A review and analysis of the performance of Ethereum’s PoW consensus mechanism from 2015 to 2020.
Authors: Everett Muzzy, Danning Sui, Bogdan Gheorge
This report provides insights into the performance of Proof of Work and mining on the Ethereum network since its launch in 2015. The report identifies relevant on- and off-chain events and analyzes how PoW and miners responded to and were affected by network changes. The main topics covered include:
- Overall statistics about miner payout addresses, miners, and mining pools since mid-2015.
- The most important on- and off-chain events since 2015 that affected the actions of miners and mining pools.
- Centralization of mining pools over the years with a focus on block production, block reward, and hashrate.
- The flow of funds from major mining pools to identifiable addresses since 2015.