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Is there already a company that tied the 'donated' cpu power to a real product with revenue/profit to a crypto currency? I mean all these hashes are nice and a

Is there already a company that tied the 'donated' cpu power to a real product with revenue/profit to a crypto currency? I mean all these hashes are nice and all, but the little magic math hash.. is about as valuable as a painting. Whatever the idiot gives for it. Imho, if there is a real product developed with the donated cpu power in exchange for crypto coins which stand for a money value in relation to the developed product/medicine etc. Like combining distributed computing, crypto currency and a product (e.g. medicine) which we could all benefit from. And those miners aren't simply wasting electricity. Yes i consider bitcoin, and sort in current form, mining a waste of electricity.

jafaku 12y ago
The hashes are not being "wasted", it's the cost of Proof of Work. By definition, it can't be useful for something else. It has to be "wasted". I can't understand how you can see that it's being used to secure the first decentralized digital currency ever, that people all over the world are already using, and at the same time say it's being wasted.
- digital-rubber 12y ago
  Hell yes :) Bitcoin is similar to a pyramid scheme. Started mining early? You are rich! Started mining yesterday? you are screwed. And the more people get interest, the more fopping rich (i still think bitcoins have zero value), increasing value their mined coins will have. Don't be so naive please.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
  - jafaku 12y ago
    Do you realize what you just said applies to every successful investment? If you started investing in Apple early, you would be rich too. Does that make Apple a "pyramid scheme"? Or maybe, just maybe, it's just that riskier investments have bigger rewards? Don't be so stubborn please.
    - digital-rubber 12y ago
      If you think stock trading and bitcoin mining is the same, then i'm not the one that is stubborn.
      - jafaku 12y ago
        I didn't say they were the same, I said they were both investments. You need to work on those straw men.
  - theorique 12y ago
    It's called diminishing marginal returns and it's a feature of many different economic and physical systems.
fdsary 12y ago
What mining does in Bitcoin is to generate consensus, so that everyone agrees on the financial history, which === keeping track of what public key owns what amount. The actual hashes are pretty worthless, but that's the service mining is providing. Personally, I think it's kinda worthless to build a bunch of skyscraper on perfectly fine land just to fill with people working for some bank, just to keep my $ secure. For my intents and purposes, having a bank company (with employees, offices, leaders who get compensated like kings, etc) is a bigger waste that I can't wait to get rid of. Same with my VISA debit card, employing thousands just to let me access my money. Also charging a 3% fee on every transaction. If only there was some kind of network of computer programs that could replace those people...
- digital-rubber 12y ago
  Consensus of what? That early miners could mine a bit coin everyday and now you have to mine for 3 months to find one?
  - martinko 12y ago
    Consensus about the timeline and validity of transactions. What does what you said have to do with anything?
    - digital-rubber 12y ago
      consensus means all members of a party agree upon something. Not just 50%+1, majority rule. This has to do with bitcoins, exchanges (the 3% fee people mentioned before). And people that are about to stuff their money into a futile idea. And don't pretend your comment is contributing in any way. People doing bitcoins now, people starting the exchanges, online wallets etc, take the exact same positions as bankers have/had now. Pretending they know it all so well and right. And soon they too will take from you just as bankers. This exchange is not going to bring any change to bitcoins, it's just the winklevoss brothers trying to make the news again, and hope they finally have a product own besides a shitload of lawsuit money. “I'm quite openly against [proof of work] mining as the future of digital currencies based on the amount of energy it wastes, and damage it does to the environment – without giving anything back apart from making the fiat rich richer.” -- Jackson Palmer, author of Dogecoin. And i share this point of view.
maxerickson 12y ago
This has little to do with the linked article and has been gone over repeatedly. Stack Exchange points out some of the problems securing a blockchain with 'useful work': http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/20879/why-cant-we-design-a-bitcoin-that-does-useful-work/20886#20886 http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/20879/why-cant-we...
- digital-rubber 12y ago
  It's about bitcoin, exchange of value, etc. Seems quite related to me. Thanks for the link though. And just because something has been discussed more often, doesn't mean it should not be mentioned at all?
  - maxerickson 12y ago
    It's not a yes/no binary rule, it's a sliding scale. For this story, your comment is over towards the "ugh, not again, they didn't even bother to understand the basic responses to their criticism" side of my scale. What it comes down to is that I don't think every story about bitcoin needs to have a bunch of facile criticism of bitcoin attached to it. Criticism specific to the story is great, as is well thought out, deeper criticism.
- digital-rubber 12y ago
  http://foldingcoin.net http://foldingcoin.net

