What would make you switch pools?

[mdiggy]

Hello Bitcointalk,
We are looking to start a new pool with incentives and other motivations to join, but want to learn about what would make you switch to a new mining pool.
Thanks for the help!
Link: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1bX9JfDpIMqD3OmIAJmDDlXHznikQg_rbyCy9EeY-WTo/viewform?usp=send_form

[jonnybravo0311]

I like to have control over my mining experience.  I own and maintain the hardware.  I operate a p2pool node.  I like the idea behind p2pool as a vast network of individual nodes that ultimately make up a single entity trying to solve blocks.  I get to determine if I want to donate to the author.  I get to determine if I want to charge people fees for mining on my node.  I get newly-minted coins when blocks are found.

With all of its benefits, p2pool has a pretty significant flaw, that is becoming more and more apparent.  The flaw is that the bigger the pool gets, the more variance the individual miner experiences.  This is completely the opposite of how things work in other pools.  Why?  Because of the share chain that is the core of p2pool.  Just like the Bitcoin block chain, the share chain has a mechanism to keep the average share time to a given value.  Bitcoin is 10 minutes.  The share chain is 30 seconds.  And just like Bitcoin, as you increase hash rate, you increase the difficulty to keep that value.  Consequently, as that difficulty increases, your hardware has less and less of a chance of getting a share onto the chain, so you have less and less of a chance to get any payout when a block is solved.

So, what would make me switch?  Provide me with the same level of control as I get with p2pool, keep the decentralized nature of the pool, but solve the variance problem.

[Ayers]

unless a large % of miners migrate in a new pool it's very hard for one single man to migrate alone, less earning, maybe something simple and intuitive can help

[Kprawn]

I hate bad support, when you run into troubles. And I hate it even more when you have to jump through 50 hoops before you can start mining.

Some of these pools have crazy requirements and things to do before you can join. 

[QuiveringGibbage]

https://ozcoin.net is running campaign atm..

3rd Anniversary of Ozcoin Bitcoin mining, to celebrate:
Blockfinders bonus reward 0.5BTC per block for the next 9 block solves
1 random share per round will be awarded 0.1BTC for the next 9 rounds

always nice to receive rewards for finding blocks

QG

[jonnybravo0311]

https://ozcoin.net is running campaign atm..

3rd Anniversary of Ozcoin Bitcoin mining, to celebrate:
Blockfinders bonus reward 0.5BTC per block for the next 9 block solves
1 random share per round will be awarded 0.1BTC for the next 9 rounds

always nice to receive rewards for finding blocks

QG

That's a pretty nice little promotion.  Congrats to the Ozcoin guys for 3 years running!  Shameless p2pool plug here: block finders in p2pool are always rewarded with 1/200 of the BTC reward (currently, that's 0.125BTC).

[DrHaribo]

That's a pretty nice little promotion.  Congrats to the Ozcoin guys for 3 years running!  Shameless p2pool plug here: block finders in p2pool are always rewarded with 1/200 of the BTC reward (currently, that's 0.125BTC).

So when it wasn't you that found the block, you pay a 0.5% fee to the block finder? That will just increase your variance, not give you higher payouts overall.

[kgb2mining]

So when it wasn't you that found the block, you pay a 0.5% fee to the block finder? That will just increase your variance, not give you higher payouts overall.

Not quite.  The 0.5% is "taken off the top", not donated by other miners.  The first 0.5% is rewarded to the node/miner that found the block, then the rest of the 99.5% is evenly distributed amongst the rest of the miners.

There is no fee otherwise, unless you as a pool node operator decide to put one in on your node.  And even then it only affects any miners connecting to your particular p2pool node, no others.

[DrHaribo]

So when it wasn't you that found the block, you pay a 0.5% fee to the block finder? That will just increase your variance, not give you higher payouts overall.

Not quite.  The 0.5% is "taken off the top", not donated by other miners.  The first 0.5% is rewarded to the node/miner that found the block, then the rest of the 99.5% is evenly distributed amongst the rest of the miners.

So if you didn't find the block, you pay some of your income to the one who did.

Psychologically it may feel great to have a block bonus, but what it means is that you earn less all the rest of the time (when you didn't find the block). Your average earnings are the same, but the variance is increased.

[jonnybravo0311]

So when it wasn't you that found the block, you pay a 0.5% fee to the block finder? That will just increase your variance, not give you higher payouts overall.

Not quite.  The 0.5% is "taken off the top", not donated by other miners.  The first 0.5% is rewarded to the node/miner that found the block, then the rest of the 99.5% is evenly distributed amongst the rest of the miners.

There is no fee otherwise, unless you as a pool node operator decide to put one in on your node.  And even then it only affects any miners connecting to your particular p2pool node, no others.

The 0.5% is awarded to the miner who found the block, not the node on which they were mining.

So if you didn't find the block, you pay some of your income to the one who did.

Psychologically it may feel great to have a block bonus, but what it means is that you earn less all the rest of the time (when you didn't find the block). Your average earnings are the same, but the variance is increased.

Pretty much summed it up.  0.5% goes to the guy who found the block, the remaining 99.5% goes to everyone else.

[JoseAldo]

the fees, i try to find a pool with the lowest amount of fees and commission

[kgb2mining]

The 0.5% is awarded to the miner who found the block, not the node on which they were mining.

Well, the node could be the miner, right? 
Small enough argument to pick, but yes, my error, the miner.

So if you didn't find the block, you pay some of your income to the one who did.

Psychologically it may feel great to have a block bonus, but what it means is that you earn less all the rest of the time (when you didn't find the block). Your average earnings are the same, but the variance is increased.

