202Course · Practitioner

Mining

How new coins come to be.

The Course

PoW is often described in slogans; here it is dissected. Difficulty, halvings, the transition from CPUs to industrial ASIC operations — and the honest economics of a modern mining firm.

Outcomes

01
Explain difficulty and its adjustment.
02
Understand mining economics.
03
Judge a mining operation by its cost structure.

Prerequisites

— History of Bitcoin; Consensus.

Pacing

~3 hours.

IModule
The mechanism
PoW, precisely.
1. 01Difficulty and targetArticle12m
2. 02Block reward and halvingsArticle12m
IIModule
The industry
From CPUs to ASICs to industrial operations.
1. 01ASICs and industrializationArticle12m
2. 02Mining economicsInteractive20m

A Note from the Faculty

Mining is an energy business dressed as a technology business.