Dero's official position on ASICs

General Discussion Technical Discussion
#61

Serena, I think the ASICs are a greater existential threat than the devs that have not yet forked realise. I have just looked - the network hash rate is now at over 100MH/s. it has literally quadrulpled in a few days and will likely go higher. I too am a fan of what of what the team is doing, but right now the priority has to be getting rid of the ASICs. If that takes a week of dev time - and that means a week later roll-out of Atlantis (or even three weeks) so what?. On balance, its a risk of the whole project being killed Vs a few weeks delay and ongoing development.

The same argument is going on over at Aeon right now. From where I sit I have entirely lost confidence and trust in dev team over there. They claim that the community and decentralisation is critical to the coin’s success - but are doing nothing to stop the complete undermining of both those aspects - and pools are closing too as people move to other coins. The same will happen here unless this ASIC problem is elevated in priority.

Any coin which claims that decentralisation is important but does NOT address the ASIC problem as a matter of urgency is at best stuck in a bunker mentality that refuses to see the real existential threats - at worst is just about hype and screwing the community. I will HODL everything I have because all of this is a speculative investment, but I will no longer support further any coin which does not address the ASICs quickly.

This is MY position. I great faith in the Devs’ ability - and Atlantis seems really amazing - but just as Betamax trusted in its technology to win over the inferior VHS technology and refused to address the existential threat which they could see was winning right in front of them, so too will those coins that do not move against the ASICs IMO.

I could live with the network hash rate at ~ 50MH/s - just, but it has literally doubled overnight. At this rate it will likely be 1GH/s by the time of Atlantis release even allowing for a tapering off - it will certainly be over 500 MH/s. That will be around a 100 fold increase in hashing pretty much all from ASICs. I doubt the coin can survive that. I am not that sure it isn’t already too late …

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#62

You left out the remote kill switch that is built into some ASICs - and/or that such centralisation allows for the possibility of some government to forcibly take control of the coin via the decentralised ASIC community. ASICs have nothing positive to bring to the table unless and until they are open source and cheap.

#64

Hi,

I’m a big fan of Dero for a number of reasons. However, as with most successful coins, there is no way to prevent ASICs from being a part of the ecosystem - whether its Baikal or Bitmain or the new and upcoming Pascal chips - its an inevitability.

There are pros and cons, the main con being decentralization and the fact that manufacturers “test” their products which some feel is unfair to the market and to cryptocurrencies. In the meantime, large farming companies, people with cash and these same corporations will now build technology that is not shared, used to enhance their own financial gain and further disrupt mining in other ways that may have yet to be tried or done.

Its very hard to accumulate very expensive and ridiculously inefficient video cards at the moment. And the more profit there is in mining, the harder it will be to get cards to mine with. Right now, in fact, an ASIC miner from Baikal is $550 for 20Khs - whereas the investment to have this up and running on a PC rig is somewhere near $16,000 - $17,500. More people can afford the ASIC - it also is much more energy efficient. I think we could all agree that if everyone could have access to the ASIC at this price - it would be a much more economical and much easier to use device and application than Mining Rigs.

Sure, the ASIC would be more expensive in Monero didn’t fork. But then most people would have pointed to XMR and and the distribution would be much better.

I’m not opposed to ASICs - especially if you consider all the top performing coins have ASICs and still have great returns for people. I think they level the playing field - because no one has ever told me that getting a 1080ti was easy or cheap. I wish we could develop more and build more technology in the West to compete with Asia - and I believe PASCAL is working hard on this.

But what I do know is the the founder of cryptocurrency intended there to be competition that led to greater technological advances and broad worldwide adoption. Video Card GPUs are not really helping get us to the next level. So there must be a better answer.

I love DERO and know it will succeed. I hope they keep the original Cryptonote algorithm and focus on their other technological milestones. The price has jumped today - and like BTC, LTC, DEC or any of the other big names in crypto - ASICs never stopped their success or impeded their progress.

