Looking for opinions of a replacement for ARS PPS if it dies

[kano]

It seems that ARS may be on the way out.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=18567.msg641492#msg641492

So to repeat a question I asked in the ARS thread:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=18567.msg643438#msg643438

But seriously, since even BurningToad is saying that he doesn't care about it any more - what's everyone's opinion of what is the next best PPS pool?
(and why?)
There are plenty of them but some seem to like to charge a lot (and always have even back when bitcoins were worth a lot more)
So complaining about the price of bitcoin falling by any pool OP who was charging a high % before is an example of a pool that should be avoided in my opinion.
I'll move this question to a new thread since I guess this thread isn't really the best place to discuss where to go if ARS dies

Yes anyone can look through the pages here but reading x thousand pages of posts to work out which is bests seems a bit over the top.

Just since a pool says they SAY they are the lowest fees and the best pool doesn't really mean much unless people actually use it and like it.

Anyone wanna suggest what they think is the best PPS and why?

[Eveofwar]

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=53406.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=53676.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=53200.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=51261.0

Why create more spam ?

[kano]

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=53406.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=53676.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=53200.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=51261.0

Why create more spam ?

Yes why did you?

[Eveofwar]

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=53406.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=53676.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=53200.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=51261.0

Why create more spam ?

Yes why did you?

So to repeat a question I asked in the ARS thread:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=18567.msg643438#msg643438

Why repeat one that's been repeated on repeatable occasions ?

[kano]

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=53406.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=53676.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=53200.0
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=51261.0

Why create more spam ?

Yes why did you?

So to repeat a question I asked in the ARS thread:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=18567.msg643438#msg643438

Why repeat one that's been repeated on repeatable occasions ?

All those threads you listed are useless.
I did read them after you posted that link and thus repeat the question: why are you posting spam here?

I also posted in the ARS thread that it would be better to ask the question in it's own thread so I did.
Please learn to read.
... and go away.

[Hotdog453]

Well... he's right and he's wrong. There's not going to be a "best" pool, they're all going to differ slightly, and you'll have to make your own choice. I know I commented on ABC in the ARS thread, but figured I'd farm for more posts contribute some more of my valuable information here

The way I look at it, all of the pools are "active", save ARS. I mean, really, it's not like there's "dead" pools out there. Which always amused the hell out of me; WHO THE HELL WAS MINING AT ARS AFTER BT LEFT? I mean, there were a few 10k+ GH people still mining there. WTF? Are you people dense, or is your botnet really hard to change targets or something? ARS was good, ARS was one of the first big, good PPS pools, but my God people, move your damn miners. It's not like BT even posts anymore. I was honestly concerned he'd just outright vanish and we'd be out any coins we've mined. I can't imagine still having 10k GH/s pointed to a dead pool, Jesus.

Anyways, I digress. Here, however, is my opinion on the pools. Take this with a gigantic grain of salt. Do not try to argue with me, because frankly I'm *SURE* I'm wrong on some points, but you're going to need to do your own research anyways, eh?

YourBTC is closing. Too bad, so sad, at least he told us.

To me, Deepbit and BTCGuild and Slush are some huge, monolithic behemoths swallowing up the entire universe. Clearly, other people disagree with me. Though I do have to question if most people don't just use them due to their "size", and don't really look into it that deeply. They're not the cheapest, they're not the most stable, they're the biggest DDOS/pool hopper targets, and their interfaces aren't that unique/special/awesome.

OZCOIN is Australian. LOL AUSTRALIAN. I have them as a backup pool, since I figure if we (the pools located in parts of the world that don't have sex with kangaroos) all get DDOSed, OZCOIN might still be up. Please note: I'm kidding, OZCOIN, I love you, and have nothing against you.

EMC is just screaming to be screwed over with that whole Paypal thing. I can see that ending incredibly poorly. Plus, at, what, sub 200GH/s, the payout routine would bother the hell out of me.

ABCPool.co: This is where I'm currently at, mostly because, frankly, I'm lazy, easily bored, and just want my X amount of BTC a day. I then turn my X amount of BTC a day into X amount of dollars and spend the dollars on Yuengling. With ABCPool.co, I know I can buy X amount of Yuengling, drink my problems away, and forget about another week of life. I don't care how many coins we've found, I don't take glee in "Beating" anyone else in stats (because all it means is I bought more 5830s from Amazon than you, nothing else. It's not a skill, it's a money pit. Congrats, we've pissed away money on old video cards). I don't care what coins I found. I don't care how I compare to every other person in the galaxy. I just want my X amount of BTC a day, a stable server, and payouts. And ABC delivers that. I don't have to THINK. I just CLICK, and turn away. There's no surprises. There's no "oh, my heavens, we didn't find a coin for 12 hours, now I'm sad in the pants". If and when they add Namecoin mining, for that 1% bonus or whatever, that'd be even better.

