right that as the price of bitcoin goes up, the hashrate goes up and the common man cannot mine anymore from their home, which would of been ideal to keep the network decentralized and fair. Like satoshi said, "One computer, one vote" or something like that.

However you are incorrect that when all the block rewards are mined and the miner reward is almost 0 that the network will crash, it won't because if there are transactions then miners would get those transaction fees. If of course there was no blockreward and no transaction, then obviously it might crash since no one would mine for free.

[yhiaali3]

It's not just miners who keep the network going, there's also a full node, those also get rewarded for continuing to keep the network going by checking transactions and blocks, even if the last bitcoin is mined they won't stop working, miners too They won't stop mining transactions in order to get the fees, also don't forget that you are talking about something that will happen 100 years from now at that time the price of bitcoin might be several million and this will make the transaction fees enough to keep the miners in business.

[Reid]

Transaction fees. Someone needs to pay for that for transaction to continue and they are actually cheap if it is from one wallet to another.
But do it in an exchange and I am sure you will be shocked at how much they will cost you.
Anyway, once all Bitcoin is mined we are dead, or I am dead and am not going to witness what else would happen but hoping it is for the good.
The good part is it's not a pyramid scheme unlike what new projects are trying to offer now. The invested money will be scattered to the first users and you will get yours once you get old in the circle.
In Bitcoin, you buy, you keep, you resist the dump and pump and be optimistic about the future.

[pooya87]

The value of the bitcoin is derived from the power the network creates.

Assuming you mean hashrate the statement is not exactly correct. The value of bitcoin is mainly derived from the utility it provides and the security of network ensures that utility.

The hashing, is basically the decentralization of the currency.

It is only part of the decentralization of bitcoin. The other part includes spread of the hashrate, number of full nodes and spread of them around the globe and partially developers and their independence.

As the crypto becomes more available it means halfing has occurred more frequently.  This makes Bit coin for example more energy intense to mine.

Wrong. Halving doesn't change how much energy bitcoin mining uses, it only changes how much new bitcoin enters circulation in each block.

It also decreases the rate of which one can accumulate bitcoins.

One accumulates bitcoin like they accumulate any other currency, by working and getting paid in that currency.

As the hashing rate is reduced, transactions will slow. 

Wrong. Transactions don't have speed. And reduced hashrate only decreases the time between blocks but only until the next difficulty adjustment which would take care of it.

People will do with crypto rigs as they do with gold rigs, set up shop where the paydirt is, and not try to get every last ounce.  Ironically, the thing that built the network and kept it running, is the bitcoin mining. 

Then someone would buy them dirt cheap and start mining precious bitcoin with their valuable ASICs

When they leave for another currency, that leaves less hashing power to be devoted to the mining bitcoin. 

There is no alternative to move on to.
You see you are contradicting yourself here. If we assume the scenario you explained happens to bitcoin, then it will happen even harder to its copies. Considering their lower price, lack of utility and the guaranteed dump in case of any small drop in bitcoin there is no incentive to move to the "alternative" at all.

Am I missing something?

Yes. You are missing the fact that when miners were being paid 50 bitcoins, only a small number of them were mining bitcoin and hashrate was tiny. 12 years later they are getting paid 6.25 bitcoin and there are thousands of miners from all around the world mining bitcoin and hashrate is massive.

[rahmatrf331]

Once their is no more reason to mine, the hashing stops.

The transaction, the transfer of one bitcoin to another is what the hashing is doing by the miners.  The miners are the ones that keep the network moving.  When the hashing stops, when the mining stops, when there is no more bitcoins to mine, the system falls apart.  

Unless bitcoin doesn't get used for a while though, there would be no reason to stop mining collectively as miners can still collect fees from people sending funds across the network (as they already do now).

Also full nodes propagate the blockchain across the network and verify transactions.

we often see graphs of the bitcoin market, if the market often goes up and down or is called fluctuating. conditions like this are the trigger for the system to keep moving and never stop. the attractiveness of the stockholders is increasing and the transaction rate is getting stronger, so the hashing of the miners never stops. if the bullrun market continues and bearish does not occur, then transactions will continue to decrease and hashing will also disappear.

[buwaytress]

As the hashing rate is reduced, transactions will slow.  

As pooya87 said above.

Average block time is 10 minutes. This is the design.

And to cope with hashrate increase/decrease, difficulty adjustments roughly every 2016 blocks. This is the design.

Miners have, at various periods in time, been demotivated or disincentivised to leave, and that's fine, as well as expected. And the network adjusts difficulty to accommodate or compensate. But there is always new motivation and new incentive for different people to mine. Increasing hashrate over time proves this.

This design has worked for over 10 years. You might say it's a proven design.

Besides, largely thanks to upgrades and increased adoption, TPS on Bitcoin has been trending up across its years of operation. Not down.

[Husires]

I believe that even if people stop making a direct profit from block mining, they will continue mining because the future value of Bitcoin will increase. Also, if countries buy reserves, they will add mining devices inside the country to ensure that another country does not attack 51% and thus make the reserves for that country worthless.

[o_e_l_e_o]

But do it in an exchange and I am sure you will be shocked at how much they will cost you.

This is due to blatant profiteering by centralized exchanges, and has nothing to do with the bitcoin network or the rewards that miners receive.

And to cope with hashrate increase/decrease, difficulty adjustments roughly every 2016 blocks. This is the design.

Difficulty adjusts exactly every 2016 blocks, which is roughly every 2 weeks.