Pretty much summed it up.  0.5% goes to the guy who found the block, the remaining 99.5% goes to everyone else.
[/quote]
I'll still argue that you don't earn less than any proprietary pool if that's your comparison.  .5% is as far as I know the lowest of the pools out there.  I'm making more than I did over at BTCGuild by 1.5% all things else the same.

[organofcorti]

So when it wasn't you that found the block, you pay a 0.5% fee to the block finder? That will just increase your variance, not give you higher payouts overall.

Not quite.  The 0.5% is "taken off the top", not donated by other miners.  The first 0.5% is rewarded to the node/miner that found the block, then the rest of the 99.5% is evenly distributed amongst the rest of the miners.

So if you didn't find the block, you pay some of your income to the one who did.

Psychologically it may feel great to have a block bonus, but what it means is that you earn less all the rest of the time (when you didn't find the block). Your average earnings are the same, but the variance is increased.

My reading was that it was a bonus donated by the Ozcoin's management as a celebratory reward to miners, and that it was coming out of the pool op's pockets, not out of the pool fee. So the variance does increase, but so does the expectation (compared to rounds where an extra 0.6 btc per round is not awarded).

[DrHaribo]

My reading was that it was a bonus donated by the Ozcoin's management as a celebratory reward to miners, and that it was coming out of the pool op's pockets, not out of the pool fee. So the variance does increase, but so does the expectation (compared to rounds where an extra 0.6 btc per round is not awarded).

On Ozcoin yeah, but this was the p2pool block finder bonus.

[organofcorti]

My reading was that it was a bonus donated by the Ozcoin's management as a celebratory reward to miners, and that it was coming out of the pool op's pockets, not out of the pool fee. So the variance does increase, but so does the expectation (compared to rounds where an extra 0.6 btc per round is not awarded).

On Ozcoin yeah, but this was the p2pool block finder bonus.

You guys! Changing subjects in the middle of a paragraph!

When will you learn that most btctalk members only read the beginning and ending of any given post?

[DrHaribo]

 

[jonnybravo0311]

The 0.5% is awarded to the miner who found the block, not the node on which they were mining.

Well, the node could be the miner, right? 
Small enough argument to pick, but yes, my error, the miner.

Yes, you could certainly be the only miner on your node (I am on mine).  Didn't mean to make it an argument, and I'm sorry if it came out that way.  This very topic was indeed an argument I've had in the past, where somebody was vehemently stating with absolute conviction that it was the NODE that got the reward, not the miner.  Anyway, it appears you understand the difference, so it's all good

I'll still argue that you don't earn less than any proprietary pool if that's your comparison.  .5% is as far as I know the lowest of the pools out there.  I'm making more than I did over at BTCGuild by 1.5% all things else the same.

There are fee-free pools, an example of which is Eligius.  If you want to see a great comparison between P2Pool, BTCGuild and Eligius, check out this thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=416933.0.  Long running experiment that very clearly shows p2pool doing better.

[eleuthria]

There are fee-free pools, an example of which is Eligius.  If you want to see a great comparison between P2Pool, BTCGuild and Eligius, check out this thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=416933.0.  Long running experiment that very clearly shows p2pool doing better.

Comparing 3 relatively small pools (all 3 are under 8% of the network) will almost always have one showing significantly better.  Had he done his experiment about 9 months ago p2pool would've been dead last by a significant margin.  Luck will affect your earnings on small pools more than anything, because the smaller you are the more you're affected by variance.

Especially true in his experiment, which was done at a point where p2pool simply finding a single block more or less than expected during two weeks would have a massive impact.  Almost the entire difference between p2pool and BTC Guild in his timeline is the difference in the second period's results.

[jonnybravo0311]

There are fee-free pools, an example of which is Eligius.  If you want to see a great comparison between P2Pool, BTCGuild and Eligius, check out this thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=416933.0.  Long running experiment that very clearly shows p2pool doing better.

Comparing 3 relatively small pools (all 3 are under 8% of the network) will almost always have one showing significantly better.  Had he done his experiment about 9 months ago p2pool would've been dead last by a significant margin.  Luck will affect your earnings on small pools more than anything, because the smaller you are the more you're affected by variance.

Especially true in his experiment, which was done at a point where p2pool simply finding a single block more or less than expected during two weeks would have a massive impact.  Almost the entire difference between p2pool and BTC Guild in his timeline is the difference in the second period's results.

I only point out that thread because it's the only one of its kind that I have seen.  Is seven months a valid sample set?  Is comparing earnings even valid as he's doing it?  Maybe, maybe not.  I think what needs to be considered, and you mention it, is variance.  Both Eligius and your own pool have significantly higher hash rates than p2pool, and have had that lead throughout the timeline of the experiment.  Meaning of course, that both your pool and wizkid's should suffer less from the effects of variance and be closer to the "expected" payout levels.  Also to note is that both of your pools were hit with a block withholding attack, which would indeed have an effect on the overall pool's luck and consequently on the payouts.  Look at p2pool's luck over the past 90 days and you'll see far greater than 100% - yet again showing how variance plays a significant role in the payouts of a small pool like p2pool.

I don't mean to imply that p2pool is better than either your pool or Eligius.  My last sentence in that post should have been, "During the timeframe of the experiment, payouts from p2pool were higher than the other two pools - not due to some inherent magic in the way p2pool works, but rather because of the inherent variance experienced by all pools, which is more noticeable on pools with lower hash rates."

Given a different timeframe, that experiment could have yielded completely different results.

[DrHaribo]

Comparing the luck of different pools is completely pointless.

One thing you may want to look at is the orphan rate of the pools. You can look that up on organofcorti.blogspot.com though. You don't need to "test" it.

Other than that there are features, fees, etc. Many things that may be interesting. But luck isn't really.