ASICMINER: Entering the Future of ASIC Mining by Inventing It

[wo0x]

I know reading is hard, but posting here is not the way to get your question considered:

If you would like to add a question, pm it to me.

Emphasis is TAT's

I know patronising others is easy, but I don't see anything wrong with collaboratively discussing and refining potential questions here.  Particularly if the community can help answer quesions without the need to bother Friedcat.

I'm not trying to stop discussion.  I'm just trying to make sure people know that they have to actually submit the question.

I cannot not find that link to the question election document. Or is TAT giving himselfs airs!?

[canth]

Personally I'd much rather see a question in there about whether a sale of AM to a larger company is possible, and if so, under what conditions, and what would shareholders get out of it. There has been quite a bit of discussion about this on the boards and no two people seem to have the same take on it. Love to hear what friedcat had to say.

Honestly, if this were a public company, as a shareholder you would not know about it until the deal was announced. The sale could be for more than the current share price, the same or less than the current share price. Any smart CEO isn't publicly selling the company right up until the point that it's sold - that's how they get the best price.

[keystroke]

It's poll time!

As a shareholder I would like to see a question about the network connectivity of the node. Specifically is there is a plan to address the number of stales and the low number of transactions in the blocks mined by AM. This would help increase shareholder value (more blocks, more transactions) and also address a concern that the community has about AM. It would also increase confirmation time and thus make the network better overall. Thanks!

[notme]

It's poll time!

As a shareholder I would like to see a question about the network connectivity of the node. Specifically is there is a plan to address the number of stales and the low number of transactions in the blocks mined by AM. This would help increase shareholder value (more blocks, more transactions) and also address a concern that the community has about AM. It would also increase confirmation time and thus make the network better overall. Thanks!

OFFICIAL UPDATE

The topic of the orphaned blocks and low tx fees in AM blocks was recently addressed by the board.

Friedcat is aware of the problem and Bitfountain is working to solve it. In the meantime, it is a negligible but necessary loss.

It is not as simple as it might seem. The problem comes from peering and poor bandwidth/internet connectivity in China and software optimizations used to deal with the situation. Companies like Amazon(.cn) also suffer from these problems in China. It isn't necessarily a problem caused by the Great Firewall itself.

Thank you,

~TAT

[keystroke]

The topic of the orphaned blocks and low tx fees in AM blocks was recently addressed by the board.

Thanks and apologies for missing this the first time it was posted! Normally I click on friedcat's username and read his posts. Should I also be following posts of a specific board member? e.g. ThickAsThieves? Thanks again!

[notme]

The topic of the orphaned blocks and low tx fees in AM blocks was recently addressed by the board.

Thanks and apologies for missing this the first time it was posted! Normally I click on friedcat's username and read his posts. Should I also be following posts of a specific board member? e.g. ThickAsThieves? Thanks again!

TAT will pretty much always post important things that friedcat doesn't post himself.  He posts a lot more than friedcat though, so there is more to sort through.

[lucasjkr]

You're worried about BFL shipments coming online??  LOL that's like saying you're worried about USB asicminers coming online..

I am. I ordered in September 2012 and received my order already. Sold it on eBay promptly thereafter. But, that makes me confident that other people are indeed receiveing their products as well. The network is seeing  a HUGE increase in hashrate and difficulty, while at the same time out dividends are slipping. On July 2, when I received mine, the total hashrate of bitminter (the pool I used) was less than 5.5 TH, by the time i shipped mine to the buyer, it was over 9 TH, and today it's nearing 12 TH. Where else are those hashes come from? Even friday, they claimed to ship "a lot" of mini rigs. Considering other days where they've said they've shipped one two or three MR's, a lot sounds like it will be a much bigger number - and every two that are shipped equals an additional TH of hashing power hitting the network.

