It Happened: Bitcoin Just Experienced Third Halving In Its History (cointelegraph.com) 52
The most anticipated cryptocurrency event of 2020, Bitcoin's (BTC) third halving, has just taken effect. Occurring only once every four years, the latest Bitcoin mining block reward halving just reduced the Bitcoin block reward from 12.5 BTC to 6.25 BTC. Cointelegraph reports: Since the first Bitcoin block was generated back in 2009, there have been three halving events. Taking place once every 210,000 blocks mined, or approximately once every four years, a Bitcoin halving cuts the current miner block reward by 50%. The first Bitcoin halving event took place in 2012, cutting the original block reward from 50 BTC to 25 BTC. The second halving took place in 2016, with the reward dropping from 25 BTC to 12.5 BTC. As Bitcoin's supply is limited to 21 million coins, Bitcoin halving events should continue to take place until the year 2140, or until the 21-millionth BTC. By that time, the block reward should reach 1 satoshi, or the smallest unit of Bitcoin at 0.00000001 BTC. At the time of publication, the number of Bitcoin in circulation amounts to 18.37 million, according to Blockchain.com.
As the two previous Bitcoin halvings eventually impacted Bitcoin's price in positive ways, Bitcoin halvings have become the subject of diverse price predictions and speculation. While some crypto players have predicted that the third Bitcoin halving will have no effect on Bitcoin's price, others are confident that the halving will definitely affect the price of the cryptocurrency due to a cut in new Bitcoin supply.
As the two previous Bitcoin halvings eventually impacted Bitcoin's price in positive ways, Bitcoin halvings have become the subject of diverse price predictions and speculation. While some crypto players have predicted that the third Bitcoin halving will have no effect on Bitcoin's price, others are confident that the halving will definitely affect the price of the cryptocurrency due to a cut in new Bitcoin supply.
And nothing of value was lost.... (Score:1)
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I do not understand this comment.
Nothing that "exists" in a digital sense was lost as a result of this halving. Yesterday lets say I had X number of bitcoins. Today, after the halving, I still have X number of bitcoins, not X/2 number. So you are correct, nothing of value was lost, or to put it more generally, nothing at all was lost here. (future mining profits for miners excluded, as that applies to miners, to the future, and bitcoins that have not been created yet, so its not possible for them to be lost
all the GPU power lost (Score:4, Insightful)
Good point, what has protein folding accomplished? (Score:3, Insightful)
Like searching for extra terrestrial intelligence, or folding protein? Approximately nothing.
Good Question, I am curious to the answer myself. Have we had any scientific breakthroughs thanks to either? Is there some drug on the market or significant discovery that never would have happened had Folding@Home never launched?
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At least GIMPS has led to the discovery of the largest known prime number [mersenne.org], and by extension there have been attempts to make useful alts [github.com] in this field too. Too bad that the latter seems to have fallen into oblivion :(
Re:Good point, what has protein folding accomplish (Score:5, Informative)
Good Question, I am curious to the answer myself. Have we had any scientific breakthroughs thanks to either?
If you're curious why not look it up? They published a list of all 224 scientific papers that have resulted from Folding@home https://foldingathome.org/pape... [foldingathome.org]
As for SETI@Home, did they find aliens? No. Did they develop and prove the concept of distributed volunteer based computing? Absolutely. Folding@home is one project that was built on the work that SETI@Home did, so even that effort was worthwhile.
Re:all the GPU power lost (Score:5, Informative)
Like searching for extra terrestrial intelligence, or folding protein? Approximately nothing.
Indeed. It's not like Folding@Home has resulted in some 224 scientific papers getting published [foldingathome.org] or anything. It's all a complete waste of time. Yes sirree.
Re:all the GPU power lost (Score:4, Informative)
Bitcoin mining has been done using ASICs doing SHA-256 since late 2013, so GPUs are no longer involved as far as Bitcoin is concerned. However, you have a point, and proof-of-work is wasteful by design. It's kind of a necessary evil for a decentralized, trustless ledger system to exist in the first place.
There are already alts (e.g. Gridcoin [gridcoin.us]) that have tried to combine PoW with greater good, with mild success. Other non-wasteful systems like proof-of-stake exist, but they have never been as robust as PoW, technically speaking.
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... proof-of-work is wasteful by design. It's kind of a necessary evil for a decentralized, trustless ledger system to exist in the first place ...
No. There are other methods, such as proof-of-stake.
Re:all the GPU power lost (Score:4, Insightful)
Homer's favourite crypto-currency is based on proof-of-steak.
Re: all the GPU power lost (Score:2)
Every network that has tried proof of stake has turned into a degenerate oligarchy or a blip. Maybe when Ethereum is finished with its 5+ year migration to PoS, there will be a successful example.
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Every network that has tried proof of stake has turned into a degenerate oligarchy or a blip. Maybe when Ethereum is finished with its 5+ year migration to PoS, there will be a successful example.
That may be. By going POW for a while they may have gotten over the initial distribution problem. Similarly bitcoin's time on POW helps avoid the problem you mention if it switches to POS.
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Re:all the GPU power lost (Score:5, Insightful)
Next to nothing compared to Bitcoin mining in a direct comparison of the service offered by both.
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Really? Are you counting all the ressources and energy needed to get all the materials to print bills and mint coins and checks, build banks, keep them heated/cooled, keep the lights on, all the computers and network equipment running, all the ATMs everywhere running 24/7 with lights and security cameras everywhere, the transport of bills and coins by trucks, etc.
