- A lone Bitcoin miner has defied the odds to mine a block on the Bitcoin blockchain
- Bitcoin mining is now such a huge industry that the lone miner’s success is a nice moment
- The miner took home the ₿6.25 reward, worth $267,000
A solo Bitcoin miner has defied the odds to mine a block on the Bitcoin blockchain, netting the ₿6.25 reward worth $267,000. The miner, mining through the solo.ckpool mining pool, won the equivalent of the Bitcoin mining lottery yesterday and became one of the dwindling number of solo Bitcoin miners to be picked to add the next block, the odds of which were calculated as around 4%. Given the scale of Bitcoin mining around the world these days, such feats are becoming notably rare and are a huge departure from Bitcoin’s early days when solo miners on laptops were all the rage.
Congratulations to a bitcoin miner with only 126TH who solved a solo block on https://t.co/UWgBvLBGsc see: https://t.co/JUMEFaYKfo
— Dr. Con Kolivas (@ckpooldev) January 11, 2022
Bitcoin Mining is Now a Billion Dollar Industry
Bitcoin mining involves miners around the world competing with each other to solve mathematical puzzles and become the next one picked to add the blocks to the blockchain, including the transactions within it.
In Bitcoin’s early years anyone could do this with a laptop, but competition soon grew to the stage where now it is a billion dollar industry with El Salvador using volcanic geothermal steam to power its Bitcoin mining facilities.
Miner Shows That Persistence Pays
The chances of a solo Bitcoin miner being chosen ahead of these Bitcoin mining monoliths to add a block is, as the statistics suggest, almost unheard of, making this a very rare event.
Of course, if you’re in the lottery then you stand a chance of winning, but the chances are so remote that only a hobbyist would run one or two ASIC machines. They certainly wouldn’t be in it for the rewards, but this Bitcoin miner clearly got lucky and has, hopefully at least, recouped the electricity costs.
