We usually know miners responsible to secure the cryptocurrency network, but actually miners are doing more than that. This article will show you how miners important to the healthy of a cryptocurrency ecosystem.

Cryptocurrency miner - courtesy usethebitcoin.com

Despite a cryptocurrency need long term investors, it still needs good miners, the miners who use computer (not ASIC devices) to mine cryptocurrency. Because this kind of miners are also good kind of investors, evangelists, network protectors, early adopters, and believers. When they are investors, they not only invest by their money, but also by their time, their efforts to learn about the system. When they are protectors, they not only provide security for the system but they are also advocators for the network. And of course, they are early adopters and evangelists for the system.

But I don't mean this kind of miners are people who mining cryptocurrency with ASIC devices. Because ASIC make mining become easy, no need to have knowledge about hardware and software, no need to learn about the system, no need to learn how to install wallet software and configure for mining software, just plug network cable and turn the ASIC device on. Many of ASIC miners don't care about technology, or vision for long term of the cryptocurrency, they only care about profits and how long they get back their investment. In this article, I only mention to miners who use computer to mine cryptocurrency.

What are the characteristics of this kind of miners?

1. They are tech savvy people: This kind of miners have good knowledge about hardware and software. They know how to build a computer for mining, and know how to configure software and tweak hardware and software system for mining most efficiency. With this kind of knowledge, miners can easily communicate with software developer and help software developers improve their software to make the system better.

2. They are early adopters: Miners usually are early adopters, even if they are not the people who know about the cryptocurrency early, they still have many characteristics of early adopters.

3. They are proactive people: To mine cryptocurrency and earn rewards, miners have some level of proactive. They find ways to build computer system for mining, find out how to configuration and tweak them to make the computer work efficiency, and of course they have to learn about the cryptocurrency to find out its interesting feature that worth to mine.

4. They are active users: Miners usually receive cryptocurrency as their rewards for providing security service to the network. Some of them usually send coin to their friends or spend the earned coin to buy things they need. With their activities, the cryptocurrency always has interactions.

5. They bring more people to the system: Because they have knowledge, they experience the system and use it frequently, they interested in its technology or passionate about its future, so they can easily talk about the cryptocurrency to their friends, co-workers, and people they meet. In this way they bring more people to the network.

6. Miners keep the ecosystem in active: Miners don't earn a lot of coin at one time. They earn coins gradually. When price go up, they spend their coin to buy things from merchants and keep the ecosystem in active.

However, ASIC makes mining become more centralized in few people who have advantage in buying new ASIC devices and low cost of electricity. Because of centralized in mining, ASIC generates an effect, called reverse network effect. This effect reduce number of users in the network, reduces interactions between users in the network, and reduces value of the network; and finally, it makes coin price reduced.

To conclude, hobby miners are very important, and a good mining algorithm is very important, too. Good mining algorithm is not only an algorithm to protect the network again attackers, but it also have capability to attract and filter to get this kind people to its network and increase network effect, not reverse network effect.