Bitcoin....who's gotten into it?

[bennymac]

You got out of Luna just in time eh? Pure luck.

And you shilled the fuck outta FTX.

But yeah - call those Celsius owners like Shera shitcoiners if it makes you feel high and mighty.

[shera]

No offense taken. I admit I deposited LINK there for the sole purpose of earning returns. I considered it a "set it and forget it" solution, my mistake.

I also borrowed against bitcoin to buying new mining hardware, now running happily and a nice upgrade to my prev s15 units which are sitting on the shelf.

The first round of settlements is $.72 on the dollar and that's for "custody" holdings, a relatively small portion of the outstanding claims. "Earn" and "loans" are as yet unresolved but there's an auction happening right now. What a pita.

I guess the silver lining is that we've been in a down market so I wasn't keen to sell anyway...

[summit]

28% haircut sucks but better than 0. Hope you get it all though

[shera]

ty

[schuss]

ERCOT Hostage? How do you figure. Miners in TX shut down when asked to and ERCOT says BTC is a good thing.

Bitcoiners didn't fall for the Celsius con. Shitcoiners did. No offense to shera.

You'll eat crow, eh? Has there been one person, literally one fucking person, in this thread who has said they were wrong about BTC in January 2018 after they called it dead? I don't think there has been. Somehow most of you smugly took victory laps after BTC crashed to a price 5x higher than when you called it dead.

Sent from my Pixel 6 Pro using Tapatalk

Do you even read? They shut down because they were paid.
I ain't taking a victory lap until it's fully dead, which is likely never at this point because of the bullshit narratives around "value".

[summit]

It is like saying the Dutch tulip industry helped "stabilize" (raise) other food commodity prices by preventing overproduction of other ag commodities, and the Tulip farmers might accept bushels of money from the state to plant food crops instead.

The "value" narrative didn't save the value of the tulips despite all the "proof of work" present in the fields.

[PNWbrit]

It is like saying the Dutch tulip industry helped "stabilize" (raise) other food commodity prices by preventing overproduction of other ag commodities, and the Tulip farmers might accept bushels of money from the state to plant food crops instead.

The "value" narrative didn't save the value of the tulips despite all the "proof of work" present in the fields.

I also borrowed against bitcoin to buying new mining hardware, now running happily

^ Borrowing against the value of my tulips to buy land to grow more.

It's fucking insanity.

[JimmyCarter]

It’s more like saying if you eat enough donuts you’ll incentivize the donut makers to invest in healthier ways to make donuts so they don’t kill their customers. And maybe they’ll also diversify into offering healthy fruit smoothies too and they’ll make donuts in the jungle where there were no donuts before and with those donut sales they’ll save the rhinos. And the World Health Organization recognizes donut makers for using all the bacon grease to fry donuts and that’s a lot better for you than just eating leftover bacon grease like custard. And if there’s a national bread shortage they’ll stop making donuts for a minute so we can make wheat bread For The Children. And isn’t that just a fantastic way to lose weight?!? It’s all fucking absurd but in the case of crypto it’s offered up with a straight face.

Just leave it at “donuts are delicious” and we can talk about whether they’re as delicious as cookies or cake and whether your hoarding of boxes of Krispy Kreme is going to pay off when they are the ultimate snack in 10 years and feed your snack cravings forever.

I may be stealing this for later use.

[leftfield]

“Complex financial derivatives.” Too much to get into here and you probably wouldn’t understand it.

Didn't mean to sound like a pompous ass- i only meant that financialized energy markets and the way large producers/consumers hedge price risk via swaps and derivative contracts is way over my head. Maybe someone from one of the stock threads can weigh in here.

What if my buzzwords are more complicated, does that mean I win? Just trying to understand the rules here.

Most definitely.

