While I'm in favour of blocking covert usage of ASICBOOST, there's every reason
to block non-covert usage of it as well. In a low margin business like mining,
the advatange it gives is enormous - quite possibly 10x your profit margin -
and given that barrier free access to being able to purchase ASICs is already
an archilles heal for Bitcoin there is every reason to eliminate this legal
vulnerability. Additionally, it's a technical vulnerability as well: we want
getting into the ASIC manufacturing and design business to have as low barriers
to entry as is feasible, and the ASICBOOST exploit significantly increases the
minimum capital requirements to do so.