[ANN] eCurrency Bitcoin **Gambling** Pool

[adaryian]

Hello everyone!

eCurrency.io is proud to announce the launch of our official gambling mining pool! That's right, when a block is found 10% goes to a lucky random winner!  As long as you have been mining in the past 24 hours of WHEN the block has been discovered and you are ACTIVELY mining, regardless of hashrate, you are officially in the list to win 2.5~ BTC!! 

That's right, 2.5 BTC so long as you remain an active miner and it's found within the last 24 hours of you being active you have a chance to win!

===

How to begin?

|| Getting Started ||

You must register on our pool, http://www.eCurrency.io/

After you have registered and verified your email address with our system.  You are on to logging into your account and setting up your workers and pointing your miners to the pool to start mining!

You can visit our "Help -> Getting Started" section for information on how to join the pool, or below is the information as well:

Hostname: stratum.ecurrency.io
Port: 3333
Username: Username.Worker
Password: x     (typically)

==

You will notice that there is a 12% pool fee.  Quick explanation so that this is in plainview.

10% goes to that lucky winner per block find.  We'll be inputting the users to Random.org and letting them pick the winner.  No winner can win back-to-back, but to keep it fair they will still be placed in following drawing.  If they happened to be chose again, the runner up will be the winner. 

1% goes to pool prizes, which, once we get enough saved up we will be taking that % to give away prizes, TBD by community.  Could be miners, gift cards, BTC donation, whatever!

1% goes to pool maintenance and upkeep.  That means it's going to pay for the server, server upgrades and a very small percent will actually touch my own pocket.. (Enough to by me enough smokes to keep me happy running this thing!)

==

Any questions/comments please leave below I'll do my best to answer them below!  Hope to see you in there!

[adaryian]

Accounts must be registered with eCurrency before 12PM EST to be included in the following days mining.

[adaryian]

New registrations are being accepted now for new spots for tomorrow.  Be sure to have them in before 12PM EST 7/23/14 to be added to the registered accounts.

[jonnybravo0311]

I'm a bit confused, so maybe you can help me understand.  You're running a pool based on p2pool technology, or a pool that actually runs on the p2pool network?

Assuming the first case, then what?  You get a bunch of people to mine on this pool, where by your statements the reward for the first few blocks the pool finds belong to you to "seed" the payouts.

After this time, for every block found, one miner will receive 25% of the block reward (6.25BTC), you get 1% for running the pool and the remainder of the miners split the 74%.  I'm still at a loss to figure out where the original few block's worth of BTC went.

Assuming the second case, where you're just running another p2pool node, how is this in any way beneficial to a particular miner?  When a block is found, it's split amongst every p2pool miner according to how many shares that miner has on the chain.  Are you stating that miners on your node will somehow receive an additional payout from you equal to 25% of the pool's income?  How does the pool generate income in this case, I mean other than that 1% fee?

[adaryian]

I'm a bit confused, so maybe you can help me understand.  You're running a pool based on p2pool technology, or a pool that actually runs on the p2pool network?

Assuming the first case, then what?  You get a bunch of people to mine on this pool, where by your statements the reward for the first few blocks the pool finds belong to you to "seed" the payouts.

After this time, for every block found, one miner will receive 25% of the block reward (6.25BTC), you get 1% for running the pool and the remainder of the miners split the 74%.  I'm still at a loss to figure out where the original few block's worth of BTC went.

Assuming the second case, where you're just running another p2pool node, how is this in any way beneficial to a particular miner?  When a block is found, it's split amongst every p2pool miner according to how many shares that miner has on the chain.  Are you stating that miners on your node will somehow receive an additional payout from you equal to 25% of the pool's income?  How does the pool generate income in this case, I mean other than that 1% fee?

It's a pool ran on the p2pool network.  I think you're looking at it in a negative way.  A lot of people play Satoshi Dice and or similar games in hopes to win.  Some do, some don't, but either way we all lose in the end because the house always has the advantage.

Where as in this case, you're still making nearly 75% (74% to be accurate) of your normal income, however, you have the chance to win 25% of the entire pools income for that 24 hour period of time, which is kept on a public spreadsheet on Google Doc's so that everyone can see and it's impossible for a winner to win twice in a row by some off chance.