Bitcoin uses the networks we already had and uses electricity which can be produced by green energy in countries that don't have coal-and-fuel-lov
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Without all that infrastructure the banks put in place to manage your government currencies, bitcoin would literally be worthless - people are using it as a value store, hoping to buy low today and sell high tomorrow, and not a currency with which to buy things.
A better example for you to use is the stock market - not the banking infrastructure.
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Not my fault people keep comparing the energy usage of Bitcoin vs fiat currency.
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I do not know in what backward country you live, but in the most of the developed world most transactions are electronic. Bills and coins are things of past. I have not used physical money for months. No need for cryptocurrency to do that.
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How much could we have achieved if all the GPU power was redirected to scientific experiments instead of mining bitcoins?
If we had applied it to covid-19 modeling, apparently we would have achieved nothing as well. No modeling can compensate for bad inputs.
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Meh (Score:2)
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Ni!
assuming a rational market this will have 0 effect (Score:1)
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If the markets were rational, bitcoin would be trading for exactly zero dollars.
A "greater fool" strategy for trading an asset is a rational strategy, its just risky.
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If the markets were rational, the US dollar would lose value every time the USA government creates more money out of thin air.
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It's just not ecconmical to mine.. (Score:3)
Unless you are not paying your own electric bill, it is just not economical to mine BTC even before this. There wasn't enough RTI to pay for the hardware last time I ran the numbers. Even the USB based ASIC miners are not going to break even for years, and that's assuming you don't have hardware failures to pay for. This stuff breaks down too, even if you keep it cool (but that costs a LOT of money in some places).
I suppose you could "lottery mine" for fun, hoping you get picked for the payout and collect the whole reward, but that's like playing the slots in Vegas, you will lose money overall. However, mining for shares, isn't going to pay. Run the numbers, It's a horrid business, way too much cost in equipment and operating costs, and unless you go into mining in a HUGE way, you will lose money just mining.
If only electricity was free.... Like it is in Venezuela, where mining is huge business but illegal. You are not allowed to use *excessive* amounts of power (So they move the mining setups around regularly so they don't get caught) and doing business requires local currency (or somebody who's willing to ignore the law and trade you BTC for stuff. Not to mention the internet connection you will need....
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Find countries which provide subsidized/free power to farmers like India and where companies trying to corner the market are providing free internet like Reliance Jio in India and where income from farm activities are non taxable like India and setup a server farm full of mining rigs in the boondocks and get it classified as farm income. Heck get a loan from an agricultural cooperative to fund the rigs so the next time the govt forgives agricultural loans your cost of capital goes to zero too. Profit.
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A friend has a rather oversized solar array (relative to normal use) on his house. He mines with the excess. It makes a small but steady income. He also does net metering, so his usage bill is negative.
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A friend has a rather oversized solar array (relative to normal use) on his house. He mines with the excess. It makes a small but steady income. He also does net metering, so his usage bill is negative.
That's still a loss. The mining is not coming close to paying for the extra solar capacity he paid for. Its making use of a "mistake" but that's something separate from profitable. Or more charitably he anticipated the degraded efficiency of the solar installation over time and ordered surplus panels to compensate, still a more loser though.
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A friend has a rather oversized solar array (relative to normal use) on his house. He mines with the excess. It makes a small but steady income. He also does net metering, so his usage bill is negative.
That's still a loss. The mining is not coming close to paying for the extra solar capacity he paid for. Its making use of a "mistake" but that's something separate from profitable. Or more charitably he anticipated the degraded efficiency of the solar installation over time and ordered surplus panels to compensate, still a more loser though.
You don't understand how some people enjoy playing with technology. The reward is not just monetary.
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And build a power integration and charging system for solar and batteries then let them fight it out over where the electromagnetic field flows.
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With net metering the break even is in about 10 years. after that it's all profit. So it's not such a bad thing.
Also with a Tesla to charge of a 60A, 240V circuit, it's saving some more money.
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Does he really make a profit? Looking at the currently available mining hardware even if the electricity is free the return is extremely marginal, and after the halving it doesn't seem worth it at all.
Or do you mean some other currency? There are others where you can still make money.
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Think of it as solar-electric heating with a little bitcoin value on the side. A PC with some GPU cards mining, run off of solar power. The payoff has reduced over time, but besides the bitcoins, the box in a building in state with cold winters for which all the electricity used ends up as heat, so it has not gone completely to waste. Today it would not make a profit due to the hardware costs, but it's been running a long time so has been active during more profitable times.
Re: It's just not ecconmical to mine.. (Score:2)
Lots of mining happens in China using hydro power. There are also companies in Iceland using geothermal. There are profitable ways to mine Bitcoin that don't use significant natural resources.
I'd be curious to know... (Score:4)
Just how many people own how much of the entire bitcoins minted so far.
I'm willing to bet is a very small number to a very large number of bitcoins....... just like the current system the bitcoin creator(s) touted would be liberating us from.
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Well, at least it liberated us from the current 1%!
Alright, I'll take my 1/100th of a Bitcoin and sit in a corner...
Great! Die Cryptocurrency Die Die Die! (Score:1)
When Cryptocurrency dies a richly deserved death, then so too will instantly die all, or nearly all, Ransomware.
Please tell me a downside to that. I'll wait...
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Re: Great! Die Cryptocurrency Die Die Die! (Score:2)
Because they missed out on earlier booms and are jealous so now they want Bitcoin to die so they can feel schadenfreude.