But, each to their own, clearly.

[Inaba]

And how exactly is EMC's "Paypal thing" just screaming to be screwed?  First off, Paypal payments have been fine since the pool started in May (or was it June?) - if it was just screaming to get screwed, why hasn't it happened yet?  Secondly, I have worked directly with Paypal both through email and on the phone to setup the automated payments system for the site and they are fully aware of how the payments are handled, for what, when and why.  

Lastly, even if, for some reason Paypal decided to change their mind (which seems unlikely at this point, as I've processed thousands of payments through them) - how, exactly would that "screw" anyone, other than the Paypal option not being available anymore?

So I have to ask, how exactly would that end incredibly poorly under any circumstance?  

Now as for the "payout routine" - what does the hashrate have to do with the "payout routine," exactly?  You get paid just like any other pool... That said, ABCpool.co is a good pool though, I certainly don't have anything bad to say about them.  However, I have a really hard time trusting any PPS pool that isn't charging a fee - it's virtually unsustainable in the long run without huge cash reserves.  But it's good stuff while it's around!  Remember, there's no upper bound on the number of shares for bad luck but there's a lower bound of 1 on good luck.  

Besides, we have a cashout option to get your coins whenever you want (including your unconfirmed and even your unrealized score value) immediately if you just can't wait.

[kano]

Completely off topic, but I'd prefer not to leave it unsaid:
Yes I agree with Inaba - the PayPal issue is in the other direction.
The problem is random people paying with PayPal and then reversing their charges - coz in all those random people there's going to be someone who will try it.

But when one source is paying lots of people with PayPal, I don't see the problem either.
Of course Inaba could change his mind and start making payment cancellations, but why would he?
Not really much benefit in doing that and certainly a great loss in clients ...

Which reminds me ... I should ask TradeHill and MTGox to offer PayPal payments (not accepting PayPal, paying out with PayPal)
Next on my list of things to do ...

[Meni Rosenfeld]

Ars isn't PPS, it's SMPPS. Don't dilute the term PPS by conflating it with other methods.

Which reminds me ... I should ask TradeHill and MTGox to offer PayPal payments (not accepting PayPal, paying out with PayPal)
Next on my list of things to do ...

Do you seriously think they're not completely aware how many customers they would get if they could pull it off? PayPal has already frozen an account used by mtgox once, and mndrix's, and any other Bitcoin-PayPal exchange service.

It's interesting that they let Inaba off the hook, probably because he's not doing currency exchange but only paying for doing computational work.

Now as for the "payout routine" - what does the hashrate have to do with the "payout routine," exactly?  You get paid just like any other pool...

If the pool's hashrate is low, and the reward method does not reduce pool-based variance, then miners will have high variance. If the pool uses PPS then the pool's hashrate is irrelevant for miners.

That said, ABCpool.co is a good pool though, I certainly don't have anything bad to say about them.  However, I have a really hard time trusting any PPS pool that isn't charging a fee - it's virtually unsustainable in the long run without huge cash reserves.

ABCpool sets the donation to 4% by default. I'm not sure how other pools do it but it seems a bit underhanded. Pools need fees, to compensate for work, hosting and (especially in PPS) risk, and pools get shut down every Monday and Thursday because their revenues do not justify these costs. We understand that. But please, be forthcoming about this, figure out what fees you need and openly publish them, don't play games.

[kano]

7.5% surcharge on Paypal Payouts ... OK I'm over that idea already ...

[chunglam]

I also highly recommend ABCPool.

That said, ABCpool.co is a good pool though, I certainly don't have anything bad to say about them.  However, I have a really hard time trusting any PPS pool that isn't charging a fee - it's virtually unsustainable in the long run without huge cash reserves.  But it's good stuff while it's around!  Remember, there's no upper bound on the number of shares for bad luck but there's a lower bound of 1 on good luck. 

I will leave it to pool owner to worry the sustainable issue . As long as you don't leave huge balance in pool wallet, you have nothing to lose.

ABCpool sets the donation to 4% by default. I'm not sure how other pools do it but it seems a bit underhanded. Pools need fees, to compensate for work, hosting and (especially in PPS) risk, and pools get shut down every Monday and Thursday because their revenues do not justify these costs. We understand that. But please, be forthcoming about this, figure out what fees you need and openly publish them, don't play games.

At least you could set it to smaller value if you want. I used to donate 1.5%. Since now pool's hashrate jump to 440GH/s, I decrease it to 1%.

[Inaba]

Holy crap, 4%!  At Hotdogs hashrate that's like $100 a month!  I'll wait 15 hours for $100, jeez.

[TheMalon]

What about Eligius?

[kano]

What about Eligius?

Read the payout scheme details ... then you'll understand the probable reason why no one mentioned it.
(then of course there's the fact that the pool also severely screws with the block times ... IMO it's gotta be buggy to make it as bad as it is)

[redditorrex]

Mt.Red has room for miners. + tons of new features.

