[meiraleal]

You use the electricity, you pay for it. Why are you implying an ethics issue with that? Someone wasting the same amount of electricity to play games 10 hours a day is doing anything better?

[adamhp]

As I said, I'm not placing any value judgment myself. There has been some debate around the energy consumption of crypto mining. Some are arguing that there is some environmental impact to that. I'm simply asking what this person's thoughts on it are.

https://techcrunch.com/2021/03/21/the-debate-about-cryptocur...

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-56012952

https://hbr.org/2021/05/how-much-energy-does-bitcoin-actuall...

[Trias11]

My thoughts are that any complaints about negative effects of mining on environment is a fud and clickbait.

This is actually driven by financial firms and politicians who have their own agenda in this game.

And no one from that list is going to prioritize care for environment higher than their own profits and powers.

[coralreef]

IMO the source of electricity matters. Generally we should aim to reduce carbon emissions, so if your electricity comes from a coal power plant, then there is greater consequence for the usage compared to renewable energy usage.

[Trias11]

I agree. But consumers has nothing to do with the source of electricity. They're consumers, not producers.

You cannot blame consumer for turning on the light in his place because the source of electricity is not too green.

If we need to change the source of anything from bad to good - that the conversation with the respective governments and politicians.

[coralreef]

Its true you may not get to choose your household electricity source. But that doesn't give you free pass to start consuming as many kilowatts as you want. We make choices with what we consume. You don't get to buy clothes made from slave labour and claim you had nothing to do with it.

I don't get to leave my car idling 24/7, burning gasoline and spitting out toxic fumes. It can't be morally justified with "well I paid for it, mind your own business, go lobby the government to make a law against leaving my car on 24/7".

[Trias11]

Exactly.

Musk and others spread fud about energy usage and I'm sure that made lots of people to guilt trip themselves when they turn on the light in their bedrooms or use computer.

I'm pretty immune to fuds and clickbaits, thus mining never was an issue for me.