Not really. ERCOT made direct payments to them to curtail, so in a sense they're holding the capacity hostage.
One link of many on the direct payments and some attempts to investigate it:
https://www.markey.senate.gov/news/p...o-cryptominers

Again, i seem to remember hearing/reading that it wasn't that simple. I'll see if i can get a better explanation.

Oh cool, a new grifter in the thread.

I'm not 'grifting' anything. It's a simple question and a complex discussion separate from any merits/drawbacks bitcoin has as an 'asset'. Is a massive, useless drain on the power grid a net negative for consumers, grid reliability/flexibility, and the environment? Almost unequivocally yes. Why does that answer change (or at the very least, become much less clear) if that same massive, useless drain also happens to function as a perfect demand response mechanism? Personally, i find it interesting. I'm a lot of fun at parties too.

Yes, infrastructure. The power generation kind. You don’t have to continuously operate at capacity.

No, but you do have to be nimble enough to very quickly match changes in demand- something baseload generators are not particularly good at. Predictably, this difficulty is magnified as grids get an increasing percentage of their generation from less reliable, intermittent sources like solar/wind. Not saying that flexible supply generation(compared to the instantaneous flexible demand response of large-scale mining ops) isn't something worth solving, just that current technologies/grid structure seem to make the economics impractical.

What it is not is some intimation that bitcoin is actually good for the environment or the grid in any unique way that couldn’t better be solved in more direct ways.

Bitcoin the 'asset'? Not interested in debating that at all. But when talking about large-scale bitcoin miners, their usefulness as a demand response mechanism is unparalleled and absolutely unique- nothing else even comes close. Traditional DR like industrial arc furnaces and cement plants both have significant drawbacks that make them ill-suited for the 4x flexibility estimated to be required as electrical grids transition to renewables.




Happy to read any counterpoints or provide links to anyone genuinely interested

[summit]

Crypto is Environmental summarized:

"We need to build mega extra generating capacity so that we make way more power than the market needs in order to cover all demand/supply variations by allowing crypto to consume all the excess power and get paid when not consuming, so that crypto can have more electricity FOR CRYPTO most of the time. That won't have any insane consequences or astronomical costs associated with it... surely.

What could you possibly do instead? I mean who would ever dream of managing demand variations from the supply side by having appropriate baseload generation and then managing variable generation renewables with some storage and surge generation plants. That would be cheaper for everyone with far less emissions, environmental impact, and capital investment, but it only make sense if you didn't have fuck tons of crypto demand on the grid... er... wait... pretend I didn't say anything."

The "crypto is environmental" argument is 100% based on the primary assumption that crypto mining will remain economical and should be allowed to predate the power grid with minimal restrictions and be supplied with shit tons of power. If you don't start with that assumption, crypto is never environmental and instead you see solutions of telling miners to fuck right off because the environment and society don't need that giant parasite consuming more power than several large countries.

[stalefish3169]

You got out of Luna just in time eh? Pure luck.

And you shilled the fuck outta FTX.

But yeah - call those Celsius owners like Shera shitcoiners if it makes you feel high and mighty.

I don't think LUNA was intentionally fraudulent. It was a highly experimental financial innovation that failed after an attack that required a massive amount of money.

I never "shilled" FTX or told anyone to buy FTT. I said Sam's call to buy SOL at $3 was legendary. I mistakenly believed that Gary Gensler, congressional representatives, and others who took Sam's money and did plenty of photo ops with him had done their due diligence. We all know now that was not the case. Of course, you play both sides so you're conveniently never wrong. But if somehow you are, you delete the posts.

Sent from my Pixel 6 Pro using Tapatalk

[stalefish3169]

Do you even read? They shut down because they were paid.
I ain't taking a victory lap until it's fully dead, which is likely never at this point because of the bullshit narratives around "value".

