<p>In the linked article the author describes in quite some detail the failure of asic-resistance. (Thank you @Jannes for finding it.)</p>

<blockquote>
  <h2>ASIC Resistance</h2>
  
  <p>We’ve been pessimistic on ASIC resistance for a long time, and our journey into the hardware world solidly confirmed our position. Hardware is extremely flexible. General purpose computational devices like CPUs, GPUs, and even DRAM all make substantial compromises to their true potential in order to be useful for general computation. For basic hardware development, most algorithms can see substantial optimization just by taking away all of that generality and focusing on one specific thing.</p>
  
  <p>The vast majority of ASIC-resistant algorithms were designed by software engineers making assumptions about the limitations of custom hardware. These assumptions tend to be incorrect.</p>
  
  <p><a href="https://blog.sia.tech/the-state-of-cryptocurrency-mining-538004a37f9b" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://blog.sia.tech/the-state-of-cryptocurrency-mining-538004a37f9b</a></p>
</blockquote>

<p>It seems, on the basis that the article is both articulate sufficiently and, correct, that there is no actual hope for asic-resistance in any currency of potential future value.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-05-31T10:40:21.787Z
2018-05-31T10:40:21.787Z
Willtech
<p>Since the early days of cryptocurrencies, we have seen attempts to utilize ASIC-resistant mining puzzles. The idea behind that was to keep rich influential custom-hardware manufacturers out of game and make mining viable on commodity hardware. But as it turnd out lately, all such current attempts are doomed to fail. And the actual higher difficulty of producing ASICs for ASIC-resistant puzzles brings even more corruption and controversy.</p>

<p>It feels like there's no point in trying to come up with some memory hardness anymore. There will always be one company willing to spend $200M on custom hardware, because in the end it does not really matter whether it's 10x or 100000x more effective. It's frankly not possible to stay competetive against it. Wasn't it better if all currencies just utilized Blake2, or dSHA256 right now? How did we even arrive in this situation? Did nobody anticipate it to happen if the Market-cap raises this significantly? Are there any new ideas or Mining-puzzles being provably <em>nonASICable</em>, e. g. some memory-superhardness or whatever, or is the era of evading ASICs over?</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-05-30T08:55:10.523Z
I read an interesting article recently that touched on this, I will try and find it.
Willtech
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-05-30T12:23:09.470Z
@Willtech https://blog.sia.tech/the-state-of-cryptocurrency-mining-538004a37f9b Yes it's been obsolete for years, but that doesn't stop newcomers from trying and scammers from pushing it.
Jannes
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-05-30T12:55:42.867Z
All coins using the same algorithm would make miners not "sticky' to particular coins, making coins vulnerable to a downward value spiral as miners flee a dropping coin and the coin drops due to loss of mining. We saw some of this play out with BTC/BCH using the same mining algo.
David Schwartz
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-05-31T10:33:10.183Z
@Jannes Yes, that was the article.
Willtech
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-05-31T10:36:05.063Z
@DavidSchwartz I agree that miners fleeing a currency correlates with a downward spiral, we have seen it, but do not agree that causation has been identified. Less mining has power does not inherently mean lower market prices. I would think it more likely that as well as fleeing to mine an alternate currency they were also cashing out, putting additional downward pressure on price.
Willtech
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-05-31T15:27:57.460Z
@Willtech If a chain loses mining power, the cost of a double spend goes down. If the value of a double spend exceeds the cost of doing a double spend, that chain is toast. So losses of mining power ultimately will either destroy a chain or result in the value of a double spend going down. How do you think the value of a double spend will go down other than a drop in asset price?
David Schwartz
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-05-31T21:14:59.753Z
@DavidSchwartz Okay, so if a chain loses 51% of mining power and an attacker can somehow muster all of those independent resources to control them or, have that much mining power independently, then I accept the double spend premise. Obviously a much greater risk for a smaller currency than a larger one. Your point is valid in both cases that the cost of a double spend goes down but if it is still infeasible there seems no relevance to currency value.
Willtech
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-06-01T07:51:42.343Z
@Willtech The problem is, as miners flee a coin, a double spend becomes more feasible. The only fix, if you can't encourage more miners, is to decrease the reward for a double spend to keep it unprofitable. How do you think that happens?
David Schwartz
<mining-hardware><asic-resistance>
Is asic-resistance obsolete?
jakob
# Is asic-resistance obsolete?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2018-05-30)

