You are threatening Bitcoin’s security

[grndzero]

obviously the solution here.. isnt necessarily that tycho's pool should be smaller.. its that it should be more reliable and spread out. say 10 pools, each one hosted in a different country on a different server... :p take out one, you only take out 10% of his total.

just telling him to shrink his pool isnt going to be effective.

Yeah, he should up his fee to 7.5% to help pay for all that too.

[Nesetalis]

... right.

[Grinder]

No. Simply no. Unless you intent to mine for ridiculously short period of times, every pool will provide you with the same payout minus fee in the long run. The reward for mining is to secure the network. To brainlessly jump into the biggest pool because you like the pretty numbers is a mistake, effectively using the very tool that secures the network to harm it. It's like saying human beings need water to survive and then trying to drown the guy.

What kind of socialist argument is that? I should sacrifice getting a regular income to make a neglible impact on the security of the network, just for the greater good?

If your interest is indeed lowering variance, then you should be spreading your mining power evenly among ever possible pool.

That would increase the variance, because Deepbit is larger than all the other pools combined. It would also be a lot more work to set up and maintain.

[speeder]

Also assuming the motivation for such attack would be economical is a weakness too.

Suppose the US decide to get rid of bitcoin. They only need to put CIA to DDoS the 3 pools, and Roadrunner to create a chain split that make business unreliable (if not outright seemly fraudulent), as soon people start to mistrust each other unti they figure what is going on, not only the bitcoin market will crash, but people will freak out, and stop using BTC, in a worry that it will happen again, and after that we will have the issue of merging the chains again or rolling back everything or something like that.

People that assume someone will attack the network to doublespend are naive, at best. Or so greedy that they can only think in greedy terms.

 The US government would be more inclined to listen in on the network and watch transactions or just find where the pools are hosted and raid them, including Great Britain, Canada, and any other friendly countries. From there they would find out who was making the most amount of money and trace them back by IP wherever possible within their jurisdiction and build an income tax fraud case against them. This wouldn't happen for a few years though since coins didn't have much value this tax season, not many people could say they actually made a profit. No government has been able to shut down Bittorrent. They raid and seize servers that are hosting pirated movie, music, games, software, etc. but they haven't stopped it from existing. It's just psychological warfare to make people think twice before pirating. The only time they manage to take down a network is when it has a central point like Napster and Limewire.

 To think that any government or treasury would bother with bitcoin anytime in the near future seems pretty far fetched to me. There's only 6.245 million in existence at a peak ( ~8.00 ) value of about US $50 million.

Two things:

First, the US government attack is a example of non-economical attack.

Second, as you said yourself, the time to take down a network is if it has a central point, and deepbit is becoming one, take down deepbit, take down BTC with it.

[rezin777]

No. Simply no. Unless you intent to mine for ridiculously short period of times, every pool will provide you with the same payout minus fee in the long run. The reward for mining is to secure the network. To brainlessly jump into the biggest pool because you like the pretty numbers is a mistake, effectively using the very tool that secures the network to harm it. It's like saying human beings need water to survive and then trying to drown the guy.

What kind of socialist argument is that? I should sacrifice getting a regular income to make a neglible impact on the security of the network, just for the greater good?

Make less now - hurt health of network to allow for possible attack and risk future income
Make more over time - help health of network to help prevent possible attack and secure future income

Socialist argument? LOL. More like smart argument. Did someone say no brainer already? I hope so.

[goatpig]

What kind of socialist argument is that? I should sacrifice getting a regular income to make a neglible impact on the security of the network, just for the greater good?

1) You're not sacrificing anything. As a matter of fact, by mining elsewhere, you're increasing your profit.
2) Your own good. If Bitcoins crash due to an attack, you lose money...
3) The goal of mining is to secure the network. The reward is the consequence of that service provided. You want to rip the reward while providing the work but not caring for the service, because you're too lazy to understand what you are contributing to and are motivated by obscure, emotional perception of this network, point of view which has been defeated times and times over. A simple proof is that you are willing to pay the highest fee out there, yet you somehow try to build an argument based on the concept of income.

Mindlessly catering to the biggest group, expecting others to deal with the consequences... who's the socialist again?

That would increase the variance, because Deepbit is larger than all the other pools combined. It would also be a lot more work to set up and maintain.

No. Even right now Deepbit has variance. Tycho even provides that data on the statistic page. What Deepbit is missing in a day is what other pools are getting as extra. You really want to beat variance? Spread out.

It would also be a lot more work to set up and maintain.

1) Takes half a minute per worker and you're done, forever.
2) This is EXACTLY why people need to move off of Deepbit, because people like you would still be mining there a week after the pool gets infiltrated and starts being used to attack the network.

