Bitcoin miners: Why should I be scolded by the community for mining coins with my own ability?

Time flies. It’s been nearly a decade since the Bitcoin network and cryptocurrency ecosystem were created.

During this time, the Bitcoin network protocol has generated a large number of users, infrastructure, businesses, and powerful developers and miners.

Since the beginning of Bitcoin mining history, individuals have mined a lot of Bitcoin using central processing units (aka home computers). Later, figures like Artforz launched the graphics processing unit (GPU) arms race - a significant moment in Bitcoin history, which eventually led to the new world of application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) mining, which changed the rules of the game.

The "evil" miners

The cryptocurrency ecosystem is composed of diverse participants, and certain specific "personal mining pools" ensure the incentives of the cryptocurrency economy and provide huge resources for the ecosystem.

Love them or hate them, Bitcoin miners have been processing our blocks for years. On these blocks, millions of transactions are broadcasted to the entire Bitcoin network.

Although miners have been following the rules of the protocol, they have been regarded as having "ulterior motives" by certain groups and people in the cryptocurrency industry. For some reason, mining pools have suddenly been labeled as "evil organizations" that seem ready to launch malicious attacks on the network at any time.

(Photo) Artforz becomes the first miner villain in the Bitcoin community

Through an incentive system called proof-of-work (PoW), miners are rewarded with bitcoins when they discover new blocks. In the first year of Bitcoin, people like Satoshi Nakamoto and Hal Finney used CPUs to mine bitcoins.

However, not long after, an anonymous individual known as "Artforz" figured out how to allow large GPU mining farms to obtain Bitcoin. Artforz, who controlled a large amount of hash rate at the time, created an issue that the community was debating, which led to Satoshi Nakamoto's request to slow down the mining arms race.

Satoshi Nakamoto also explained, “We should have a gentleman’s agreement to postpone the GPU arms race to ensure a good ecosystem for the Bitcoin network. If new users’ concerns about GPU drivers and compatibility can be eliminated, it will be easier for them to keep up with the progress of development. If anyone with a CPU can now compete equally, this is the ideal situation.”

(Figure) As early as 2010, a miner named Artforz controlled the vast majority of the BTC network’s hash rate

ASIC Era

A few years later, after Satoshi Nakamoto disappeared, numerous ASIC mining machines entered the market and completely changed the industry. The days of mining Bitcoin with home computers are gone, and Bitcoin cannot be mined with GPUs because it is not profitable.

These ASIC devices and their operators have long been a core topic of discussion among cryptocurrency network participants. In the process, many ASIC manufacturers have emerged, many of which have failed, but some have continued to operate from the early days to the present. Since the beginning of the ASIC evolution, the mining industry has gradually become a target of public criticism - because it has caused many controversial topics, such as consuming too much electricity and colluding to destroy the network.

(Picture) ASIC Antminer

Remember when Ghash.io controlled 51% of the network?

Fears of mining conspiracies have plagued the cryptocurrency community for quite some time, after ASICs gradually phased out GPUs. Soon after the advent of ASICs, personal mining and "home mining", even with ASICs, became unprofitable for individual miners. As a result, many of them began to join "mining pools" to mine cryptocurrencies. Mining pools can find blocks more easily and use contractual agreements to divide profits.

In the early days, only a few mining pools existed, but over time more groups joined, dividing the network’s hash rate. It wasn’t until June 2014 that one mining pool caused a lot of controversy.

(Figure) In June 2014, the Ghash.io mining pool accounted for more than 51% of the hash rate of the Bitcoin network

At that particular time, the Ghash.io mining pool accounted for more than 50% of the Bitcoin network's hash rate. In theory, this meant that the mining pool could veto verified transactions. The incident caused an uproar in the community and made headlines in mainstream media. Eventually, the heated debate slowly subsided and Ghash.io was disbanded into several smaller mining pools.

'Selfish and greedy' miners

In December 2015, the ScalingBitcoin conference once again excited the community because of a group photo at the conference - the mining pool operators in the photo controlled nearly 70% of the hash rate. At that time, mining pool developers such as F2pool, Antpool, BTCC, Avalon and others discussed the topic of scaling together for the first time. Since then, year after year, miners have been criticized for being "selfish and greedy" and even called "conspirators" - which is actually an objective product of the Bitcoin protocol.

(Photo) Sensational photo in 2015: The miners in the photo controlled nearly 70% of the hash rate of the Bitcoin network at the time

Last year, the topic was revived as the Bitcoin community was once again outraged by the use of hidden ASICs to boost mining. This controversy, along with other conspiracy theories, led some supporters and developers to talk about changing Bitcoin’s PoW consensus.

At the time, the use of hidden ASICBoost mining caused a frenzy of criticism on cryptocurrency-centric forums and Twitter. The topic has begun to rotate throughout forums and social media, and the community is now discussing the topic of ASIC Boost patents and public adoption of mining technology...

Miners continue to process blocks

In fact, no one can really explain why miners are constantly criticized and even "crucified" for their mining practices. Miners have been around since the beginning of coding. The controversy over mining has also caused the topic to permeate other cryptocurrency communities. ASIC mining has caused some digital asset teams (such as Monero) to consider changing their consensus algorithms to avoid being dominated by ASICs at all costs.

Currently, the Bitcoin network hash rate is processing 28 exahash per second. Even though mining has become unprofitable in some areas, most miners still remain firm in their beliefs and continue to process blocks despite the "infamy".