Lets not fall into the "it's a scam" outlook of angry buyers still waiting for their products. I can say at least that Jalapenos have shipped, first hand. The hashrate of the network is flying upwards, and the word that Avalon Batch 3 was shipped was shipped doesn't account for the rapid growth in the june to mid july time frame. It's clearly not a "scam" - real products are shipping. It took a lot longer than all of us buyers would have liked, and there was probably a LOT more interest in these products than anyone ever would have guessed. So unless someone has a better idea of where all of this is coming from, and why people who post that they're waiting for their product on Jody's log on one day suddenly disappear from that blog a few days after their stated order date has passed, the truth appears they're coming online.

If it's not BFL, then who is the dark horse that's added so much power to the network at our expense? However you want to look at it, something is in the offing, and we're not keeping up.

I'm not trying to come across as a BFL sock puppet, simply a concerned AM shareholder who doesn't want to play the roll of an ostridge with its head in the sand. There's a lot of power out there documented as being on order, and even more to come (if KNC delivers), so I have to wonder how much we can grow our operation with the chips we have on hand, since 2nd gen chips are a fews away from delivery. Friedcat has been incredibly transparent so far, I think, and it would be great to have greater transparency as to what his thoughts are in the short to medium term future.

[empoweoqwj]

Personally I'd much rather see a question in there about whether a sale of AM to a larger company is possible, and if so, under what conditions, and what would shareholders get out of it. There has been quite a bit of discussion about this on the boards and no two people seem to have the same take on it. Love to hear what friedcat had to say.

Honestly, if this were a public company, as a shareholder you would not know about it until the deal was announced. The sale could be for more than the current share price, the same or less than the current share price. Any smart CEO isn't publicly selling the company right up until the point that it's sold - that's how they get the best price.

My point was simply that when this sale question was brought up, some people said AM could sell at "7 day average share price", some thought they couldn't sell without the consent of the shareholders, and some just said it wasn't mentioned anywhere int the contract so .... who knows?

That's all I'm asking ... for some clarification. Just saying "friedcat will do right by us" isn't really sufficient.

But hey, if nobody else thinks this is a priority question, fine.

[romerun]

in the "real" world, when company is sold, the share is normally brought back at 2-3x price, as what happened to SDICE.

[gog1]

in the "real" world, when company is sold, the share is normally brought back at 2-3x price, as what happened to SDICE.

There's usually a premium, but SDICE is bought out at that price just to shut investor's mouth.  Imagine if they were bought out for way less than IPO price. 

If there's a ASICMINER buyout by some new entrant (ie. entities new to bitcoin), it probably cannot be done with bitcoins as the order book on gox + bitstamp has only 110k coins combined right now.

[hammurabi]

in the "real" world, when company is sold, the share is normally brought back at 2-3x price, as what happened to SDICE.

There's usually a premium, but SDICE is bought out at that price just to shut investor's mouth.  Imagine if they were bought out for way less than IPO price. 

If there's a ASICMINER buyout by some new entrant (ie. entities new to bitcoin), it probably cannot be done with bitcoins as the order book on gox + bitstamp has only 110k coins combined right now.

Part of the shares can be bought with coins and part with other thingies, like facebook shares for example.

[gog1]

I guess that some of those who left ASICMINER for playing the IPO game are back with us again - there is bid for 100 shares @4.1 at BTC-TC.

I guess that tells us how limited the amount of BTC is around on the exchanges.

[Lohoris]

Part of the shares can be bought with coins and part with other thingies, like facebook shares for example.

That would be bullshit: if I wanted to buy another security, I would have bought that instead.

[VJain]

I guess that some of those who left ASICMINER for playing the IPO game are back with us again - there is bid for 100 shares @4.1 at BTC-TC.

I guess that tells us how limited the amount of BTC is around on the exchanges.

Or maybe that person sold at the 4.8~ mark like myself . I currently have 0 shares, since the market's a bit too... uncertain for me to buy back into at the moment.

Waiting to see if there's any big news from Friedcat - since personally, I don't trust all those IPO startups.

[lucasjkr]

in the "real" world, when company is sold, the share is normally brought back at 2-3x price, as what happened to SDICE.

There's usually a premium, but SDICE is bought out at that price just to shut investor's mouth.  Imagine if they were bought out for way less than IPO price. 

