ASICMINER: Entering the Future of ASIC Mining by Inventing It

[ThickAsThieves]

My research and conversation with smart dudes has led me to the conclusion that selling hardware is much more important than growing the mining farm. This is not to say that mining is worthless in comparison, bit that it's profitability is very temporary.

We need to be much more keen on hardware sales than begging AM to get to 50TH, 200TH, 1000TH.

Furthermore, it can be argued that AM should abuse its dominant position to the point of rapid commoditization of mining equipment, because that is where things will end up. It is better for them to reap the rewards, than to wait for more players to enter the market.

They should then use their resources to transcend the mining hardware/farm market altogether. Ideally they would time this right at the tipping point of total commoditization, and get into a tertiary market like custom decryption for governments, or alternative ASIC designs for other purposes than bitcoin.

[doosey2]

With regard to growing Asicminer's total hash rate to more than the current 20s%...

An attacker who controls 30% of the network has a 20% chance of solving 6 blocks in a row...so even though we are not the dreaded 51% attacker, the network would still be exposed to some risk by friedcat having 30%.

Moreover - if friedcat does get 30%, imagine that competitor pools of total size 40% gets taken out (eg ddos). Now Asicminer's 30% suddenly becomes 50% of the total, and again we are the attacker.

[Surprise]

I believe the highest priority should be getting our hashrate to near 50% and implementing a scheme like Endlessa's where we detect the network hashrate and always stay a safe % below 50 turning on and off machines automatically as necessary. Using the funds gained from mining, we should continue to ensure hashrate dominance by building newer and more efficient miners to ensure maximum profitability off the maximum hashrate we can control. This ensures the company and its investors will receive ~50% of the millions of bitcoins that are yet to be created, and also access to transaction fees per block, which should become more substantial as adoption increases. Bitcoin has the potential to become one of the most valuable resources in the coming years and we would be unwise to shift our focus away from being the dominant miner of it. Thanks to friedcat and co's brilliant maneuvers we already have a substantial hashrate which gives us the leverage we need to go all the way, all that remains is to do a little more deployment of machines already designed, built, and delivered.

With that being said, I must say I am disappointed to see that we will seemingly not reach the stated goal of 50TH/s deployed by June 1. As a project manager I understand things come up and sometimes goals can not be met but I do wish that the investors would have received a heads up that the goal was no longer feasible when problems arose. While proving to be a useful source of one time income, I hope that the sales of hardware have not been the cause of our delayed deployment of hashing power. There is a lot of competition hashpower set to deploy soon and I would hate to see us squander our current superior position.

My take on the current situation, was not my intention to preach or tell Friedcat or anyone what to do. Was meant to contribute to a discussion of the company and its current status.  

[vortex1878]

With regard to growing Asicminer's total hash rate to more than the current 20s%...

An attacker who controls 30% of the network has a 20% chance of solving 6 blocks in a row...so even though we are not the dreaded 51% attacker, the network would still be exposed to some risk by friedcat having 30%.

Moreover - if friedcat does get 30%, imagine that competitor pools of total size 40% gets taken out (eg ddos). Now Asicminer's 30% suddenly becomes 50% of the total, and again we are the attacker.

Following your logic... But that some competitor pool would have 40% is OK?

EDIT: Sorry that I cannot type as quickly as you are editing your post without tracking.

[CanadianGuy]

My research and conversation with smart dudes has led me to the conclusion that selling hardware is much more important than growing the mining farm. This is not to say that mining is worthless in comparison, bit that it's profitability is very temporary.

We need to be much more keen on hardware sales than begging AM to get to 50TH, 200TH, 1000TH.

Furthermore, it can be argued that AM should abuse its dominant position to the point of rapid commoditization of mining equipment, because that is where things will end up. It is better for them to reap the rewards, than to wait for more players to enter the market.

They should then use their resources to transcend the mining hardware/farm market altogether. Ideally they would time this right at the tipping point of total commoditization, and get into a tertiary market like custom decryption for governments, or alternative ASIC designs for other purposes than bitcoin.

One thought that has come across my mind a few times is the possibility of AM making sales with fiat currency and that could lead to the possibility of being listed on a regulated stock exchange.  He could open himself up to new investors and use the funds to dump back into development.. ?

[stripykitteh]

My research and conversation with smart dudes has led me to the conclusion that selling hardware is much more important than growing the mining farm. This is not to say that mining is worthless in comparison, bit that it's profitability is very temporary.

