ELI5: Why are YOU mining crypto currency?

[Tacocat]

I'll be the first to admit I have not been keeping up on the why's and how's of mining crypto currencies. So I'm curious as to why so many are interested in it and how you go about it.

I could see two reasons why I'd get into it myself:

• Pure curiosity or if I was convinced it served a good purpose. In this case it would not matter if it was profitable or not.

• Use of otherwise idling hardware to make some money. In this case it would only make sense if I could exchange the mined coins to cold hard cash and that the profit margin was enough to offset the hassle.

What are your reasons and how to you go about it?

 

[pyro_]

Option number two, i have machines that are always on anyways so might as well make use off all the idle time on it and make something for it

 

[alex_stief]

Number two, definitely. I could not care less about the "good purpose" of cryptocurrencies and for many of them I doubt that this was the intention behind it. It may be based on a superficial understanding of the topic, but that is the opinion I formed so far.

 

[audio catalyst]

number 2 sir

plus fiddling around is always fun

send from a mobile device, so typo's are to be expected

 

[exahash]

I love the idea that I can leave my computer running some software that ultimately makes me money.

During the .com bubble in the late 90's I ran probably ten different ad programs on multiple computers. Basically all they did was show banner ads at the bottom of the screen and the companies paid out maybe a dollar an hour. The programs got popular and the companies added restrictions, and then the payouts fell pretty quickly, but when they were new, it was awesome.

When I heard about bitcoin mining in 2010, it sounded like the same thing so I held off till early 2011. I thought I was late to the party. ;-)

I've learned a lot about mining in the past seven years, and scaled up quite a bit. I'm still mining because I love the idea of having computers making me money instead of employees.

If this wasn't an ELI5, I could give you a lot more detail.

 

[Marsh]

I'm still mining because I love the idea of having computers making me money instead of employees.

Reason #3, passive income , generate a income stream without working leads to Financial Independence.

 

[Joel]

Number 3: Financing new expensive toys that I'd otherwise never buy!

 

[Tacocat]

Thank you for your replies.

One more question for you, do you convert the coins to $$$ as soon as you have mined them or are you holding on to them to speculate?

 

[zdude]

I do all of the above, some I hold, others I pull out. ETH I pull out immediately I am holding most of the AEON I mine and the ZEC I mine I pull out every few months when I remember to check that machine.