I am selling half of my Bitcoin holdings because of Ghash

[QuestionAuthority]

I understand GHash is presently mining at 29% -- considerably down from the 51% they were mining at earlier.  Did this large decline in mining rate come about as a result of them voluntarily cutting back on their mining operations (or redirecting them elsewhere)?  Or, as I understand, were they a direct result of some actors within the community taking directed actions against GHash?  If the latter, then it seems that there is already an emergent mechanism in place for protecting the market against rogue operators.  I would be tempted to hold long enough to ascertain whether or not this mechanism can be relied upon in the future to take the necessary action should this happen again.  Presumably the threshold for going into action will be lower the next time (40% is already excessive).

What's the total of unknown + Ghash? I think you might find that they are currently way over 51%. I do appreciate them making the pie chart look all pretty again though.

[Kprawn]

Well I think the solution will be to get big investors. {Oil companies} to fund the smaller unknown mining operations, to counter Ghash.

Or more people, caring about this, to invest in the smaller unknown miners.

I doubt, when Satoshi envisioned this currency in the beginning, that he wanted only big companies doing all the mining.

Your best bet would be to invest in smaller operations, to cancel the 51% attack. NOT to sell all your coins in fear of it.

Most people on this forum, agree that mining for bitcoins with GPU's are gone, but mining with ASIC is still possible. So subsidize smaller "unknowns" with investment capital for them to be competitive, instead of buying hash with ROI periods of 10 months or more.

According to Andreas M. Antonopoulos there are many ways to counter 51% attacks, they have just not implemented it yet or needed to.

[QuestionAuthority]

Well I think the solution will be to get big investors. {Oil companies} to fund the smaller unknown mining operations, to counter Ghash.

Or more people, caring about this, to invest in the smaller unknown miners.

I doubt, when Satoshi envisioned this currency in the beginning, that he wanted only big companies doing all the mining.

Your best bet would be to invest in smaller operations, to cancel the 51% attack. NOT to sell all your coins in fear of it.

Most people on this forum, agree that mining for bitcoins with GPU's are gone, but mining with ASIC is still possible. So subsidize smaller "unknowns" with investment capital for them to be competitive, instead of buying hash with ROI periods of 10 months or more.

According to Andreas M. Antonopoulos there are many ways to counter 51% attacks, they have just not implemented it yet or needed to.

The bible (white paper) tells a story of pure greed. Their is no reason to a fear a node with controlling interest in the system because their rational self interest, being the same as ours, is for more wealth.

The incentive may help encourage nodes to stay honest. If a greedy attacker is able to assemble more CPU power than all the honest nodes, he would have to choose between using it to defraud people by stealing back his payments, or using it to generate new coins. He ought to find it more profitable to play by the rules, such rules that favour him with more new coins than everyone else combined, than to undermine the system and the validity of his own wealth.

I suppose being a scientist his failure to take political, social or psychological perspectives into account is understandable. Greed is the only reason to not take action against Bitcoin when you are in control. Governments pour trillions of dollars into self preservation annually. Crazy people kill just because they can do it. Radicals, believing their way is the only way, forgo personal wealth and chain themselves to trees to stop what they believe is the ultimate evil. There are major holes in the original structure of Bitcoin. Nakamoto did a good job with the organization of the concept by building on a foundation laid by the leading minds of the time but the practical application is unworkable without modification.

[LiteCoinGuy]

I'm converting half of my Bitcoin to gold temporarily, and investigating other altcoins which could one day replace Bitcoin.  Cryptocurrency needs to be invulnerable to 51% attacks, or the entire theme of decentralization becomes a mockery.

Dr. Michael Moriarty

yeah, like Litecoin, good job Dr.   

[bEGPO cNuPTA]

I agree with your point OP except you shouldn't just sell them into fiat. Why don't you hedge your bet by making a major purchase with half of your Bitcoin. That way you can make the statement you want, eliminate some of the risk of holding too much of a high risk investment and help the community at the same time. What Bitcoin needs badly is greater velocity of circulation. You would be doing a great favor for the community.

Didn't he say he was going BTC -> gold and holding gold as a stopgap measure? Or did I misunderstand.

And what type of purchase do you have in mind?

[QuestionAuthority]

I agree with your point OP except you shouldn't just sell them into fiat. Why don't you hedge your bet by making a major purchase with half of your Bitcoin. That way you can make the statement you want, eliminate some of the risk of holding too much of a high risk investment and help the community at the same time. What Bitcoin needs badly is greater velocity of circulation. You would be doing a great favor for the community.

Didn't he say he was going BTC -> gold and holding gold as a stopgap measure? Or did I misunderstand.

And what type of purchase do you have in mind?

I would try to live on it if I could. I know I'm getting rid of half so why not pay for everything in your life with it and benefit Bitcoin in the process. If you were right you only lost half of your Bitcoins. If you were wrong it wouldn't matter because you helped the economy grow. Almost a win-win.

[S4VV4S]

Is it me or is the Dr. gone ever since I asked how many coins and at what price will he be willing to part with them?

[QuestionAuthority]

Is it me or is the Dr. gone ever since I asked how many coins and at what price will he be willing to part with them?

Page after page of people making fun of him and he abandons the thread. Funny that?

[Beliathon]

Unfortunately, I'm following in Peter Todd's footsteps.

Unfortunately for you. Fortunately for all the smart(er) people who will buy up those coins at ~$600 and sell at $1,000, $6,000, or $60,000 per BTC. Don't say I didn't warn you.