[TheMalon]

What about Eligius?

Read the payout scheme details ... then you'll understand the probable reason why no one mentioned it.
(then of course there's the fact that the pool also severely screws with the block times ... IMO it's gotta be buggy to make it as bad as it is)

Did it (again) and i don't see anything "wrong" ... can you be more clear?

[Meni Rosenfeld]

What about Eligius?

Read the payout scheme details ... then you'll understand the probable reason why no one mentioned it.
(then of course there's the fact that the pool also severely screws with the block times ... IMO it's gotta be buggy to make it as bad as it is)

Did it (again) and i don't see anything "wrong" ... can you be more clear?

I don't know what kano meant since Eligius uses SMPPS, just like arsbitcoin. If you want to know what's wrong with SMPPS you can have a look at section "Shared maximum pay-per-share (SMPPS)" (currently 4.2) of Analysis of Bitcoin Pooled Mining Reward Systems.

[Luke-Jr]

If you want to know what's wrong with SMPPS you can have a look at section "Shared maximum pay-per-share (SMPPS)" (currently 4.2) of Analysis of Bitcoin Pooled Mining Reward Systems.

Put bluntly, this paper is wrong and biased:

• MPPS does pay out fairly over the long-term to fair miners, at least in practice.
• While it is true that hoppers can hurt fair miners with MPPS, they have no incentive to do so. (remember that any pool can be hurt by the block withholding attack, so this is not a significant flaw)
• Terminology: SMPPS does not accrue "debt", but issues fiat "extra credits" when it cannot pay Bitcoins.
• SMPPS, in theory, will always drift toward 0-buffer 0-credit, it does not have any inherent negative drift.
• In practice, SMPPS has proven to have a positive buffer much more than zero (on Eligius, we have only very briefly hit 0-buffer a few times)
• While in theory, people might "hop" off SMPPS when it has no buffer, this is in practice not a problem. There was no mass exodus from Ars when its buffer hit zero and began issuing extra credit, and by now everyone has observed that so long as the pool remains online, it will eventually recover. Furthermore, this kind of "hopping" does not benefit the hopper nor harm the non-hopper.

Note that I only read the "Attempts for risk-free pay-per-share" section, and am not attempting to cover the other methods here.

[Meni Rosenfeld]

If you want to know what's wrong with SMPPS you can have a look at section "Shared maximum pay-per-share (SMPPS)" (currently 4.2) of Analysis of Bitcoin Pooled Mining Reward Systems.

Put bluntly, this paper is wrong and biased:

Arguing with you is futile, but I'll try. Obviously the paper is neither wrong nor biased.

• MPPS does pay out fairly over the long-term to fair miners, at least in practice.

You saying it doesn't make it true. Is there a factual error in what was written about MPPS?

• While it is true that hoppers can hurt fair miners with MPPS, they have no incentive to do so. (remember that any pool can be hurt by the block withholding attack, so this is not a significant flaw)

They do, it increases their expected payout and reduces its variance. I wasn't talking about block withholding.

• SMPPS, in theory, will always drift toward 0-buffer 0-credit, it does not have any inherent negative drift.

The drift is caused by external factors such as invalid blocks and withholding. In other methods these cause a decrease in profitability but not an expediting of a collapse.

• In practice, SMPPS has proven to have a positive buffer much more than zero (on Eligius, we have only very briefly hit 0-buffer a few times)

Look up "randomness". Just because Eligius' buffer had a certain manifested trajectory is very little evidence of anything.

• While in theory, people might "hop" off SMPPS when it has no buffer, this is in practice not a problem. There was no mass exodus from Ars when its buffer hit zero and began issuing extra credit, and by now everyone has observed that so long as the pool remains online, it will eventually recover. Furthermore, this kind of "hopping" does not benefit the hopper nor harm the non-hopper.

This kind of hopping does benefit the hopper and harm the non-hopper. Currently hoppers are busy with the proportional pools, they'll be happy to take advantage of SMPPS once those are gone. By your own admission the pool has only dipped in negative buffer area, so there was no observation of what happens when it is seriously negative.

[Inaba]

While I will always defer to Meni with regards to the rigorous math, and I respect Luke-Jr's abilities and contributions to the bitcoin community, saying that any sort of credit system is not ultimately a downward spiral into oblivion over a long enough time frame is ludicrous.

You can take evidence, if from no other source, than trying to graph the luck of a pool, and it just happens to be a problem I've been working on lately.  There is a lower bound to good luck, that being 1 share.  There is no upper bound to bad luck - that is why, eventually, a pool issuing credit based on future work will eventually end up in the negative.

That said, it's entirely possible that in practice, that this eventuality would not happen in the expected pool lifetime, but to say that it will never happen is pure fallacy.  The time frame for it happening is another issue entirely, and I would have no idea how to even try to calculate that.