Subject: Re: [bitcoin-dev] BIP Proposal: Consensus (hard fork) PoST Datastore for Energy Efficient Mining

From: Keagan McClelland <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 5 Mar 2021 14:11:02 -0700

It is important to understand that it is critical for the work to be
"useless" in order for the security model to be the same. If the work was
useful it provides an avenue for actors to have nothing at stake when
submitting a proof of work, since the marginal cost of block construction
will be lessened by the fact that the work was useful in a different
context and therefore would have been done anyway. This actually degrades
the security of the network in the process.

As a separate issue, proposing a hard fork in the hashing algorithm will
invalidate the enormous amount of capital expenditure by mining entities
and disincentivize future capital expenditure into mining hardware that may
compute these more "useful" proofs of work. This is because any change in
the POW algorithm will be considered unstable and subject to change in the
future. This puts the entire network at even more risk meaning that no
entity is tying their own interests to that of the bitcoin network at
large. It also puts the developers in a position where they can be bribed
by entities with a vested interest in deciding what the new "useful" proof
of work should be.

All of these things make the Bitcoin network worse off.

Keagan

On Fri, Mar 5, 2021 at 1:48 PM Lonero Foundation via bitcoin-dev <
[email-masked]> wrote:

> Also in regards to my other email, I forgot to iterate that my
> cryptography proposal helps behind the efficiency category but also tackles
> problems such as NP-Completeness or Halting which is something the BTC
> network could be vulnerable to in the future. For sake of simplicity, I do
> want to do this BIP because it tackles lots of the issues in regards to
> this manner and can provide useful insight to the community. If things such
> as bigger block height have been proposed as hard forks, I feel at the very
> least an upgrade regarding the hashing algorithm and cryptography does at
> least warrant some discussion. Anyways I hope I can send you my BIP, just
> let me know on the preferred format?
>
> Best regards, Andrew
>
> On Fri, Mar 5, 2021, 10:12 AM Lonero Foundation <
> [email-masked]> wrote:
>
>> Hi, this isn't about the energy efficient argument in regards to
>> renewables or mining devices but a better cryptography layer to get the
>> most out of your hashing for validation. I do understand the arbitrariness
>> of it, but do want to still propose a document. Do I use the Media Wiki
>> format on GitHub and just attach it as my proposal?
>>
>> Best regards, Andrew
>>
>> On Fri, Mar 5, 2021, 10:07 AM Devrandom <[email-masked]>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Hi Ryan and Andrew,
>>>
>>> On Fri, Mar 5, 2021 at 5:42 AM Ryan Grant via bitcoin-dev <
>>> [email-masked]> wrote:
>>>
>>>>
>>>>   https://www.truthcoin.info/blog/pow-cheapest/
>>>>     "Nothing is Cheaper than Proof of Work"
>>>>     on | 04 Aug 2015
>>>>
>>>>
>>> Just to belabor this a bit, the paper demonstrates that the mining
>>> market will tend to expend resources equivalent to miner reward.  It does
>>> not prove that mining work has to expend *energy* as a primary cost.
>>>
>>> Some might argue that energy expenditure has negative externalities and
>>> that we should move to other resources.  I would argue that the negative
>>> externalities will go away soon because of the move to renewables, so the
>>> point is likely moot.
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
> bitcoin-dev mailing list
> [email-masked]
> https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/bitcoin-dev
>