So if you have 300 GH/s or 3TH/s when combined, and this may seem optimistic, but still nevertheless noteworthy.  Is that if for example we have 1 PH/s mining and a block is found 25% of the winnings for that day is very substantial versus someone mining at even 2TH/s, let alone the minimum needed to join being 300 GH/s.

As for the statement on the pool keeping the funds, I've already pointed a minimum of 300 GH/s to get the ball rolling.  So if someone were to join by the time they start mining, regardless if they find a share or 100 shares there is equal stakes being made.

The 1% as I stated, will be split amongst the amount of BTC the pool collectively mines, not 25 BTC as we're not a mining pool mining solo.  (Though, if it grows large enough that option, I would like to introduce..) The 1% is divided at 0.25% going to the pool operator, being myself as I think I should be rewarded for my time and efforts, the remainder will be held for server upgrades and possibly even venturing into running a non-P2Pool node if we have enough hashing power, which would require better servers, programmers, people who will also want to be paid for their efforts and time.  1% pool fee on a non 25BTC receiving pool isn't all that much, even if we get enough to get 5 BTC per block, that's only 0.05 BTC.  But with time and savings that can be a good savings for future development and possibly even prizes too.

I'm not saying this is the pool for everyone.  However, if you like to gamble BTC anyways and you're mining, this is a win-win as you're still getting paid and you'll also have the chance to still win big.

I hope that answered your questions, if you have any others please ask away.  Hope to have you join us if you're interested!

-Adaryian

[jonnybravo0311]

I don't believe I'm looking at this in a negative way, and if it came across that way, I apologize.  I am, however, looking at this in a confused way, so please bear with me.

Based on your last post, it seems that you're running a standard p2pool node and trying to add on this extra "gambling" functionality.  This is where I am confused.  Every p2pool miner, no matter on which node they mine, is still submitting shares to the share chain.  If I moved from my node to windpath's to OgNasty's to yours, it wouldn't make any difference to my earnings because the share chain remains constant on every node.

The only way you, or any other node operator, can dictate a reduction in a miner's earnings is by charging a fee.  Therefore, any income your node has to award is based solely on this fee.  You mention that a miner would earn 74% of normal, with a chance to win an extra 25%.  The remaining 1% would be kept by the node (0.25% going to you personally and the remaining 0.75% to the node for operational expenses).  In order to accomplish this, the only way I know is that you are charging a 26% fee on your node.

If that is a correct assessment, then you've got a pretty interesting concept.  You've also got a ton of work to do to maintain the gambling aspect.  You'll have to keep a database of all miners that have connected to your node, which stores the miner's address, the timestamp they started mining, the timestamp they stopped mining and all shares they submitted on your node during that timeframe.

Regardless of the technical details on how to manage the miners who have connected, whether or not they are registered to be a part of the contest, etc, I still have questions on the implementation you've outlined:

1) What is this "fair GH" formula you outline?  This is not how p2pool pays a miner.  This is more akin to a PPS pool.  So if you are running a p2pool node, then effectively what you're doing is not what I described in my initial paragraph, but rather mining 100% to the node's wallet and then manually making payouts to registered users based upon your formula.  Since there's no guarantee that p2pool will find a block a day, it's no wonder you need seed coin to make this happen.  You're asking early adopting miners to give up not 26% of their income, but virtually 100% of it until such time that there is enough coin in the node's wallet to afford paying out.  When does that period end?  What constitutes "enough" coin in the node's wallet?  For example, let's say you've started this with just 300GH/s.  Currently, in ideal conditions you'd expect to mine 0.008703BTC a day.  If in our example, that's the only miner that ever connects, how do you make a payout if p2pool goes 2 or 3 days without finding a block?  Now what happens when a miner with 3TH/s joins?  There's not enough coin to pay that miner.  Could you please explain how you intend to handle situations where the hashing power is constantly changing?

