eleuthria



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LegendaryActivity: 1750Merit: 1007 [ANN] BTC Guild's Mitigation Plan April 05, 2013, 05:02:41 PM

Last edit: March 11, 2017, 09:52:21 PM by eleuthria #1 This mitigation plan is no longer in effect. The first step was already done in May of 2013. If the pool becomes a valid 51% threat again, a new plan will be put forward.



This is being posted in a new thread so that it stands out to people who do not frequent the primary pool thread, since this is about more than just the pool.

A lot of noise in the IRC, reddit, and forum yesterday related to "BTC Guild dangerously close to 51%" due to a large amount of luck yesterday -



This is the outline for measures that will be taken. I will not be using 24-hour pie charts from blockchain.info to base these decisions due to how much luck influences the charts (either good luck by BTC Guild or bad luck on the rest of the network). Figures will be pulled from





If Pool Speed is Over 40% of Network

BTC Guild will begin limiting the creation of new accounts. Additionally, the fee on PPS will be increased from 5% to 7.5% on all new miners, and will be moved to 7.5% on old miners after the difficulty changes. PPLNS will remain at the 3% + tx fees rate initially.





If Pool Speed is Over 45% of Network

BTC Guild will remove all getwork based pool servers within 24 hours. This is expected to reduce the pool by about 3.5 TH/s, or roughly 15% as of this post.





If Pool Speed is Over 45% of Network After Getwork is Removed

PPLNS fee will be raised to 4%, and new registrations will be completely closed off until speed drops back under 40%.







Suggestions are welcome if you can think of a better way to make miners willingly leave the pool. The only thing I will not consider is kicking miners off entirely (outside of getwork).

This is being posted in a new thread so that it stands out to people who do not frequent the primary pool thread, since this is about more than just the pool.A lot of noise in the IRC, reddit, and forum yesterday related to "BTC Guild dangerously close to 51%" due to a large amount of luck yesterday - https://slotsonlinecanada.ca/ . The pool found ~30% more blocks than expected at its given hash rate. According to the last 2016 blocks, BTC Guild is still shy of 40% (36.61% as of this post). Obviously I can't wait until the pool is 49.9% to start taking measures, even though a 51% attack is only a true threat if the person controlling it uses it.This is the outline for measures that will be taken. I will not be using 24-hour pie charts from blockchain.info to base these decisions due to how much luck influences the charts (either good luck by BTC Guild or bad luck on the rest of the network). Figures will be pulled from http://blockorigin.pfoe.be/top.php which accurately grabs each block for BTC Guild, and also uses a 2016 block window to determine percentages.BTC Guild will begin limiting the creation of new accounts. Additionally, the fee on PPS will be increased from 5% to 7.5% on all new miners, and will be moved to 7.5% on old miners after the difficulty changes. PPLNS will remain at the 3% + tx fees rate initially.BTC Guild will remove all getwork based pool servers within 24 hours. This is expected to reduce the pool by about 3.5 TH/s, or roughly 15% as of this post.PPLNS fee will be raised to 4%, and new registrations will be completely closed off until speed drops back under 40%.Suggestions are welcome if you can think of a better way to make miners willingly leave the pool. The only thing I will not consider is kicking miners off entirely (outside of getwork). RIP BTC Guild, April 2011 - June 2015

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LegendaryActivity: 1750Merit: 1007 Re: [ANN] BTC Guild Registration Limits/51% Mitigation Plan April 05, 2013, 08:03:32 PM

Last edit: April 08, 2013, 12:57:01 AM by eleuthria #7 I've considered raising fees, but Guild already charges reasonable fees (3% and paid for orphans+tx fees or 5% straight PPS). It's a good spot, and it's made me enough to be worth the 16+ hour work days when a crisis happens.



Raising fees is just penalizing users who stick around. I might make more, I might make less, but it's at the cost of the users that don't leave. It also leaves a bad taste in people's mouth when a pool raises fees. Pools have always had a strong leader, and it's changed hands a few times in the last two years (Slush -> Deepbit -> BTC Guild -> Deepbit -> 50BTC -> BTC Guild). I'm trying to come up with a solution that doesn't damage the pool long term if the lead changes again. I don't want to be in the position of 51%, but I also don't want to cut off the legs of my business in the long run.



I've been a bit too defensive (which turns into aggressive) in IRC the last 24 hours about this, and I apologize to those that were on the receiving end when they raised the concerns. This is something that has been on my mind a lot for the last month. Everybody expected the network speed to explode once ASICs delivered. But I don't think anybody expected a single pool to get such a disproportionate amount of the first batch. The pool has increased to 6x more GH/s than what was there at the start of February.







EDIT/UPDATE: After a lot of input (mostly in IRC), the above statement no longer applies to the new plan. Quite simply, raising fees is the only effective way to make users consider choosing another pool and willingly leave. I'm giving a large amount of warning now with this post, and it's also referenced on the pool website news page. I hope it's not required, but it really is the only method that we've come up with to make users leave without arbitrarily kicking them off the servers. RIP BTC Guild, April 2011 - June 2015

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LegendaryActivity: 1372Merit: 1001 Re: [ANN] BTC Guild Registration Limits/51% Mitigation Plan April 05, 2013, 08:11:01 PM #8 How about the PPS fee raises by 10% of the amount mined for each 1% above 45%? In other words, at 50%, the users are paying a 53% fee to mine there? That way, you're not penalizing the users until they refuse to switch over, and only then.

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LegendaryActivity: 1750Merit: 1007 Re: [ANN] BTC Guild Registration Limits/51% Mitigation Plan April 05, 2013, 08:44:38 PM #9 Quote from: SgtSpike on April 05, 2013, 08:11:01 PM How about the PPS fee raises by 10% of the amount mined for each 1% above 45%? In other words, at 50%, the users are paying a 53% fee to mine there? That way, you're not penalizing the users until they refuse to switch over, and only then.



The biggest problem with raising fees is miners do not keep constant check on the website/forum thread. If you have automatic payouts and self monitoring, there is very little reason to even look at the pool website. Even less reason if you use the pool API. Raising fees, in my opinion, requires significant warning time. Users will feel cheated if they log in after a week and see the last few days they were being charged more than they signed up for. Lowering fees is easy, nobody complains about extra money, but the other way around just leads to a lot of headaches. The switch to PPS with BTC Guild had a lot of warning, and users still emailed me complaining -weeks- after the switch. The biggest problem with raising fees is miners do not keep constant check on the website/forum thread. If you have automatic payouts and self monitoring, there is very little reason to even look at the pool website. Even less reason if you use the pool API. Raising fees, in my opinion, requires significant warning time. Users will feel cheated if they log in after a week and see the last few days they were being charged more than they signed up for. Lowering fees is easy, nobody complains about extra money, but the other way around just leads to a lot of headaches. The switch to PPS with BTC Guild had a lot of warning, and users still emailed me complaining -weeks- after the switch. RIP BTC Guild, April 2011 - June 2015