Some ASIC critics believe that silicon manufacturing is essentially an unfair game, and larger chip manufacturers can use economies of scale to weaken and eliminate competitors. Theoretically, if their creators believe that the ASIC manufacturing industry can become a fair competition environment, then anti ASIC network is unnecessary. If it has been determined that ASIC is inevitable, the simplest method that the community with ASIC resistance can adopt is to change the workload proof algorithm through hard bifurcation. Does this approach create risks? This is the content to be discussed in this article.

Is there any risk of hard branching from ASIC?

ASICs, or application specific integrated circuits, work only for specific algorithms, so small changes will make them useless. This is very different from GPU. GPU is a more flexible hardware, which can be used to profitably mine many different algorithms, no matter Monroe coin, zero coin, Ethereum or green coin.

In 2018, Monroe coins changed the hash algorithm in one of their hard forks. The green coin has done this for a long time. The Sia team has issued a statement saying that if the ASIC of BitContinental threatens the security of the network, they will use the soft branching network. In other words, if ASIC is confirmed to exist on the network, Ethereum will have to face this decision.

The change work proves that the algorithm can successfully resist ASIC once or twice, but the long-term sustainability of this strategy seems doubtful. This kind of game like cat and mouse requires the consensus of the community and good execution to constantly adjust the algorithm. With the development and wide application of open source protocols, this consensus will inevitably become more difficult to reach. To some extent, community stakeholders may realize that these constant bifurcations may be futile.

In addition, cryptologists have said that in an appropriate public blockchain network, the core development team should not exert enough influence to repeat the hard branching network. If ASIC appears, developers will change their work to prove that such solutions as algorithms are meaningless. Because in a decentralized currency, developers have no such power. And in the centralized currency, work has proved to be a completely unnecessary waste of electricity.

What are the risks of staying away from ASIC hard forks?

In addition to the community consensus that needs to be more and more difficult to achieve over time, there are many risks in hard branching every time ASIC is conceived. such as

1. Introduce new vulnerabilities or exploits, whether accidental or malicious

In theory, it may sound simple to change a small algorithm every few months or every year, but many things may go wrong. Public blockchains should maximize flexibility, which means they should be conservative when making major changes to the protocol.

2. Hard forking will disperse the hash capability on the network.

If the ASIC is successfully removed from the network, the decrease of the hash rate may be huge, which will make the network in trouble and make the difficulty adjustment unstable for a period of time. In addition, continuous branching will disperse the hash ability, generate more orphans and reduce the overall security of the network. Moreover, since only the GPU and CPU are running, it is easier to rent hash computing power and attack the network. Because of this security loophole, the Monroe Coin community has called on new users to contribute their computing power after the bifurcation.

3. GPU mining is also vulnerable to the domination of vertical integration companies such as economies of scale and BitContinental.

If developers insist on maintaining GPU mining and continue to make efforts to split, players like BitContinent can also enter the ranks of GPU development and mining, which may lead to similar mining centralization. You should know that the most important reason for Bitcoin's dominance in the mining field is that it has huge capital and cheap electricity. These same advantages can also be extended to GPU mining.

4. ASIC developers can build more flexible FPGA designs that can adapt to minor algorithm adjustments.

ASIC is only applicable to specific algorithms, but it has become feasible to implement more flexible hardware to adapt to small changes. These FPGAS are much slower than the super focusing ASIC, but still much faster than the GPU. This has a great impact. If the workload proves that the algorithm changes, three of the four ASIC models may be damaged, while the fourth FPGA still works on the new algorithm. This is a worse result than doing nothing, because it will lead to greater centralization.

summary

Is there any risk to hard bifurcations away from ASICs? What are the risks? The answer to these two questions. In short, there are many problems with persistent hard bifurcations. There are security problems. You may disperse the hash rate, but you may not eliminate the more flexible FPGAS. In addition, if players with a large amount of capital enter the GPU mining field, it may be vulnerable to vertical integration.