You can make up your own opinion, but you can't make up your own facts.

https://twitter.com/DSBatten/status/...WmFa6ukOg&s=19

Brad Jones, former CEO ERCOT just confirmed that Bitcoin mining

· Makes renewable operators more profitable
· Accelerates the renewable transition
· Does not compete with other users of electricity
· Drives electricity costs for all users DOWN

As an expert on grids who's seen Bitcoin mining on grids firsthand, he's the person most qualified to make an objective assessment

Here’s what he said:

Bitcoin mining makes renewable operators more profitable

“In the last 2 years there was 1100 hours of negative pricing. That means we are paying consumers to consume electricity.

The reason that occurs is that we have a lot of renewables in the State. When the wind is really blowing, we simply can’t use all that power.

Bitcoin allows those renewables to earn money during those times rather than having to shut off their service, or even having to pay customers to use their power.”

Bitcoin mining assists the renewable transition
“Bitcoin mining helps to sustain those markets for renewables and drives more renewables.”

Bitcoin does not compete with other users of electricity
“And then when prices go up [because many people want power at the same time], Bitcoin comes offline because its not economical.”

Bitcoin drives the cost of electricity for all consumers DOWN
“The real value of Bitcoin is its flexibility. The capability for us to use it in our ancillary services at the lowest possible cost means cost for all consumers of in the state of Texas.”

~ Brad Jones, former CEO ERCOT post-Winter Storm Uri

Sent from my Pixel 6 Pro using Tapatalk

[bennymac]

Never deleted any posts in this thread. But you “remember” something that never happened and can’t let it go.

I’ve been wrong 100 times on TGR. I admit it all the time.

And you promoted what Sam and FTX were doing in this thread a bunch of times

#winnerswin

[stalefish3169]

Never deleted any posts in this thread. But you “remember” something that never happened and can’t let it go.

I’ve been wrong 100 times on TGR. I admit it all the time.

And you promoted what Sam and FTX were doing in this thread a bunch of times

#winnerswin

Please quote instances from this thread where you've admitted you were wrong.

I'll wait.

Sent from my Pixel 6 Pro using Tapatalk

[Mustonen]

You can make up your own opinion, but you can't make up your own facts.

https://twitter.com/DSBatten/status/...WmFa6ukOg&s=19

Brad Jones, former CEO ERCOT just confirmed that Bitcoin mining

· Makes renewable operators more profitable
· Accelerates the renewable transition
· Does not compete with other users of electricity
· Drives electricity costs for all users DOWN

As an expert on grids who's seen Bitcoin mining on grids firsthand, he's the person most qualified to make an objective assessment

Here’s what he said:

Bitcoin mining makes renewable operators more profitable

“In the last 2 years there was 1100 hours of negative pricing. That means we are paying consumers to consume electricity.

The reason that occurs is that we have a lot of renewables in the State. When the wind is really blowing, we simply can’t use all that power.

Bitcoin allows those renewables to earn money during those times rather than having to shut off their service, or even having to pay customers to use their power.”

Bitcoin mining assists the renewable transition
“Bitcoin mining helps to sustain those markets for renewables and drives more renewables.”

Bitcoin does not compete with other users of electricity
“And then when prices go up [because many people want power at the same time], Bitcoin comes offline because its not economical.”

Bitcoin drives the cost of electricity for all consumers DOWN
“The real value of Bitcoin is its flexibility. The capability for us to use it in our ancillary services at the lowest possible cost means cost for all consumers of in the state of Texas.”

~ Brad Jones, former CEO ERCOT post-Winter Storm Uri

Sent from my Pixel 6 Pro using Tapatalk

You mean that this guy likes one of his biggest customers? Get out. I can’t think of too many businesses who won’t thrive a little better with a steady and reliable stream of income.

Again, it’s still just incentives. There are other ways to stabilize these utilities that are more efficient and better for the environment.

[Long Analogy] Imagine you had a business making bologna sandwiches, and I sold pictures of me reclining in stacks of bologna sandwiches. It’s a viral phenomenon. I buy thousands of sandwiches a day to pose next to and throw away. It catches on in other cities. Hundreds of millions of bologna sandwiches are made and wasted every day, unless you were a bologna sandwich porn lover, in which case you wouldn’t think it’s wasted at all.

