ASIC Mining Rigs Invade CryptoNight

Application-Specific Integrated Circuits (ASIC) are customized computers used for a single purpose. In the case of cryptocurrency mining their one goal is to pump out as many hashes per second as possible, for the least amount of energy. Hashes can be thought of as tickets in a lottery. The more you have, the higher chance of winning the prize.

ASIC machines are even limited by which hash they can compute. A Bitcoin miner (hash function SHA-256) cannot mine Litecoin (Scrypt). For a while Litecoin was considered ASIC resistant but then the Antminer for the Scrypt algorithm was invented. Many blockchain developers attempt to thwart ASIC miners by changing the hashing function in order to promote decentralization with GPU mining. Monacoin Switched from Scrypt to Lyra2REv2 for this exact reason. Just recently CryptoNight ASIC machines have invaded the cryptospace.

For a point of reference my computer gets 750 CryptoNight hashes per second. This thing gets 220,000. If I make $2 a week this thing makes $600.

CryptoNight is the algorithm used for privacy coins (Monero, Zcoin, Zcash, Electroneum, etc). Many blockchains are hard at work trying to nullify these machines. I'm currently mining Electroneum. I was getting 100 coins every 5 days but now it's every 12 days because of this ASIC invasion.

The money I get from mining is negligible so it doesn't matter much. It just shows how overpowered these machines are. They are basically making everyone compete to see who can waste the most energy. This is a big reason why I am excited for POW 2.0 coins, because that energy will actually be accomplishing a useful task, instead of just a hash lottery.

I've gained a lot of respect for Monero lately because they seem much more on top of this new ASIC problem than the other privacy coins. They've already created a technology called Lithium Luna that is ASIC-resistant. I think the Monero dev team may be a step ahead of other privacy coins. Electroneum stated that they would move fast enough to avoid ASIC setbacks. 5 day payouts compared to 12 days payouts (and counting) seems like quite the setback if you ask me.

IMO privacy coins are very undervalued at the moment. Privacy is important. You have nothing to hide? You always have something to hide if a corrupt authority targets you. The more unstable debt-based economies become, the more you can bet that they will increase their corruption to stay afloat and in power for just a bit longer. Remember that they can print money and spend it whenever they want to. Here in the cryptosphere we have rules against such tomfoolery.