Bitcoin Mining is a Family Business for This Father and Son

In Raleigh, North Carolina, a father-and-son team are bucking the trend of industrial bitcoin mining.
Bitcoin mining is a highly energy intensive process in which competing parties race to add the next block or batch of transactions to the blockchain. The reward for doing so is 12.5 BTC – just under $7,700 at a bitcoin price of $615.
It’s that pursuit for fresh bitcoins that led Jason Gantt and his father Vernon to pursue a mining operation of their own. They operate two bitcoin mines out of their respective homes, with a third one currently under construction.
In some ways, the North Carolina operation harkens back to the old days of bitcoin mining. Back then, hobbyists at home would build a rig, connect to the network, start hashing and, with a dash of luck, scoop up some bitcoins of their own.
But mining has changed over the years. Driven by competition, climbing costs and an ever-escalating network difficulty, the most successful mines are the ones that scale the most effectively. As such, the average mine has evolved from a handful of computers at home to data center-based operations in which hundreds of machines are simultaneously grinding away. What’s more, these operations have grown more prevalent in areas with the most competitive power costs, taking operators to places like the river valleys of Washington or the mountains of Tibet.

This post was published at Coin Desk on October 10, 2016.