[Argwai96]

Personally, I prefer to time the market for my exit, if I'm going to drop 50% of my holdings. We're primed for another push to $700s-$800s. Then I'd unload.

[bEGPO cNuPTA]

I agree with your point OP except you shouldn't just sell them into fiat. Why don't you hedge your bet by making a major purchase with half of your Bitcoin. That way you can make the statement you want, eliminate some of the risk of holding too much of a high risk investment and help the community at the same time. What Bitcoin needs badly is greater velocity of circulation. You would be doing a great favor for the community.

Didn't he say he was going BTC -> gold and holding gold as a stopgap measure? Or did I misunderstand.

And what type of purchase do you have in mind?

I would try to live on it if I could. I know I'm getting rid of half so why not pay for everything in your life with it and benefit Bitcoin in the process. If you were right you only lost half of your Bitcoins. If you were wrong it wouldn't matter because you helped the economy grow. Almost a win-win.

That's a pretty good idea. Buy everything you need off Amazon via gift cards ect. Book any travel on Expedia. Things like that are good and help support the companies that have stepped up to accept btc.

[QuestionAuthority]

I agree with your point OP except you shouldn't just sell them into fiat. Why don't you hedge your bet by making a major purchase with half of your Bitcoin. That way you can make the statement you want, eliminate some of the risk of holding too much of a high risk investment and help the community at the same time. What Bitcoin needs badly is greater velocity of circulation. You would be doing a great favor for the community.

Didn't he say he was going BTC -> gold and holding gold as a stopgap measure? Or did I misunderstand.

And what type of purchase do you have in mind?

I would try to live on it if I could. I know I'm getting rid of half so why not pay for everything in your life with it and benefit Bitcoin in the process. If you were right you only lost half of your Bitcoins. If you were wrong it wouldn't matter because you helped the economy grow. Almost a win-win.

That's a pretty good idea. Buy everything you need off Amazon via gift cards ect. Book any travel on Expedia. Things like that are good and help support the companies that have stepped up to accept btc.

Exactly! Make the companies that support Bitcoin proud of their decision, help Bitcoin, hedge your investment, stand up for your principles, bla, bla, bla.

[redhawk979]

Gavin has said he has some code sitting aside for this when it becomes a critical issue, so to brush it off is stupid otherwise he wouldn't care at all.

[ThomasCrowne]

ive actually been giving this some thought as well.  even though i'm only sitting on a couple of coins personally all this talk of ghash.io 51% attack (intentional or not) has me a bit worried

[fryarminer]

I'm converting half of my Bitcoin to gold temporarily, and investigating other altcoins which could one day replace Bitcoin.  Cryptocurrency needs to be invulnerable to 51% attacks, or the entire theme of decentralization becomes a mockery.

Dr. Michael Moriarty

yeah, like Litecoin, good job Dr.   

Stupid question: Is Litecoin vulnerable to a 51% attack? Sorry stupid question but I haven't studied much on Litecoin.

If it's not, this would be its opportunity to really take off. Now that BTC price is going up, it seems that Ghash is also getting more hash rate - it wouldn't surprise me if they are purposely doing this to control the btc price.

[moriartybitcoin]

Yes, Litecoin is vulnerable too - the Coinotron Pool represents a major 51% threat on Litecoin.

NXT is an interesting crypto because it is NOT vulnerable to 51% attack since mining occurs within the user's wallets.

Most major cryptos are mined by ASIC hardware which ends up resulting in mining pool monopolies like Ghash, Coinotron, etc. 

In my opinion, Bitcoin needs to undergo some major changes at the protocol level to mitigate the threat posted by 51%.  This is not the first or last time we'll be facing such a potential calamity.  If Bitcoin can't overcome this threat, I think we need to investigate mass exodus from Bitcoin into some other more stable and truly decentralized crypto - like NXT. 

Disclaimer: I am not particularly knowledgeable about NXT and I don't advocate it right now.  I simply like the idea that it can't be attacked by 51%.

[moriartybitcoin]

Personally, I prefer to time the market for my exit, if I'm going to drop 50% of my holdings. We're primed for another push to $700s-$800s. Then I'd unload.

I think Bitcoin is heading to $1000+ after the US Marshall sale.

Problem is, it's hard to estimate the 'real' price of Bitcoin, and it's hard to figure out when massive speculation is driving up the price beyond realistic levels.  As we learned from the Gox fiasco, it is also very difficult to determine when price spikes are due to intentional manipulation by trading bots on large exchanges.  Like MtGox, BitStamp AND BTC-E both have the power to manipulate the Bitcoin price due to shady trading activities ...

[devphp]

If you're fascinated with Proof-of-Work and are afraid of 51% attack, Myriadcoin is the coin for you.
If you're ok with Proof-of-Stake, nothing better than NXT right now.

[darkota]

The OP didnt sell shit.

Obvious way to try and make the bitcoin price drop down so he could buy in lower.

If he did "sell", I'm sure he had like .005 bitcoin anyway, so .00025 bitcoin sold. wow big deal.

[beetcoin]

The OP didnt sell shit.

Obvious way to try and make the bitcoin price drop down so he could buy in lower.

If he did "sell", I'm sure he had like .005 bitcoin anyway, so .00025 bitcoin sold. wow big deal.

good job jumping to a conclusion. how do you know he didn't sell the coins? you could be right, but you could also be wrong. no need for armchair detective work.. if you aren't actually doing any detective work.