2) How do you determine a 90% mining rate?  When a user registers, is that user expected to tell you how much hashing power he is contributing?  For example, let's say that I join with 1TH/s.  I keep that hashing away on your pool for 2 days.  Halfway through the third day, I drop 500GH/s (a few of the boards on my miner died, boo!).  Now it would appear that on day 3 I am hashing at less than the required 90% rate.  What do you do in such a case?  Do I get disqualified for that day's potential winnings?  From my perspective, I'm still pointing 100% of my hashing power to your pool, unfortunately, it is 50% less than it was previously.

3) What defines a 24 hour period?  Is it from the time a miner connects, or a fixed point in the day.  You mention that a miner must join prior to 1200h EDT to be included in the following day's drawing.  So, if I happen to join at 1201h, I must wait 47 hours, 59 minutes and 59 seconds until I am eligible?

I apologize for the long-winded post.  As I stated, I think you've got a pretty interesting concept, but I'm struggling to understand its implementation.  Thanks in advance for your replies.

[adaryian]

I don't believe I'm looking at this in a negative way, and if it came across that way, I apologize.  I am, however, looking at this in a confused way, so please bear with me.

Based on your last post, it seems that you're running a standard p2pool node and trying to add on this extra "gambling" functionality.  This is where I am confused.  Every p2pool miner, no matter on which node they mine, is still submitting shares to the share chain.  If I moved from my node to windpath's to OgNasty's to yours, it wouldn't make any difference to my earnings because the share chain remains constant on every node.

The only way you, or any other node operator, can dictate a reduction in a miner's earnings is by charging a fee.  Therefore, any income your node has to award is based solely on this fee.  You mention that a miner would earn 74% of normal, with a chance to win an extra 25%.  The remaining 1% would be kept by the node (0.25% going to you personally and the remaining 0.75% to the node for operational expenses).  In order to accomplish this, the only way I know is that you are charging a 26% fee on your node.

If that is a correct assessment, then you've got a pretty interesting concept.  You've also got a ton of work to do to maintain the gambling aspect.  You'll have to keep a database of all miners that have connected to your node, which stores the miner's address, the timestamp they started mining, the timestamp they stopped mining and all shares they submitted on your node during that timeframe.

Regardless of the technical details on how to manage the miners who have connected, whether or not they are registered to be a part of the contest, etc, I still have questions on the implementation you've outlined:

1) What is this "fair GH" formula you outline?  This is not how p2pool pays a miner.  This is more akin to a PPS pool.  So if you are running a p2pool node, then effectively what you're doing is not what I described in my initial paragraph, but rather mining 100% to the node's wallet and then manually making payouts to registered users based upon your formula.  Since there's no guarantee that p2pool will find a block a day, it's no wonder you need seed coin to make this happen.  You're asking early adopting miners to give up not 26% of their income, but virtually 100% of it until such time that there is enough coin in the node's wallet to afford paying out.  When does that period end?  What constitutes "enough" coin in the node's wallet?  For example, let's say you've started this with just 300GH/s.  Currently, in ideal conditions you'd expect to mine 0.008703BTC a day.  If in our example, that's the only miner that ever connects, how do you make a payout if p2pool goes 2 or 3 days without finding a block?  Now what happens when a miner with 3TH/s joins?  There's not enough coin to pay that miner.  Could you please explain how you intend to handle situations where the hashing power is constantly changing?

2) How do you determine a 90% mining rate?  When a user registers, is that user expected to tell you how much hashing power he is contributing?  For example, let's say that I join with 1TH/s.  I keep that hashing away on your pool for 2 days.  Halfway through the third day, I drop 500GH/s (a few of the boards on my miner died, boo!).  Now it would appear that on day 3 I am hashing at less than the required 90% rate.  What do you do in such a case?  Do I get disqualified for that day's potential winnings?  From my perspective, I'm still pointing 100% of my hashing power to your pool, unfortunately, it is 50% less than it was previously.

3) What defines a 24 hour period?  Is it from the time a miner connects, or a fixed point in the day.  You mention that a miner must join prior to 1200h EDT to be included in the following day's drawing.  So, if I happen to join at 1201h, I must wait 47 hours, 59 minutes and 59 seconds until I am eligible?