We need to be much more keen on hardware sales than begging AM to get to 50TH, 200TH, 1000TH.

Furthermore, it can be argued that AM should abuse its dominant position to the point of rapid commoditization of mining equipment, because that is where things will end up. It is better for them to reap the rewards, than to wait for more players to enter the market.

They should then use their resources to transcend the mining hardware/farm market altogether. Ideally they would time this right at the tipping point of total commoditization, and get into a tertiary market like custom decryption for governments, or alternative ASIC designs for other purposes than bitcoin.

I've read some old threads that mining was a means of bootstrapping the company to sell hardware. It seems ATM that the volume of blade sales, while tasty, is not yet earth-shattering (when AM does most things so well expectations are high). This is due to setting a price point at which a handful of early adopters were willing to pay. A lower price point would certainly ship a ton more blades. The high price point of the moment seems to invite competition (100TH, KnCMiner and the open-source brigade, and yes even BFL and their crippleware) and disparaging remarks from the GPU crowd (even though I think if they properly accounted for their cost of operation they'd see blades are cheaper).

I can understand the viability of the commoditization strategy; perhaps it is too early for those of us looking in at AM from the outside to see exactly how it will be conducted. While things like the USB sticks will put ASICs in many hands, it won't discourage competition.

Perhaps it's better that we hoi-polloi investors aren't truly aware of how it will be done. I can imagine a casual friedcat announcement appearing in these pages in a few weeks that suddenly makes it clear to everyone exactly who the winners and losers in this game are.

[ThickAsThieves]

My research and conversation with smart dudes has led me to the conclusion that selling hardware is much more important than growing the mining farm. This is not to say that mining is worthless in comparison, bit that it's profitability is very temporary.

We need to be much more keen on hardware sales than begging AM to get to 50TH, 200TH, 1000TH.

Furthermore, it can be argued that AM should abuse its dominant position to the point of rapid commoditization of mining equipment, because that is where things will end up. It is better for them to reap the rewards, than to wait for more players to enter the market.

They should then use their resources to transcend the mining hardware/farm market altogether. Ideally they would time this right at the tipping point of total commoditization, and get into a tertiary market like custom decryption for governments, or alternative ASIC designs for other purposes than bitcoin.

I've read some old threads that mining was a means of bootstrapping the company to sell hardware. It seems ATM that the volume of blade sales, while tasty, is not yet earth-shattering (when AM does most things so well expectations are high). This is due to setting a price point at which a handful of early adopters were willing to pay. A lower price point would certainly ship a ton more blades. The high price point of the moment seems to invite competition (100TH, KnCMiner and the open-source brigade, and yes even BFL and their crippleware) and disparaging remarks from the GPU crowd (even though I think if they properly accounted for their cost of operation they'd see blades are cheaper).

I can understand the viability of the commoditization strategy; perhaps it is too early for those of us looking in at AM from the outside to see exactly how it will be conducted. While things like the USB sticks will put ASICs in many hands, it won't discourage competition.

Perhaps it's better that we hoi-polloi investors aren't truly aware of how it will be done. I can imagine a casual friedcat announcement appearing in these pages in a few weeks that suddenly makes it clear to everyone exactly who the winners and losers in this game are.

You've got the right idea. See, AM does not have to sell "cheap" hardware, they must only be the cheapest currently. Right now, no one is shipping, so AM can choose between selling somewhat overpriced hardware, or mining with it themselves. For now, that mixed approach works.

However, scaling up a mining farm, exposes us to liabilities like depreciating hardware and infrastructure. So their approach must be calculated, always looking for when the time is right to lower hardware retail prices.

[philipma1957]

My research and conversation with smart dudes has led me to the conclusion that selling hardware is much more important than growing the mining farm. This is not to say that mining is worthless in comparison, bit that it's profitability is very temporary.

We need to be much more keen on hardware sales than begging AM to get to 50TH, 200TH, 1000TH.

Furthermore, it can be argued that AM should abuse its dominant position to the point of rapid commoditization of mining equipment, because that is where things will end up. It is better for them to reap the rewards, than to wait for more players to enter the market.

They should then use their resources to transcend the mining hardware/farm market altogether. Ideally they would time this right at the tipping point of total commoditization, and get into a tertiary market like custom decryption for governments, or alternative ASIC designs for other purposes than bitcoin.

