Miners have enough food and will not leave in the cold winter丨People in the chain

The recent Bitcoin curve has affected the currency and blockchain circles. The price of product coins has fallen, and the direct victims are its producers. For Bitcoin miners, bad news comes one after another. Ant S9 and other mining machines have reached the shutdown price, and news of suspension of work has been coming one after another. For a while, miners in various mining-related groups are struggling to make a living.

——What do the miners talk about?

For example, the one below.

This group is almost entirely made up of miners who have turned off their computers, and the topics they talk about are very realistic.

There is another very realistic thing for Bianews. In a Chain People series article in July titled "The Troubles of Miners with 6 Houses", the rights-defending miner "Xiangyang" who "loves all kinds of venture capital, owns 6 houses, and regards mining as entertainment" was mentioned. When asked about it again this time, he was like this.

But Mr. Liu, a self-proclaimed ordinary miner who was interviewed by Bianews, had another idea.

"Survivor bias" in "mine disasters"

Mr. Liu joined the ranks of miners at the end of 2017, mainly mining Bitcoin and Ethereum.

Mr. Liu said that although the mining farms that have invested over tens of millions are still small, they basically mine mainstream currencies, because everyone knows that the prices of non-mainstream currencies fluctuate, and few people will use their own real money to play with non-mainstream currencies.

After Mr. Liu entered the cryptocurrency industry, the entire industry was booming. Judging from his company’s business, many sectors involve blockchain, including investment and digital currency mining.

Mr. Liu spent most of the first three months of 2018 in Xinjiang, operating the mine. From the initial site construction, to his own machines coming in, to more machines from friends coming in, to dealing with the local government, and the subsequent construction and production, he said it was a hard and boring process.

After this "mine disaster", compared with the tragic scenes we have seen before, Mr. Liu did not feel the chill that penetrated his bones. Why is that?

In his opinion, the current bear market in the overall mining market is indeed a low period for the industry, but if your costs are controlled very low, or your early operating efficiency is very high, as mining machines continue to shut down, the average number of bitcoins mined is still increasing, although the price is lower.

Regarding the hotly debated monopoly issue, Mr. Liu said that he felt the monopoly problem was not actually serious. Small miners could rely on personal resources. If the personal resources of his team were good and they could solve the local living environment problems, then their operations would be better.

"Everyone has unique resources, unique stores and unique locations. There is a monopoly on mining machine brands, but production is actually not bad."

Regarding the reason for the decline of Bitcoin, he frankly told Bianews that he felt he did not have much say because he did not have in-depth research on the secondary market.

However, since he is optimistic about Bitcoin in the long term, short-term bull and bear markets and short-term fluctuations do not mean much to people like him . In fact, if you are optimistic about something in the long term, short-term fluctuations may be an opportunity for you.

However, Mr. Liu still believes that this bear market will last longer.

One reason is that the overall market sentiment is relatively weak now, and the other reason is that global funds are relatively weak.

He said that the popularity of this industry actually came from the influx of a large amount of funds, which is an important indicator, but now there is a state of net outflow of funds, so he thinks this bear market will last longer.

Of course, there are indeed some miners around him who have shut down their machines and stopped production, but they themselves have strong assets and this is just a small setback in their investment, not to the extent of doubting their lives.

But there are also many people like him, who have huge incomes from other industries, and now is the right time to expand or take over. In his words, "it is a time point to have a deeper understanding of this industry . "

These thoughts may not be relatable to the miners whose machines have been shut down and production has ceased, and can only be recognized by those who are still "alive".

Perhaps, this is the embodiment of the ubiquitous "survivor bias" in this mining disaster .

Questions that only “survivor” miners can consider

We actually prepared the following topics for other miners to interview, but those who have shut down their machines and stopped production have obviously lost the intention to answer these questions.

First of all, let’s talk about the real problems faced by miners. Mr. Liu revealed to Bianews that in fact, equipment iteration has a great impact on them.

First, the depreciation of existing equipment will accelerate; second, the increased computing power of new equipment will improve efficiency, which will have a huge impact on existing computing power.

Compared to the bear market in coin prices, which may be an opportunity for them, the discount of equipment and the backwardness of computing power are fatal and irreversible.

Miners always seem to be considering such realistic issues, or rather, as long as the mining machines are running for a day, miners must consider these issues.

In fact, miners are not without ideals. Mr. Liu also has his own ideas about the decentralized computing power democracy envisioned by Satoshi Nakamoto.

“That’s just like artificial intelligence, biotechnology, genetic technology, and so on. Decentralization does not necessarily have a 100% decisive impact on society, but it is a very good way to transform the world, just like a demigod existence will bring a very good transformation to the real world. As for whether it can be completely transformed and when it can be completely transformed, I don’t know.”

"But I only know that every little bit of reform he makes is likely to bring more human happiness and more fair democracy."

But at the same time, Mr. Liu also frankly said that less than 50% or even 30% or 40% of miners will seriously use their computing power to vote, and most people still mine from the perspective of profit. This is another helpless situation limited by reality.

Just like when talking about whether he or the people around him strongly support which side in the recent computing power war, Mr. Liu said a little shyly: "I still support Wu Jihan, because everyone has the value concept of this thing." After a pause, he said, "On the other hand, there is also the calculation of economic benefits. Some of our mining farms have cooperated with Bitmain, so there is still a little interest connection."

Perhaps miners are the kind of people who try very hard to find a balance between ideals and reality.

These worries are issues that only the miners who survived or decided to survive have time to think about.

end

Regarding the future of the mining industry and miners, Mr. Liu said that he felt that the future would develop in a better direction.

Because computing power includes many things, and now with the emergence of more computing power capacity such as cloud computing, people are gradually recognizing the value of computing power. In particular, the blockchain world is expanding more and more, which is good for miners, because digital currency is only a part of the blockchain world, and the computing power of miners can play many roles in the blockchain world.

Therefore, the decline of Bitcoin will not affect Mr. Liu's judgment of the future. He still decides to survive and believes that he still has enough ability to operate, rather than just living for the sake of survival.

For those who have left the sad land of mining, such as Xiang Yang, the future of this industry may not be that important.

Regardless of what kind of person they are, through the baptism of "mining accidents" of all sizes, they have come to understand that no industry has unchanging glory. The only thing that remains unchanged is the future of life, where opportunities and challenges always exist at the same time.