Your business would scale up. You’d hire employees. You’d establish disaster recovery procedures in case you ran out of wonderbread or whatever you spread mayo with broke. If the local school cafeteria ran out of money or had a grease fire I’d stop taking pictures for a few days so you could sell sandwiches to them instead. You’d pay me for my abstinence, obviously. My pictures would be GOOD for the bologna sandwich business. Sort of. If you imagine my bologna sandwich pictures are forever.

But nobody would think that this is actually a reasonable way to scale up and stabilize food production capabilities. The food waste and factory pig farming impacts would be the subject of 60 minute pieces. And they’d be right. It would be a fucking disaster.

But some bologna porn lover would be in here quoting your tweets, as head of the bologna sandwich making guild, in support of bologna porn. “Who better knows the business of food production?” You’d say. [/Long Analogy]

[bennymac]

Please quote instances from this thread where you've admitted you were wrong.

I'll wait.

Sent from my Pixel 6 Pro using Tapatalk

Show me where I said “I’ve been wrong in this thread”

I’ll wait

Meanwhile while you’re searching for that maybe also examine and reflect how you were fellating FTX and Tom Brady’s promotion of it etc in this thread. Shilling scammy shitcoins by your own definition.

#shillersgonnashill

[Vt-Freeheel]

The Mustonen pieces are gold Jerry

[frorider]

I recently read that there are btc miners in TX who are not contractually bound to switch off when grid asks them to. Wasn’t an issue this past winter, but if btc ever rebounds for real (say, 60k+) then that mob of miners (many presumably smallish?) in the future will suck that sweet power even when the $/kwh spikes during a demand phase.

[subtle plague]

The Mustonen pieces are gold Jerry

Bologna sandwiches......mmmhhhh.

[LongShortLong]

You mean that this guy likes one of his biggest customers? Get out. I can’t think of too many businesses who won’t thrive a little better with a steady and reliable stream of income.

Again, it’s still just incentives. There are other ways to stabilize these utilities that are more efficient and better for the environment.

[Long Analogy] Imagine you had a business making bologna sandwiches, and I sold pictures of me reclining in stacks of bologna sandwiches. It’s a viral phenomenon. I buy thousands of sandwiches a day to pose next to and throw away. It catches on in other cities. Hundreds of millions of bologna sandwiches are made and wasted every day, unless you were a bologna sandwich porn lover, in which case you wouldn’t think it’s wasted at all.

Your business would scale up. You’d hire employees. You’d establish disaster recovery procedures in case you ran out of wonderbread or whatever you spread mayo with broke. If the local school cafeteria ran out of money or had a grease fire I’d stop taking pictures for a few days so you could sell sandwiches to them instead. You’d pay me for my abstinence, obviously. My pictures would be GOOD for the bologna sandwich business. Sort of. If you imagine my bologna sandwich pictures are forever.

But nobody would think that this is actually a reasonable way to scale up and stabilize food production capabilities. The food waste and factory pig farming impacts would be the subject of 60 minute pieces. And they’d be right. It would be a fucking disaster.

But some bologna porn lover would be in here quoting your tweets, as head of the bologna sandwich making guild, in support of bologna porn. “Who better knows the business of food production?” You’d say. [/Long Analogy]

I think you may be wrong here. I've put some thought and calculations into the excess power problem, and there are neither great supply side nor demand side solutions. There really is a need for economic fast ramping electric consumers (or suppliers). Basically we need some low-capital industry that is energy intensive. Ok, we don't need it, we currently dump those electrons or pay someone to take them. But if there's a use for excess electrons, the common good is improved by using them (leaving aside the politics of wealth distribution).