jafaku 12y ago

The hashes are not being "wasted", it's the cost of Proof of Work. By definition, it can't be useful for something else. It has to be "wasted". I can't understand how you can see that it's being used to secure the first decentralized digital currency ever, that people all over the world are already using, and at the same time say it's being wasted.

digital-rubber 12y ago
Hell yes :) Bitcoin is similar to a pyramid scheme. Started mining early? You are rich! Started mining yesterday? you are screwed. And the more people get interest, the more fopping rich (i still think bitcoins have zero value), increasing value their mined coins will have. Don't be so naive please.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- jafaku 12y ago
  Do you realize what you just said applies to every successful investment? If you started investing in Apple early, you would be rich too. Does that make Apple a "pyramid scheme"? Or maybe, just maybe, it's just that riskier investments have bigger rewards? Don't be so stubborn please.
  - digital-rubber 12y ago
    If you think stock trading and bitcoin mining is the same, then i'm not the one that is stubborn.
    - jafaku 12y ago
      I didn't say they were the same, I said they were both investments. You need to work on those straw men.
- theorique 12y ago
  It's called diminishing marginal returns and it's a feature of many different economic and physical systems.

fdsary 12y ago

What mining does in Bitcoin is to generate consensus, so that everyone agrees on the financial history, which === keeping track of what public key owns what amount. The actual hashes are pretty worthless, but that's the service mining is providing. Personally, I think it's kinda worthless to build a bunch of skyscraper on perfectly fine land just to fill with people working for some bank, just to keep my $ secure. For my intents and purposes, having a bank company (with employees, offices, leaders who get compensated like kings, etc) is a bigger waste that I can't wait to get rid of. Same with my VISA debit card, employing thousands just to let me access my money. Also charging a 3% fee on every transaction. If only there was some kind of network of computer programs that could replace those people...

digital-rubber 12y ago
Consensus of what? That early miners could mine a bit coin everyday and now you have to mine for 3 months to find one?
- martinko 12y ago
  Consensus about the timeline and validity of transactions. What does what you said have to do with anything?
  - digital-rubber 12y ago
    consensus means all members of a party agree upon something. Not just 50%+1, majority rule. This has to do with bitcoins, exchanges (the 3% fee people mentioned before). And people that are about to stuff their money into a futile idea. And don't pretend your comment is contributing in any way. People doing bitcoins now, people starting the exchanges, online wallets etc, take the exact same positions as bankers have/had now. Pretending they know it all so well and right. And soon they too will take from you just as bankers. This exchange is not going to bring any change to bitcoins, it's just the winklevoss brothers trying to make the news again, and hope they finally have a product own besides a shitload of lawsuit money. “I'm quite openly against [proof of work] mining as the future of digital currencies based on the amount of energy it wastes, and damage it does to the environment – without giving anything back apart from making the fiat rich richer.” -- Jackson Palmer, author of Dogecoin. And i share this point of view.

maxerickson 12y ago

This has little to do with the linked article and has been gone over repeatedly. Stack Exchange points out some of the problems securing a blockchain with 'useful work': http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/20879/why-cant-we-design-a-bitcoin-that-does-useful-work/20886#20886 http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/20879/why-cant-we...

digital-rubber 12y ago
It's about bitcoin, exchange of value, etc. Seems quite related to me. Thanks for the link though. And just because something has been discussed more often, doesn't mean it should not be mentioned at all?
- maxerickson 12y ago
  It's not a yes/no binary rule, it's a sliding scale. For this story, your comment is over towards the "ugh, not again, they didn't even bother to understand the basic responses to their criticism" side of my scale. What it comes down to is that I don't think every story about bitcoin needs to have a bunch of facile criticism of bitcoin attached to it. Criticism specific to the story is great, as is well thought out, deeper criticism.
digital-rubber 12y ago
http://foldingcoin.net http://foldingcoin.net