well it works both ways.. the competitor doesnt want to start a war they prolly cant win.. Bitmain has proven in the past they are not to be messed with.. i may not agree with their tactics but this is a business.  I dont fault them for that.(something along the lines of dont hate the player hate the game blah blah blah) i guess its rather utopian to think we could help out one another.. crazy idea right.  but anyway if they gave it away not only would diff skyrocket the price of btc would prolly drop aswell.> I think they control more of btc than we think.  By keeping the price high they are also not giving a big fu to the initial buyers like they did with s7(but we have to look at the diff increase with s7 release. they had to drop or it wouldnt have sold at all.  going to be hard to see that again for a while.  my feeling is that the latest diff rise was the s9 being swapped while they sold s7 as newest tech).  I finally cracked and bought s9 for myself.>   Ill post soon my experience with batch 8 s9.  To me that seemed like the better buy.  wanted too much for the extra overclock and 1ths for me to jump on b9.  Anyway best of luck to all that hold out.  For me not buying any s7 playing hold out i thought it was finally time to jump in again.  I respect those that are holding out.  You are well disciplined! I do have to keep in mind tho this is all a gamble.  i wouldnt have ever gotten into this had it not been for the thought that we could take back some power for the people.  I still feel it will happen we just have a long road ahead. Welcome to the grind folks

Best Regards
d57heinz