I penciled out things like pumped hydro and battery storage using the daily swings in California's wholesale electric rates. In theory, one could buy the cheap power and sell it later expensive. The trouble is the large capital cost to build a storage system, its lifetime, how many profit cycles occur in a year that exceed operation costs, and the time value of money. Many days, the swing is only a few pennies per kWh, some days are huge, and some have no trading opportunity. Depending on assumptions, I might be able to break even, make a small profit, or have a big loss. E.g. you could build it at an existing reservoir to save some construction cost (and some of these already exist - engineers apparently could do math 60 years ago).

If some aspect of crypto is energy intense, relatively low capital, and fast ramping, then it ought to help the green energy transition. I personally think crypto is useless, but accept that others assign value to it. I assign value to driving to the mountains during blizzards and then consume more energy to go out in the winter cold to thrash around in deep snow with boards strapped on my feet. Crypto seems equally valuable. So if a burst of crypto mining produces value, or a halt doesn't cost too much, then it should economically help us use variable electric generation.

That said, it's not clear to me that crypto helps overall as much as they say. I suspect there's a mispricing somewhere - random excess crypto mining gets paid but doesn't have actual value. I'm assuming the demand for crypto mining is relatively constant, and like electricity is also needed instantaneously, and can't really be stored for later use.

If instead of excess crypto mining and crypto halts, crypto mining is being shifted around the world, then it ought to serve like an ultra long distance lossless transmission grid. E.g. shifting Texas' excess power to wherever it's needed around the world. And the world's excess power to Texas when needed there. And that's beneficial. I'm implicitly assuming there's a realtime market for crypto mining to signal the miners where and when to mine, and am unsure this exists.

[shera]

Wow this thread leveled up. Following...

[skaredshtles]

I think you may be wrong here. I've put some thought and calculations into the excess power problem, and there are neither great supply side nor demand side solutions.

What about producing hydrogen from "excess" power to be used in fuel cells?

[Muffcabbage]

Energy has three basics - generation, transmission, and distribution.
There's not enough storage capability/capacity to consider it a fourth basic. Yet.
Large scale mechanical batteries could help. Maybe saline batteries.
Utilizing off peak pumping for demand generation is a kind of storage, as mentioned.
Peak usually means shoveling more coal to the boilers.
Would increased storage capacity create a 24 hour peak for not so green generators?
Until something surfaces to fill the need void, it's pretty much rubber bands and springs.
Utiluglies have fighting have been fighting energy conservation, efficiency, and greening from day one.
They only implement what's mandated. The bottom line is their business. They are the Starbucks of energy.

Didn't Tesla create the long distance lossless transmission you think about, LSL?

[MultiVerse]

if that same massive, useless drain also happens to function as a perfect demand response mechanism?

If some aspect of crypto is energy intense, relatively low capital, and fast ramping, then it ought to help the green energy transition.

Bitcoin mining is essentially a game of guess a very large number. The only way for miners to better their odds of guessing that number is to add computing power and increase their uptime, requiring more energy and more capital. The cost of high end hardware means it's not economically viable to run it with intermittent renewables.

It's really only when you're talking about older mining hardware does it become economical to run it with (cheap) intermittent renewable sources of energy. That's why miners mostly draw their power from the grid. Miners essentially run 24 hours a day, not just when there is excess solar or wind. Because otherwise mining operations would fail to be profitable running only when unused energy is available.

The reality is bitcoin mining is primarily about bringing zombie coal and gas plants back from the dead by relying on the dirtiest sources of energy.

[stalefish3169]

Show me where I said “I’ve been wrong in this thread”

I’ll wait

Meanwhile while you’re searching for that maybe also examine and reflect how you were fellating FTX and Tom Brady’s promotion of it etc in this thread. Shilling scammy shitcoins by your own definition.

#shillersgonnashill

I see. You've been wrong in other threads, but somehow you're infallible in this one.

You're such a clown.

Sent from my Pixel 6 Pro using Tapatalk