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Monero did the thing with the thing!

This morning, the Monero network hard-forked to cut off ASIC machines that were secretly built for its network. Its lead developer celebrated with the tweet below, quoted in our headline.

Technical & Updates

Much of today's buzz in cryptocurrency world is around Monero's scheduled hard fork. As a result, hashrate on the network dropped significantly.

Riccardo's speculation on the source of the drop:

This hard fork resulted in several new networks:

Comment from discussion WTF is going on?.

Monero just hard forked - and it resulted in four new projects
(Bitcoin Magazine, Aaron van Wirdum)

"A bigger problem is that moving coins on both blockchains reveals which coins are controlled by the same user. This is at odds with Monero’s central value proposition of privacy and fungibility. Therefore, anyone who uses Monero for privacy reasons is best advised to completely choose one chain and ignore the other completely. (It’s presumably best to ignore the chain that carries the least value.)"

What the hell is Monero Original?
(CryptoMedication)

"If Monero is able to successfully complete this hard fork and the original chain which contained the CryptoNight algorithm that was ASIC-exploitable ‘disappears’, then Bitmain will be left with millions of dollars worth of useless equipment. Not only that, but whatever profits that they were making from the chain will be absolved as well."

Evidence of the hypothesis in the article is reiterated in this tweet:

Commentary thread on the motivations behind the anti-ASIC hard fork

Ethereum's community is going through a similar situation as Bitmain just announced E3. Vitalik, however, is taking an opposite position:

Vitalik opposes fork to disable Ethereum ASICs
(Coindesk, Rachel Rose O'Leary)

"Vitalik Buterin is coming out against a proposal that would find the blockchain he created changing its software to limit the performance of mining hardware designed to yield a greater cut of the network's rewards."

For deeper analysis of ASIC-resistance, read Derek's article:

Is the war against ASICs worth fighting?
(Derek Hsue)

News & Commentary

Vijay Boyapati responds to a tweet that suggests the medium-of-exchange property is more important than storage-of-value property for Bitcoin

Tiny towns, small states bet on Bitcoin even as some shun its miners
(Stateline, by Jen Fifield)

"O’Shaughnessy says it’s a good thing, though. In the past decade, his town of about 13,000 on the St. Lawrence River has lost much of its main industry — as a powertrain plant closed and an aluminum manufacturing plant downsized. But now, one and possibly two bitcoin mining companies are moving in, and they have promised to create dozens of jobs."

The US employment rate has returned to its pre-Recession level adjusted for aging
(PIIE, by Harris Eppsteiner, Jason Furman, and Wilson Powell III)

"However, when adjusted for age—that is, applying earlier employment rates for different age groups to the current, now older population—the employment rate is essentially back to its pre-recession level."

The outlook for the U.S. Economy
(Chairman Jerome H. Powell)

"Since monetary policy affects the economy with a lag, waiting until inflation and employment hit our goals before reducing policy support could have led to a rise in inflation to unwelcome levels. In such circumstances, monetary policy might need to tighten abruptly, which could disrupt the economy or even trigger a recession."

Here's how the U.S. needs to prepare for the age of artificial intelligence
(MIT Technology Review, by Will Knight)

"While AI can drive economic growth, it may also accelerate the eradication of some occupations, transform the nature of work in other jobs, and exacerbate economic inequality."

A somewhat related note on the state of employment:

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