Just my opinion. I bought DERO with BTC that some ASIC mined and I purchased. I’m very happy with my investment and continue to point my NVIDIA cards at other coins for mining.

I wish this project the best and whatever is decided - I’ll trust its the best solution for the future of the coin. GPUs are like the Samurai of old - great respect and honor, but not enough to defeat the invention of gunpowder and firearms (ASICs.)

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#65

Yap, everyone who bought ASICs will support ASICs. But globally for any other miner it means that to stay on the same level of profitability he should send money to Bitmain. It is like a tax. Another option - you can buy the coins on the market, sending money again to Bitmain. The idea of cryprocurrency is in decentralized emission, but in reality it is controlled by Bitmain. They do not just sell ASICs, they mine for themselves first of all.

#66

But honestly that’s not completely true. To be decentralized there needs to be competitive technological growth that allows for reduction in pricing and fair distribution. GPU mining can still be controlled - in fact, with the new round of ASIC technologies emerging, you will not be able to tell the difference between a GPU and an ASIC. A GPU is not a longterm advance for any cryptocurrency. I dont have ASICs, but I understand that the future cannot be a GPU - the bitcoin blockchain would still be immature if that were the case.

#67

hagglecoin, your logic is so flawed I can only assume you haven’t thought it through. ASICs only offer a benefit in terms of Hashes/watt, there is no fundamental benefit. That H/watt advantage only works if everyone else is on cpus/gpus. If everyone moves to ASICs - no benefit is gained at all. The Hashes/coin rises to massive levels and the same energy burn is the result per coin. Further, there is a major centralisation effect. One of the major drivers of crypto is the desire to wrest control from banks and governments and control our own destinies - that is especially true of cryptonight based coins. The ASICs manufacturers have a history of bad faith and are furthermore at the potential behest of the Chinese Government. Lest anyone forgets, this is a regime which is proven to be willing to kill its own people to maintain power. I for one don’t trust any government control - its why I am into crypto - but even less one with China’s track record. Further, ASICs destroy any prospect of privacy - they are known to have a call home facility which means that IP addresses can be tied to miners which gives a major back door to anyone wanting to track you and your money. If that isn’t enough, there are also more egalitarian things like the fact that forcing ASICs to be needed effectively strips away the entire reason that crypto was created in the first place - to be egalitarian, if the young kid with a gaming PC cannot get started dabbling in crypto - it also closes a door to potentially learning programming, becoming comfortable with more advanced things like compiling etc. I haven’t even begun to pull apart the fallacy of your position - but that should do for starters.

3 Likes
#68

Todays update: approx. 200MH/s @ Dero Network.

Tomorrow it will be 300MH/s…

…still want to wait 6 weeks?!

#69

@NoLimit

Why do you feel that a 300MH/s network in itself is an issue?

Network hashrate is reflecting the increase in Dero’s price and popularity, and that on its own is a very good thing.

Please explain your point of view on the subject.

#70

Hahaha… goog joke :joy::joy:
Price?? Popularity??? Tell me more about your phantasies…

Asic miners hold coins back from market to dump it after a while… youll see… it will be a desaster :upside_down_face:

I hodl my coins anyway, take out popcorn and watch:)
300MH/s wouldnt be a problem if its agalty spreaded within every miner. Price and reward/block doesnt match the network rate…

#71

Emission is constant, higher network hashrate doesn’t mean they are scooping more coins. It is less profitable now for an ASIC miner to mine Dero, than it was profitable to you last month.

Therefore, since GPU miners had 5 months to mine, and ASICs have 1 month, one could make the argument that ASIC miners are afraid GPU miners will dump, and are reluctant to join the increasing hashrate.

Don’t get me wrong, Dero is anti-ASIC, and pro egalitarian mining.

I am just presenting a wider point of view.

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#72

True: emission is constant.
But: before we had 10MH/s (700 workers) and a reward of ~30Dero per block. Now we got 200MH/s… from these there are approx 2MH/s GPU miners and rest Asic. And i bet there arent so many workers.
Result: Gpu miner get nothing, less worker ant in total only Asics——> Coins are going in less miner who can control easely the market and price.

