<p>Nakamoto did discuss the idea when others brought up the notion of cooperative mining, but I don't know if he wrote about it before anyone else came up with the idea.</p>
<p>You can search an archive of Nakamoto's communications</p>
<p><a href="https://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/posts/bitcointalk/threads/250/?view=satoshi" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/posts/bitcointalk/threads/250/?view=satoshi</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>ribuck's description is spot on.</p>
<p>Pool operators can modify their getwork to take one additional parameter, the address to send your share to.</p>
<p>The easy way for the pool operator would be to wait until the next block is found and divy it up proportionally as:</p>
<p>user's near-hits/total near-hits from everyone</p>
</blockquote>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-01-08T23:45:17.890Z
2021-01-08T23:45:17.890Z
RedGrittyBrick
<p>Mining pools are common today where users pool their resources together and share profits accordingly. Such pools today can account for significant proportions of a network's hash power and they're are risks shold a coalition of malicious parties form a pool with 51% of the mining power.</p>
<p>My question is, did Satoshi ever forsee this coming or consider it as a possibility that may arise? Did Satoshi ever provide any thought about the positive/negative implications of the existence of mining pools?</p>

<mining-pools><mining-theory><majority-attack><satoshi-nakamoto>
Did Satoshi Nakamoto (in his blogs or the whitepaper) forecast that mining pools would exist?
Hamish Gibson
# Did Satoshi Nakamoto (in his blogs or the whitepaper) forecast that mining pools would exist?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2021-01-08)

Mining pools are common today where users pool their resources together and share profits accordingly. Such pools today can account for significant proportions of a network's hash power and they're are risks shold a coalition of malicious parties form a pool with 51% of the mining power.

My question is, did Satoshi ever forsee this coming or consider it as a possibility that may arise? Did Satoshi ever provide any thought about the positive/negative implications of the existence of mining pools?

**Tags:** mining-pools, mining-theory, majority-attack, satoshi-nakamoto


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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2021-01-08. Score: 1

Nakamoto did discuss the idea when others brought up the notion of cooperative mining, but I don't know if he wrote about it before anyone else came up with the idea.

You can search an archive of Nakamoto's communications

<https://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/posts/bitcointalk/threads/250/?view=satoshi>

> ribuck's description is spot on.
>
> Pool operators can modify their getwork to take one additional parameter, the address to send your share to.
>
> The easy way for the pool operator would be to wait until the next block is found and divy it up proportionally as:
>
> user's near-hits/total near-hits from everyone


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