If there's a ASICMINER buyout by some new entrant (ie. entities new to bitcoin), it probably cannot be done with bitcoins as the order book on gox + bitstamp has only 110k coins combined right now.

Part of the shares can be bought with coins and part with other thingies, like facebook shares for example.

It would be an incredible pain for them to do that. Even a cash offer would be difficult to entertain, I imagine. Sure, friedcat could take in cash, then he'd have to contact each shareholder and get their payment information and initiate transfers from his chinese account to everyone elses accounts scattered all around the globe. There's a fee right there, per transaction. Add in the passthrough share, especially the TAT ones where 1 AM shares = 100 potential shareholders, and you're looking at making transfers that will be consumed by the entire fee.

Likewise, friedcat could get FB shares. Then, everyone else would need to provide him brokerage account information for him to initiate FOP transfers. He can't do ACAT transfers, because those need to be same name. FOP can cost, especially when it's a few shares at a time (which it would be). Really, the way everything is set up, there's no option to transact in anything buy BTC, which is purposeful.

[hammurabi]

in the "real" world, when company is sold, the share is normally brought back at 2-3x price, as what happened to SDICE.

There's usually a premium, but SDICE is bought out at that price just to shut investor's mouth.  Imagine if they were bought out for way less than IPO price. 

If there's a ASICMINER buyout by some new entrant (ie. entities new to bitcoin), it probably cannot be done with bitcoins as the order book on gox + bitstamp has only 110k coins combined right now.

Part of the shares can be bought with coins and part with other thingies, like facebook shares for example.

It would be an incredible pain for them to do that. Even a cash offer would be difficult to entertain, I imagine. Sure, friedcat could take in cash, then he'd have to contact each shareholder and get their payment information and initiate transfers from his chinese account to everyone elses accounts scattered all around the globe. There's a fee right there, per transaction. Add in the passthrough share, especially the TAT ones where 1 AM shares = 100 potential shareholders, and you're looking at making transfers that will be consumed by the entire fee.

Likewise, friedcat could get FB shares. Then, everyone else would need to provide him brokerage account information for him to initiate FOP transfers. He can't do ACAT transfers, because those need to be same name. FOP can cost, especially when it's a few shares at a time (which it would be). Really, the way everything is set up, there's no option to transact in anything buy BTC, which is purposeful.

From Friedcat's point of perspective all PT shareholders are one entity. So no scattering here, and in fact the process is even easier.
Facebook was given as entertaining example. He can trade for bars of gold if need be or chocolate! Let's talk how much chocolate AM is worth?

[ThickAsThieves]

It's poll time!

Please review the questions below, and consider whether there are any you would like added to this poll.

If you would like to add a question, pm it to me.

Please try to be reasonable with any submitted questions, and understand that not all suggestions will be used.

QUESTIONS

Does ASICMINER/Bitfountain intend to create an official website and/or blog outside of the bitcointalk forums?
 
Does ASICMINER have plans to develop a marketing campaign to extend beyond word of mouth and business on the bitcointalk.org?
 
Originally, board members were going to receive a test unit of an ASIC mining device. Will you provide this or any other tangible items to board members in the future?
 
Could we have an official live hashrate meter from ASICMINER?
 
For more transparency, is it possible to share a wallet address for depositing income from ASICMINER hardware sales?

What are the plans regarding the Official ASICMINER Exchange? Have they been dropped?

Besides mining, hardware sales, and fees, are there any other potential sources of revenue?
 

[hammurabi]

Facebook was given as entertaining example. He can trade for bars of gold if need be or chocolate! Let's talk how much chocolate AM is worth?

I'll accept chocolate bars as long as they are 90% pure.

What is the point for You??? I mean You can have chocolate from food replicator on board USS Enterprise.

[superduh]

anyone know what FAB AM uses? TSMC? and how will the latest avalon rumors, if true, affect AM going forward?

have they begun development on smaller chips yet?

[gramma]

USD$200 million is some serious fiat cashola.  I'd be interested in AM's thoughts about the news of the Avalon investment, and meeting that challenge.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323997004578644491403250124.html