Just amazing...

BTC Difficulty 37,392,768 -> 50,636,479 (35.42%) in 2 hours.   What a huge jump!  I believe this is a record.  13.2 million in a single bound.

Is it possible to manipulate the difficulty increases by removing hashing power prior to the change? How is the next difficulty level set?  Average over a number of blocks?   Just looks like 100TH dropped off the network today just before the increase and I'm sure we will see the power back online immediately after the difficulty gets set.

Don't even bother looking at Mining.TheGenesisBlock.com until after the change has happened.  Their moving window for the average difficulty is based on a 30 day window which causes it to be all messed up near the end of the window.  Example, right now it expects a very low monthly increase (in the 30% range).  I'm sure it will show 75% or more once that window gets corrected.

Just amazing to see how quickly the value of a miner can drop and this is why everyone is "concerned".    

KNC has provided all the info they currently have and the next update will probably be that the chips are in.  Until then we can watch the charts!