[Gladiator]

Just DDoS it when it reaches 45% of the network's hashing speed. Loic is always ready.

[PabloW]

I have to say I choose deepbit for the insant pay option, and also cause I hate to see that uncofirmed/confirmed numbers. I just want to see one number going up and cash out my coins whenever i want to.

Simple as that.

If BTCMine had that option I would surely move on there in a second!

[Nesetalis]

I have to say I choose deepbit for the insant pay option, and also cause I hate to see that uncofirmed/confirmed numbers. I just want to see one number going up and cash out my coins whenever i want to.

Simple as that.

If BTCMine had that option I would surely move on there in a second!

Well then, get off bitcoin? :p maybe deepbit is willing to take a 50BTC hit every time the block is proved solved by some one else... but most pools certainly arnt..

[grndzero]

Also assuming the motivation for such attack would be economical is a weakness too.

Suppose the US decide to get rid of bitcoin. They only need to put CIA to DDoS the 3 pools, and Roadrunner to create a chain split that make business unreliable (if not outright seemly fraudulent), as soon people start to mistrust each other unti they figure what is going on, not only the bitcoin market will crash, but people will freak out, and stop using BTC, in a worry that it will happen again, and after that we will have the issue of merging the chains again or rolling back everything or something like that.

People that assume someone will attack the network to doublespend are naive, at best. Or so greedy that they can only think in greedy terms.

 The US government would be more inclined to listen in on the network and watch transactions or just find where the pools are hosted and raid them, including Great Britain, Canada, and any other friendly countries. From there they would find out who was making the most amount of money and trace them back by IP wherever possible within their jurisdiction and build an income tax fraud case against them. This wouldn't happen for a few years though since coins didn't have much value this tax season, not many people could say they actually made a profit. No government has been able to shut down Bittorrent. They raid and seize servers that are hosting pirated movie, music, games, software, etc. but they haven't stopped it from existing. It's just psychological warfare to make people think twice before pirating. The only time they manage to take down a network is when it has a central point like Napster and Limewire.

 To think that any government or treasury would bother with bitcoin anytime in the near future seems pretty far fetched to me. There's only 6.245 million in existence at a peak ( ~8.00 ) value of about US $50 million.

Two things:

First, the US government attack is a example of non-economical attack.

Second, as you said yourself, the time to take down a network is if it has a central point, and deepbit is becoming one, take down deepbit, take down BTC with it.

Your example is a poor example then. Everything is the US is about money one way or the other. Whether it's businesses supposedly being harmed by piracy or possibly losing tax revenue. The US Government doesn't care where your money comes from (as long as it's legal, and even then sometimes they don't care) as long as they get their share of it. Bitcoin is not going to be confused with US currency like the case with the Liberty Dollar.

Pools are not a central entities. deepbit is not Bitcoin, it is a large entity on the Bitcoin network. Bitcoin will NOT die if deepbit goes down, or even if deepbit and slush both went down at the same time. People would probably freak out, but they can go to other pools or mine solo. Napster was killed because the company was the network, they hosted the servers. They killed the company and killed the network at the same time. That's not the way Bitcoin works.

[Grinder]

1) You're not sacrificing anything. As a matter of fact, by mining elsewhere, you're increasing your profit.

And if you sell your house and sleep on the street you'll save a lot of money too.

2) Your own good. If Bitcoins crash due to an attack, you lose money...

If Bitcoin goes down it wouldn't be because my measly hash rate was at Deepbit and not another pool.

Mindlessly catering to the biggest group, expecting others to deal with the consequences... who's the socialist again?

I'll deal with the consequences that concerns me. Demanding that I do something I don't want because you are afraid of losing your benefits is what socialists do.

No. Even right now Deepbit has variance. Tycho even provides that data on the statistic page. What Deepbit is missing in a day is what other pools are getting as extra. You really want to beat variance? Spread out.

If you don't even understand that the only important factor in lowering variance is total hash rate there's really no point in discussing it with you.

2) This is EXACTLY why people need to move off of Deepbit, because people like you would still be mining there a week after the pool gets infiltrated and starts being used to attack the network.

Yeah, I guess I have to be really slow to disagree with your truly brilliant arguments...

Regarding the fee, you have to include what I just call the sucker fee in the smaller pools. It's the income you loose because some people are pool jumping. If you monitor the hash rate, you'll notice that it will go down on in the rounds that last a long time. All in all I'm probably earning about the same as Deepbit as I would in the other pools. If there is a difference it's neglible and one I accept to pay for the convenience.

[goatpig]

And if you sell your house and sleep on the street you'll save a lot of money too.

The goddamn fee...