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#73

I just don’t understand the reluctance to fork sooner. I have just re-read the entire thread. There is an official statement that it would only take a couple or three days to implement a PoW change … so why not? If it makes a one week delay in the rollout of the next major update, so what? There is no point in rolling out to a dead project - unless the Dero team have a vested interest in some way for ASICs being allowed around longer I just don’t see any benefit not forking quickly.

Monero took an 80% hashrate hit - it is /still/ a little below 50% of the peak. All that went somewhere and I am betting a good chunk of it is here (or coming here).

The price is clearly pump and dump - which is another ASICs sign. Oh well, its your call but I for one will do no more mining until the ASICs are removed and then I will review what faith I have in the project/devs before I return. Some other leading coins which are showing similar tardiness in forking will I am sure suffer long term as a result. Dero at least has a really interesting roadmap which might save it.

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#74

Hi @deroguy

First, please let me point out that your argument is based on a lot of speculation.

Second, you took out an important part of the 2-3 days needed. That statement included that Dero team will not risk the security and stability of the network by forking a temporary unverified algorithm.

I understand your concerns; however, Dero team is taking the best possible route. Keep in mind that Dero devs have access to technologies that are not publicly available.

#75

Simply repeating the same thing again and again does not address the concerns. /Why/ and /how/ would implementing a temporary PoW change to buy time risk the integrity of the network? That is the bit I keep asking in a variety of different ways and to which no answer is ever forthcoming.

I think the Devs are doing a truly amazing job and I have a great deal of faith in their technical competence and vision - I just don’t understand why the PoW change is such a problem when it is such a small delay to the roll-out.

I am not sure what you think is so much speculation either? The 80% drop in hash rate? - fact. It went from 1.2 GH/s to ~300 MH/s and its still around the 500 MH/s mark (give or take inherent the variability).

The 2-3 days is the devs own estimation - how is that speculation on my part? Your reply apparently confirms that includes quality checking and testing, so what is the problem?

The only speculation I see is the interpretation of the price movement being caused by pumping from ASICs. That is hardly a lot of speculation. Nor is it that big a leap - its been a well observed pattern elsewhere too.

You state as fact without any supporting commentary or evidence that the devs are ‘taking the best possible route’. That is merely an opinion and one we have to take on trust - but right now with the dearth of any feedback of any substance as to /why/ not doing anything about the ASICs is the best course of action it looks like FUD. Why would you want to do that? You may well be taking the best path, but there is no way of judging if your choice is right, stupid, inspired or just plain daft. All we get is ‘trust us’ … That makes me nervous. If I had less faith in the team from what they have already delivered I’d be long gone already.

At least throw us a bone :slight_smile:

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#76

It’s good, more coins in circulation, then fork and ‘checkmate’.
We will be working on the best coin ever.

People, (kids) PATIENCE !!! Some faith in the team. They know what they are doing.

Good luck dev :slight_smile:

#77

The exact technicalities behind that are not public information :slight_smile:

The problem is the risk mentioned above.

Increased hashrate doesn’t lead to more coins being mined. Emissions are constant. Even by the end of 45 days, GPU miners will still have mined multiples of what ASICs would mine, so one could argue that GPU miners are the risk of dumping (just an arbitrary argument, I’m a GPU miner)

I wish I could supply supporting evidence, however, that is not public information :slight_smile:

We do appreciate your faith in the Dero team, and you (and all of our supporters) will not be disappointed.

:slight_smile:

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#78

@maxior Thank you for your support

Emissions are constant, doesn’t matter if 1MH/s or 1GH/s network. So the number of coins in circulation will increase at a specific rate no matter what. :slight_smile:

#79

Firstly, I logged in to write something has happened here in the UK which has caused me to reassess and change my opinion - the TSB bank online banking update which has gone horribly wrong - and to apologize for being so critical. I should have had more faith in the team’s judgement given the truly amazing work you have already done - so my apologies (just to be explicit).