I apologize for the long-winded post.  As I stated, I think you've got a pretty interesting concept, but I'm struggling to understand its implementation.  Thanks in advance for your replies.

Sorry for implying you were looking at it negatively.  I'm going to answer the questions in bold below this post, underneath your questions to my best ability.  I think this personally, is a great concept as I don't believe I've ever seen anyone do it before (but I may be wrong.)  I was messaged recently about this pool and I didn't give it much thought until you brought up some interesting points.  

P2Pool is a great service, but eventually we will grow out of it and instead of causing more growing pains then necessary it seems like a wiser move to already have our own pool, which will allow us more freedom to .. do what we want.  So, I'm throwing together MPOS service with Bitcoin where it's very simple to give a 25% block finder fee, HOWEVER that 25% will always go to the pool's wallet.  I'll have direct access to instantly gather the information on who has joined in the last 24 hours from when the reward should be done and I can take that information and compare it to the users' statistics.  Then I can verify that they have been mining at least 90% of the time.  Now to explain that.

It wouldn't really matter much if you went from 1TH/s to 500GH/s you're still mining, but if you go from 1TH/s to dead then we have a problem.  You see, whether you decide to mine for 16 hours at 1TH/s and then drop to 500GH/s the last 8 hours has absolutely no bearing on whether you'll win or lose the "jackpot" as it's being drawn randomly.  The incentive is to throw all your mining power to it, so that we find blocks faster, thus giving you a better chance at winning the "jackpot" more often then not.  Sure, your income will vary from 1TH/s to 500GH/s as we all know will happen in ANY pool as it still is a PPLNS system which will pay you as you know for the work you contributed (up to the 74%).

So, you won't be punished for dropping or growing in hashing speed other than what you're paid out in PPLNS as the "jackpot" will be randomly drawn from Random.org's website and no one will know the result of it until after the drawing has taken place.

That whole procedure right now is very gritty and not fluid in terms of automation as there will have to be manual intervention, but given time and understanding and if I have to hire someone to code that if it's out of my realm of understanding then so be it, but eventually we'll get to an automated system where it will use the Random.org's 'Third Party Draw Service' to complete this task.  As of right now, it will be manual.

[jonnybravo0311]

Thanks for the reply so far.  I think you actually cleared quite a bit of it up when you said it was an MPOS pool.  As you stated, you can easily setup whatever fee structure you want, so 25% goes to "jackpot" wallet, 0.25% goes to your own wallet and 0.75% goes to some "node maintenance" one.  Easy enough... then you just setup the pool for PPLNS and you're good to go.

[adaryian]

Thanks for the reply so far.  I think you actually cleared quite a bit of it up when you said it was an MPOS pool.  As you stated, you can easily setup whatever fee structure you want, so 25% goes to "jackpot" wallet, 0.25% goes to your own wallet and 0.75% goes to some "node maintenance" one.  Easy enough... then you just setup the pool for PPLNS and you're good to go.

Exactly.  I originally thought that doing the P2Pool would help eliminate some variance in the payout, but since it's sitting at 1 PH/s currently, a pool like this could just as easily, equally match that hash rate.. so, why put forth extra effort when it's really not needed.

Will keep everyone updated, having a little difficulty with the dashboard which I'm looking into, and then we'll be up and running.

Thanks for your questions and interest!

[adaryian]

Okay, so I had to update the distro as the front end was reliant on a specific piece of software that didn't work in it's predecessor as I thought it would.   Blockchain is downloading and is nearly halfway done.

As of this point everything is working, just now awaiting the blockchain to finish downloading and then the mining can begin!

If you're interested in joining us, we're looking for miners.  This is a private pool, and you'll be emailed login information.  

If you have 300 GH/s + please send me a PM or email at Adaryian@eCurrency.io or Adaryian@outlook.com (both go to the same place).

Let the membership begin!

--

To register, PM/Email me your desired username and your email address if you meet the 300 GH/s requirements.

[copychicken]

nice idea i must say.. well its gambling anyways...

[adaryian]

Locking this thread, as I will be making a new thread to update this one as this has old information that no longer pertains to the current setup.  I will link back to it for future reference or if anyone has any questions about it.