I've read some old threads that mining was a means of bootstrapping the company to sell hardware. It seems ATM that the volume of blade sales, while tasty, is not yet earth-shattering (when AM does most things so well expectations are high). This is due to setting a price point at which a handful of early adopters were willing to pay. A lower price point would certainly ship a ton more blades. The high price point of the moment seems to invite competition (100TH, KnCMiner and the open-source brigade, and yes even BFL and their crippleware) and disparaging remarks from the GPU crowd (even though I think if they properly accounted for their cost of operation they'd see blades are cheaper).

I can understand the viability of the commoditization strategy; perhaps it is too early for those of us looking in at AM from the outside to see exactly how it will be conducted. While things like the USB sticks will put ASICs in many hands, it won't discourage competition.

Perhaps it's better that we hoi-polloi investors aren't truly aware of how it will be done. I can imagine a casual friedcat announcement appearing in these pages in a few weeks that suddenly makes it clear to everyone exactly who the winners and losers in this game are.

You've got the right idea. See, AM does not have to sell "cheap" hardware, they must only be the cheapest currently. Right now, no one is shipping, so AM can choose between selling somewhat overpriced hardware, or mining with it themselves. For now, that mixed approach works.

However, scaling up a mining farm, exposes us to liabilities like depreciating hardware and infrastructure. So their approach must be calculated, always looking for when the time is right to lower hardware retail prices.

  yeah  23 to 30% share of mining at all times is a good thing for now. you need 2 places at a minimum to mine.   selling mining gear a bit overpriced works to make money and keep the percentage  of mining in the  23-30 range

[mvidetto]

Having hash rate near 50% is terrible for the network.  This is because if someone DDoSes the next biggest pool like BTC Guild, then they go over 51% and this looks like a weakness in bitcoin and reduces confidence in the coin.  This thereby reduces price of coin etc. even though they may not do anything with the attack, the point is that it's possible.

[radiumsoup]

My research and conversation with smart dudes has led me to the conclusion that selling hardware is much more important than growing the mining farm. This is not to say that mining is worthless in comparison, bit that it's profitability is very temporary.

We need to be much more keen on hardware sales than begging AM to get to 50TH, 200TH, 1000TH.

Furthermore, it can be argued that AM should abuse its dominant position to the point of rapid commoditization of mining equipment, because that is where things will end up. It is better for them to reap the rewards, than to wait for more players to enter the market.

They should then use their resources to transcend the mining hardware/farm market altogether. Ideally they would time this right at the tipping point of total commoditization, and get into a tertiary market like custom decryption for governments, or alternative ASIC designs for other purposes than bitcoin.

This is almost spot on from my analysis. Since we *can* leverage the virtual monopoly power we currently have on hash rate with only the cost of the datacenter they're deployed in (compared to the cost of making the hardware, which is the same if we sell them or use them ourselves), we *should* take advantage of the opportunity as long as the additional deployment costs versus BTC mining rewards are minimal. But once we lose that advantage when other ASIC developers start performing on par, we need to quickly but deliberately shift to an emphasis on primarily selling hardware, with mining only as much as is necessary for development and testing, or to the extent that we need hash rate for marketing purposes (think ads saying, "buy the same hardware the #1 miner uses",) and the core of the business should be to let someone else buy the bulk of our shovels to mine with. This first shift point is coming, and soon. Perhaps in mere weeks, but certainly in no more than 6 months. I predict that in the long term, it's going to cycle like this: We increase our own in-house deployment to mine at a disruptively high hash rate -> miners lose advantage and need more equipment to keep up -> we sell more equipment -> (mini cycle here where miners compete among themselves for a while, driving more equipment sales) -> eventual equilibrium -> we develop nextgen devices -> we increase mining disruptively, etc... the internal mining by AM is really just the catalyst for the equipment sales.

Additionally, while it's intriguing, one problem I see with the tertiary market idea is that those services will almost certainly be paid in fiat (especially from governments), and if revenue is large enough, conversion for BTC dividends could be a bit disruptive to the BTC spot price - in BTC's favor, certainly, but still disruptive. I think it's a good idea for a spinoff.

[Endlessa]

(...) At 40% AM would receive 2400 a day on average (40% of the average of 6000 coins per day) (...)

Just a small correction on this: 25 BTC per block * 6 blocks per hour * 24 hours per day = 3600 BTC per day.

40% of 3600 = 1440.

(Assuming steady-state difficulty and hashrate.)

