Re: Bitcoin Mining Just Stopped?

I understand that it would slow down, but it is an arm and a let in order to get into mining right now with the difficulty at this point.

Correct. Those that are currently mining profitably would continue to mine and continue to receive profit.

Mining would not get easier until after the difficulty adjustment.

Quote from: Conus on October 24, 2016, 09:51:36 PM

I think that it would be harder to get into mining and catch up or would mining become easier?

It would not be harder or easier. It would be exactly the same until the difficulty adjustment. After the difficulty adjustment, it would get much easier and many new miners would start mining.

The amount of time it takes until the difficulty adjustment would depend on when the mining farm shut down. The difficulty is adjusted every 2016 blocks. So, if the shutdown happened immediately after an adjustment, then the network would have to wait until all 2016 blocks were mined for the next adjustment. IF the shutdown happened 1008 blocks after an adjustment, then the network would only have to wait 1008 more blocks for the next adjustment.

Are you saying that difficulty is directly proportional to miners?If there were less miners there would be less difficulty/I think dificulty is related to volume of transaction and block size

Difficulty is nothing to do with transaction volume or block size. Difficulty is determined by how long it takes to find blocks. Measured over a "period" of 2016 blocks, if the average time is more than 10 minutes per block the difficulty will reduce; if less then 10 minutes it will increase - in both cases by the amount estimated to keep the 10 minute average. The time to actually find blocks is directly related to the amount of hash power (i.e. the miners) that is on the network. So yes difficulty is related to miners, or more accurately the hash power those miners are using.