Since the early days of cryptocurrencies, we have seen attempts to utilize ASIC-resistant mining puzzles. The idea behind that was to keep rich influential custom-hardware manufacturers out of game and make mining viable on commodity hardware. But as it turnd out lately, all such current attempts are doomed to fail. And the actual higher difficulty of producing ASICs for ASIC-resistant puzzles brings even more corruption and controversy.

It feels like there's no point in trying to come up with some memory hardness anymore. There will always be one company willing to spend $200M on custom hardware, because in the end it does not really matter whether it's 10x or 100000x more effective. It's frankly not possible to stay competetive against it. Wasn't it better if all currencies just utilized Blake2, or dSHA256 right now? How did we even arrive in this situation? Did nobody anticipate it to happen if the Market-cap raises this significantly? Are there any new ideas or Mining-puzzles being provably *nonASICable*, e. g. some memory-superhardness or whatever, or is the era of evading ASICs over?

**Tags:** mining-hardware, asic-resistance

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: I read an interesting article recently that touched on this, I will try and find it.  
> **username_2**: @username_1 https://blog.sia.tech/the-state-of-cryptocurrency-mining-538004a37f9b Yes it's been obsolete for years, but that doesn't stop newcomers from trying and scammers from pushing it.  
> **username_3**: All coins using the same algorithm would make miners not "sticky' to particular coins, making coins vulnerable to a downward value spiral as miners flee a dropping coin and the coin drops due to loss of mining. We saw some of this play out with BTC/BCH using the same mining algo.  
> **username_1**: @username_2 Yes, that was the article.  
> **username_1**: @username_3 I agree that miners fleeing a currency correlates with a downward spiral, we have seen it, but do not agree that causation has been identified. Less mining has power does not inherently mean lower market prices. I would think it more likely that as well as fleeing to mine an alternate currency they were also cashing out, putting additional downward pressure on price.  
> **username_3**: @username_1 If a chain loses mining power, the cost of a double spend goes down. If the value of a double spend exceeds the cost of doing a double spend, that chain is toast. So losses of mining power ultimately will either destroy a chain or result in the value of a double spend going down. How do you think the value of a double spend will go down other than a drop in asset price?  
> **username_1**: @username_3 Okay, so if a chain loses 51% of mining power and an attacker can somehow muster all of those independent resources to control them or, have that much mining power independently, then I accept the double spend premise. Obviously a much greater risk for a smaller currency than a larger one. Your point is valid in both cases that the cost of a double spend goes down but if it is still infeasible there seems no relevance to currency value.  
> **username_3**: @username_1 The problem is, as miners flee a coin, a double spend becomes more feasible. The only fix, if you can't encourage more miners, is to decrease the reward for a double spend to keep it unprofitable. How do you think that happens?  

---

## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2018-05-31. Score: 3 | Accepted answer

In the linked article the author describes in quite some detail the failure of asic-resistance. (Thank you @username_2 for finding it.)

> ## ASIC Resistance
>
> We’ve been pessimistic on ASIC resistance for a long time, and our journey into the hardware world solidly confirmed our position. Hardware is extremely flexible. General purpose computational devices like CPUs, GPUs, and even DRAM all make substantial compromises to their true potential in order to be useful for general computation. For basic hardware development, most algorithms can see substantial optimization just by taking away all of that generality and focusing on one specific thing.
>
> The vast majority of ASIC-resistant algorithms were designed by software engineers making assumptions about the limitations of custom hardware. These assumptions tend to be incorrect.
>
> <https://blog.sia.tech/the-state-of-cryptocurrency-mining-538004a37f9b>

It seems, on the basis that the article is both articulate sufficiently and, correct, that there is no actual hope for asic-resistance in any currency of potential future value.


---