Now please continue with your previously scheduled discussion...

lol ya I am running fumes today ty for the correction

[Endlessa]

With regard to growing Asicminer's total hash rate to more than the current 20s%...

An attacker who controls 30% of the network has a 20% chance of solving 6 blocks in a row...so even though we are not the dreaded 51% attacker, the network would still be exposed to some risk by friedcat having 30%.

Moreover - if friedcat does get 30%, imagine that competitor pools of total size 40% gets taken out (eg ddos). Now Asicminer's 30% suddenly becomes 50% of the total, and again we are the attacker.

that's why what I was saying the hashing needs to be monitored.   if you only 2.4 blocks of each 6 blocks (or 4 out of 10 in you like base 10)  mined you will always be 40% of the network. ..if the network slows down you shut down some hash.  nobody cares about a luck streak. . .they care about sustained hashing power.  remember % of hash (and total network hash) are calculated by speed the blocks are being solved over time is what matters for network perception, not your potential to hash rate.  So if there is a software governor controlling the hardware and we never allow more than a 4 of 10 you will never be more than 40% of the network.  you don't have to worry about sudden drops in network hash or any of that, because the governor will never allow it.

[SebastianJu]

Do i interprete friedcat correctly here that Asicminer and Avalon are letting create their ASIC's in a foundry of TSMC? See here:

3) They would consider a 2/3 yield rate a non-failed one. However in most circumstances the rates are much higher than this bottom line. Made-in-China of course are connected with the impression of lower quality, but calculating with a whole project should put the overall cost into consideration. TSMC has higher threshold for newcomer clients and is less affordable.

from https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=99497.msg1394701#msg1394701

I would need to know how Avalon is delivering their ASIC Chips. Unfortunately they have at the moment no support. So i have to guess.

Friedcat posted pictures:

Update

After a long and anxious waiting, we have finally got our packaged chip samples at hand. Everyone would be busy in the following 2-3 weeks.

The following pics are taken from my cellphone.

30GHash/s of computing power on one table:


Top and bottom side of the chips:


A closer look at our baby:

From: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=91173.msg1422891#msg1422891

When i count the chips in each of these tubes i get to 30. And avalon is giving out exactly 30 sample chips per 10k chips ordered too. The ASICMINER ASIC shown looks similar small than avalon ASIC's. Avalon ASIC's are 7x7mm big.

So you think it is a relatively sure guess to think that Avalon Asics will come in the same form? I need to buy the packaging to ship such chips, so i need to know how they are delivered...

[Caesium]

With regard to growing Asicminer's total hash rate to more than the current 20s%...

An attacker who controls 30% of the network has a 20% chance of solving 6 blocks in a row...so even though we are not the dreaded 51% attacker, the network would still be exposed to some risk by friedcat having 30%.

Moreover - if friedcat does get 30%, imagine that competitor pools of total size 40% gets taken out (eg ddos). Now Asicminer's 30% suddenly becomes 50% of the total, and again we are the attacker.

that's why what I was saying the hashing needs to be monitored.   if you only 2.4 blocks of each 6 blocks (or 4 out of 10 in you like base 10)  mined you will always be 40% of the network. ..if the network slows down you shut down some hash.  nobody cares about a luck streak. . .they care about sustained hashing power.  remember % of hash (and total network hash) are calculated by speed the blocks are being solved over time is what matters for network perception, not your potential to hash things.  So if there is a software governor controlling the hardware and we never allow more than a 4 of 10 you will never be more than 40% of the network.  you don't have to worry about sudden drops in network hash or any of that, because the governor will never allow it.

Sorry, this is all pointless.

The only time that controlling >50% of the network is a problem is if the person controlling it is malicious. With that in mind, if some software is responsible for shutting off hashpower temporarily, that malicious person could just disable the software whenever they felt like a bit of double spending.

The only way for everyone on the bitcoin network to be assured that friedcat can't take advantage of having >50% of the network is not to have that hashing power in the first place.

[Endlessa]

With regard to growing Asicminer's total hash rate to more than the current 20s%...

An attacker who controls 30% of the network has a 20% chance of solving 6 blocks in a row...so even though we are not the dreaded 51% attacker, the network would still be exposed to some risk by friedcat having 30%.