I was aware of the emission rate being the constant - it the whole point of a dynamic difficulty after all.

Having said all of that, I still think that ASIC miners almost by definition are the ones more likely to dump. GPU and CPU miners are generally in it because they believe in a project or vision and are looking to be part of a revolutionary movement - its certainly why I came to Dero. But enough of that.

Thank you for being so patient and tolerant of me. I guess I am just too keen to get back to mining Dero.

#80

@Mojo

We had a discussion earlier, and you made the point that GPU miners had been mining for a while before the asics arrived, so they are at an advantage currently basically.

You also mention here that emissions are constant and that GPU miners have mined multiple times more of what asics have mined. I disagree.

emission is the same, but @ 220khs an asic would get 23 dero a day roughly. at a lower power cost.
my gpu capacity of 38khs gets me like 4 dero a day? 5? after electricity its like 4 dollars profit a day. Miners are incentivised to support the network through the rewards issued to them through emissions.

currently…there is NO current incentive to support the network with my small farm. and if i am not doing that, i am willing to bet a lot of other miners who were on the dero network like me from earlier days (not beginning) are also looking at this and going huh?

There is so much secrecy around what is actually going on, it really is feeling big brotherish, trust us, everything will be ok but what do we have to go on? we have nothing except words. So we the community have every right to be concerned.

I do agree we shouldnt fork if it compromises security, but what are you trying to prove here? youve defeated multiple attacks on the network, you’ve blatantly encouraged attackers to try their luck, they havent succeeded. GREAT! and we are all quite impressed with that.

But you are alienating pockets of the community…who…may or may not follow you when you do actually fork.
Miners are everywhere, but supportive, fervently loyal community miners who are dedicated to the network are a lot harder to find (the ones who dont pump and dump)

You guys (& gal @ Serena) need to really throw us some info that really gives us the warm fuzzy feeling. Atlantis will be great, but it doesnt sort the current situation out. There is no dump currently…but there will be one…maybe not now, but its coming. and there will be blood on the streets and the community will turn to you and the team and at that point (if it comes, this is speculation :wink: ) you will have a much harder time building trust with the community, and if thats the case…you have much bigger problems than asics

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#81

+1 to hagglecoin. GPU Dero miners have neither the numbers nor the dedication and can be easily overcome by a tiny fraction of ETH or Monero hasharate switch resulting in network insecurity. Same for cryptonight ASICs atm but there is a bigger share of ASICs on Dero now than there were GPUs prior to ASICs introduction. Dero price action reflects this. The miners who want their profits now is a secondary consideration to NW security. Mine something else and buy Dero. Think about it, if you want to get more Deros mined with your GPU it means it should be cheap. You cannot have it both ways because of the free open market. When Dero switches its algo and remains popular then GPU miners will not get more coins than they can get now by mining something else and buying Dero. Miners’ pofitability should remain the same if the price remains stable during the transition.
If it’s a new unique algo Dero will need to gain a great share of miners’ GPUs to become secure. Then sooner or later ASICs will be developed for this algo and GPU miners will complain again.
When ASICs are a problem is when there are only a few of them controlling most of the hashrate.
What makes you think that ASIC miners are more likely to hold the coins compared to GPU miners? Because only if they don’t sell most of the mined coins we can talk about centralization. There are probably not as many cryptonight ASIC owners as there are GPU cryptonight farms but it will get there.
It would be interesting to see any research conducted on coin distribution among addresses that originated from buying/GPU mining/ASIC mining.

@deroguy If ASIC owners are more likely to dump as you say this is a good thing because it will prevent centralization of ownership, just buy the coins from them. So what if they get your btc? You get Dero in return.

@Abrustetha A dump is not a bad thing and is natural when a market becomes overextended and people take profits. It would create a buying opportunity for others and help spread the ownership.

You either trust the dev(s) or you don’t. No number of checks or amount of openness will prevent a foul play only delay the dissemination of information when some degree of privacy is maintained. However keeping a trade secret for a while is a competitive advantage.