If Bitcoin goes down it wouldn't be because my measly hash rate was at Deepbit and not another pool.

It would be because of the accumulated hashrate of people like you who swarm one pool and will perpetuate that practice even if the pool has been compromised, all this for no good reason.

I'll deal with the consequences that concerns me. Demanding that I do something I don't want because you are afraid of losing your benefits is what socialists do.

No you won't deal with the consequences. You know you won't because you're refusing to take a minute right now to switch to another pool, which will benefit you. When shit will hit the fan, you'll just rationalize it away like you are doing now. And I am not demanding anything, I'm beating you're joke of an argument that you use as a basis to stick to Deepbit, disregarding the gapping hole it brings into the network security. I'm simply warning you, because I don't want to see Bitcoin go down. But I have no wish to use force. If the worst has to happen for your kind to understand, then so be it. The burden of responsibility is on your shoulders. I'm not the one endangering the network, you are.

If you don't even understand that the only important factor in lowering variance is total hash rate there's really no point in discussing it with you.

From Deepbit's stat page

Average shares per block: 153246 (-2.7%)
Average in last 24 hours: 147860 (-6.5%)

If you can't put it in your head with this that Deepbit has consequent variance, then there's nothing I can do for you. You're the guy thinking he should put all of his hashing power in the same pool while you say that total hash rate impacts variance. Then tell me, Sherlock, is it better to be in one pool that has 50% of the network or 3 pools that have 60%?

Yeah, I guess I have to be really slow to disagree with your truly brilliant arguments...

You are beyond slow.

Regarding the fee, you have to include what I just call the sucker fee in the smaller pools. It's the income you loose because some people are pool jumping. If you monitor the hash rate, you'll notice that it will go down on in the rounds that last a long time. All in all I'm probably earning about the same as Deepbit as I would in the other pools. If there is a difference it's neglible and one I accept to pay for the convenience.

Here comes the irony. Score based pools defend against Raulo's attack, Deepbit doesn't. I can't believe you're aware of that attack, yet don't understand the vulnerability nor the counter, all the while willing to stick to a pool that is vulnerable to it and has higher fees. Priceless.

[mroth7684]

We are not supposed to use deepbit because they have the best features? There is no real solution to this "attack theory". Anonymous could just ddos all of the pools for the lulz then everyone can go back to solo mining. It only takes 1-2 computers running a "port fuck" attack on the RPC port to cause disruption.

You make it sound like bitcoin is like the "Death Star" and a simple shot to the exhaust will blow it up.

[SpessMehren]

So guys, if Deepbit is so evil because they have the largest pool for generating unregulated, decentralized currency, could someone recommend a pool where I can make more bitcoins than I am on Deepbit with a 184 Mhash/sec rate?

[Nesetalis]

its simple.
a single target is an easy target... a few large targets.. are still easy targets..
thousands of small targets without any clear 'big' targets.. make it very hard to DDOS.
if no pool held over 10% of the total share then it would mean you had ~5 targets..
if no pool had over 5%... ~10 targets...
if each pool had 10 or 15 servers... multiply those targets by 10 or 15... and suddenly your DDOS is mostly ineffective.

and if no one understands what the danger is in that 51%... then please, go back and read and stop trying to say there is no danger.
deepbit isnt evil... it just means hes making himself in to a huge target that anyone can take a shot at.

[goatpig]

We are not supposed to use deepbit because they have the best worst features?

FTFY

So guys, if Deepbit is so evil because they have the largest pool for generating unregulated, decentralized currency, could someone recommend a pool where I can make more bitcoins than I am on Deepbit with a 184 Mhash/sec rate?

BTCmine, BTCguild, slush's, Luke's, and all those new comers 0% fee that I see starting recently. The first page in the mining forums is filled with their official threads.

[Nesetalis]

I switch off using BTCMine and MtRed

[Gladiator]

Deepbit is not evil.
It just has too much power and users.
Imagine what will happen if(when) deepbit suddenly crashes(hardware failure, police raid, zombie attack). Whining and frustration all over the board. Sudden migration of deepbit users. Other pools can't handle it and crash too. At least some of them. Hashrate falls dramatically and the network is vulnerable. Remember what happened to Mtgox? And it was just a little shake.
What will happen if someone hacks the pool server and uses it to... use your imagination.
Every event on mtgox causes price fluctuations. Do you really want to have another vulnerability?

[Nesetalis]

between the two sites, they are turning the decentralized currency in to a centralized currency :p this is bad, but they arnt evil for doing it... thats just the nature of free market and monopolies.

[rezin777]

There is no real solution to this "attack theory".

 

I'll see your watermelon cat and raise you a bear facepalm.