Moreover - if friedcat does get 30%, imagine that competitor pools of total size 40% gets taken out (eg ddos). Now Asicminer's 30% suddenly becomes 50% of the total, and again we are the attacker.

that's why what I was saying the hashing needs to be monitored.   if you only 2.4 blocks of each 6 blocks (or 4 out of 10 in you like base 10)  mined you will always be 40% of the network. ..if the network slows down you shut down some hash.  nobody cares about a luck streak. . .they care about sustained hashing power.  remember % of hash (and total network hash) are calculated by speed the blocks are being solved over time is what matters for network perception, not your potential to hash things.  So if there is a software governor controlling the hardware and we never allow more than a 4 of 10 you will never be more than 40% of the network.  you don't have to worry about sudden drops in network hash or any of that, because the governor will never allow it.

Sorry, this is all pointless.

The only time that controlling >50% of the network is a problem is if the person controlling it is malicious. With that in mind, if some software is responsible for shutting off hashpower temporarily, that malicious person could just disable the software whenever they felt like a bit of double spending.

The only way for everyone on the bitcoin network to be assured that friedcat can't take advantage of having >50% of the network is not to have that hashing power in the first place.

A malicious person penetrating your network can do that anyway. . .

[Endlessa]

With regard to growing Asicminer's total hash rate to more than the current 20s%...

An attacker who controls 30% of the network has a 20% chance of solving 6 blocks in a row...so even though we are not the dreaded 51% attacker, the network would still be exposed to some risk by friedcat having 30%.

Moreover - if friedcat does get 30%, imagine that competitor pools of total size 40% gets taken out (eg ddos). Now Asicminer's 30% suddenly becomes 50% of the total, and again we are the attacker.

that's why what I was saying the hashing needs to be monitored.   if you only 2.4 blocks of each 6 blocks (or 4 out of 10 in you like base 10)  mined you will always be 40% of the network. ..if the network slows down you shut down some hash.  nobody cares about a luck streak. . .they care about sustained hashing power.  remember % of hash (and total network hash) are calculated by speed the blocks are being solved over time is what matters for network perception, not your potential to hash things.  So if there is a software governor controlling the hardware and we never allow more than a 4 of 10 you will never be more than 40% of the network.  you don't have to worry about sudden drops in network hash or any of that, because the governor will never allow it.

Sorry, this is all pointless.

The only time that controlling >50% of the network is a problem is if the person controlling it is malicious. With that in mind, if some software is responsible for shutting off hashpower temporarily, that malicious person could just disable the software whenever they felt like a bit of double spending.

The only way for everyone on the bitcoin network to be assured that friedcat can't take advantage of having >50% of the network is not to have that hashing power in the first place.

He already does have the hashpower. .. he just sells it and stacks in rooms, instead of deploying it

[CanadianGuy]

Wouldn't a 51% attacker be worried about scaring everybody off with double spends and crashing the price down to $1 before he even has a chance to convert his theft into fiat?

[SebastianJu]

Wouldn't a 51% attacker be worried about scaring everybody off with double spends and crashing the price down to $1 before he even has a chance to convert his theft into fiat?

A >50% attack doesnt make sense in case one wants to earn money. It might be only useful to destroy bitcoin. One could claim that friedcat never would do this but it wouldnt matter when people freak out in fear.

[Lohoris]

A >50% attack doesnt make sense in case one wants to earn money. It might be only useful to destroy bitcoin. One could claim that friedcat never would do this but it wouldnt matter when people freak out in fear.

+1

and that's why it is much better to stay in a safe zone of no more than 30%.

[SebastianJu]

A >50% attack doesnt make sense in case one wants to earn money. It might be only useful to destroy bitcoin. One could claim that friedcat never would do this but it wouldnt matter when people freak out in fear.

+1

and that's why it is much better to stay in a safe zone of no more than 30%.

Im not sure that this is needed. When i see this chart: http://blockchain.info/de/charts/hash-rate it looks the variance in the whole network isnt very high. 99825 to 76744. Thats 100% to 76.88%. In this case, if AM would have under 38.372 TH the network would still be safe because it dropped only to 76.744 TH. We are still way beyond that. 38,372TH for a total 99.825TH of the net would mean 38.44% would be safe.

But i think friedcat could even go higher near 50% when there is a script running to prevent 50%. A damage would only be done when someone shows that AM had over 50%. A theoretical >50% doesnt matter. If it would matter BFL, Avalon or Asicminer would have been a threat all the time because they theoretically have the power to kill bitcoin. But theoretically doesnt matter much.

Of course this raises the risk of AM being hacked to kill bitcoins... and so on... isnt really that easy...