Mining and hash power is self regulating. If some miners leave, then the difficulty adjusts downwards, it because easier to mine a block, and so more miners will start mining again because it is more profitable to do so.

[buwaytress]

And to cope with hashrate increase/decrease, difficulty adjustments roughly every 2016 blocks. This is the design.

Difficulty adjusts exactly every 2016 blocks, which is roughly every 2 weeks.

Brain knew that, at least it thought it was saying it

[Obito]

I believe that even if people stop making a direct profit from block mining, they will continue mining because the future value of Bitcoin will increase. Also, if countries buy reserves, they will add mining devices inside the country to ensure that another country does not attack 51% and thus make the reserves for that country worthless.

That's wishful thinking that miners will continue to mine bitcoin for that long not to mention that it's uncertain whether it's going to go up much higher than we expect it to be, everyday is a new experience so I don't think that we will see the same thing for bitcoin because eventually we'll see something different hopefully I am just being negative and that bitcoin will continue to grow even further but we can't dismiss the possibilities.

[el kaka22]

Quantum computers. There is nothing wrong with bitcoin itself or the blockchain, but quantum computing could make it a problem unless it is used for defense and I doubt that it would be. Nobody can tell me that quantum computing could not be done, it will be done one day, maybe tomorrow or maybe 20 years later but it will be done one day. Considering how insanely faster it will become, and how we didn't even have 1gb ram up until 10-15 years ago and now have 32 gb rams, it should be clear to all of us that quantum computing will be in everyone's home and even maybe pockets.

This is the scare, the moment it can be done, that pace and power could be used to crack into any wallet ever, sure it is hard right now and takes thousands of years to even try it, but with that much power it may take seconds to crack into anyone's wallet. And that is the biggest problem in the future.

[o_e_l_e_o]

This is the scare, the moment it can be done, that pace and power could be used to crack into any wallet ever

No, it couldn't.

Sufficiently powerful quantum computers could eventually break elliptic curve cryptography, rendering any wallet with a revealed public key vulnerable to theft. This includes early coins mined to P2PK addresses and coins in reused addresses which have have previously made a transaction, since the public key of an address is revealed whenever a transaction is made spending coins at that address.

However, quantum computers do not provide enough of a benefit over conventional computers to be able to break SHA256 and reverse an address in to the relevant private key. Therefore, if you do not reuse addresses, then you don't need to worry about quantum computers. Long before we reach the stage that a quantum computer exists which is fast enough to solve the ECDLP in <10 minutes and attempt to double spend a transaction, we will have forked to a quantum resistant algorithm.

Since we know that bitcoin will evolve to deal with quantum computers, the real question is what to do with the vulnerable coins which could be stolen by quantum computers if the owners of those coins do not move them to quantum-proof addresses.

[NeuroticFish]

How on earth you guys find same "problems" over and over again for bitcoin?

Am I missing something?

Yes: you've completely forgotten the tx fees and the ever rising price.

Quantum computers. There is nothing wrong with bitcoin itself or the blockchain, but quantum computing could make it a problem unless it is used for defense and I doubt that it would be. Nobody can tell me that quantum computing could not be done, it will be done one day, maybe tomorrow or maybe 20 years later but it will be done one day.

So you don't know about quantum computers, hence in the future they'll be basically magic.
If quantum computers would become that good at some point, everything that's encrypted - routers, banks, access to nuclear missiles - all will be vulnerable. So your point is...?
When this will get close to become a problem, the world will prepare. Bitcoin too. But.. isn't this in the realm of science fiction?

[philipma1957]

As I'm diving deeper into crypto, I have found a fatal flaw.  The value of the bitcoin is derived from the power the network creates.  The hashing, is basically the decentralization of the currency. As the crypto becomes more available it means halfing has occurred more frequently.  This makes Bit coin for example more energy intense to mine. It also decreases the rate of which one can accumulate bitcoins.

As the hashing rate is reduced, transactions will slow. 

People will do with crypto rigs as they do with gold rigs, set up shop where the paydirt is, and not try to get every last ounce.  Ironically, the thing that built the network and kept it running, is the bitcoin mining.  Bitcoin IS the fuel that runs the rigs.  When they leave for another currency, that leaves less hashing power to be devoted to the mining bitcoin.  The paradox, is the amount of "currency" available to be circulated won't have the hashing power to maintain the network transactions.   

When the last bitcoin is mined, there will be no more hashing power dedicated to the currency.

Am I missing something?

Well in about 50 years from now it will become apparent if the lack of rewards kills off or alters btc.

one could argue btc is intentionally made scarce.

doge has an interesting property it mines x coins every year.

year 1 = x coins
year 2 = 2x coins 100% inflation
year 3 = 3x 50% inflation
year 4 = 5x 33% inflation
year 5
year 6
year 7
year 8
year 9
year 10 =10x
year 11 = 11x down to 10% inflation
year 12
year 12
year 14
…
year 50 =50x
year 51 =51x only 2% inflation

year 100 = 100x
year 101 = 101x only 1% inflation

certainly better than the usd

and certainly not the scarcity of btc

a tweener idea 💡

given time I wonder if it has staying power as the actuall future of cash.

and btc is more like a 10000 dollar t-bill

[Findingnemo]

Even miners will get rewards from the TX fees of each blocks so the miners will not move out to other crypto currency even if the last bitcoin mined and you know the last bitcoin is expected to mine at 2140 so we still have lot of time by that time we may know bitcoin is enough or people will choose other cryptos or anything newer than bitcoin.