Sergey Brin, Google’s Co-founder wrote in a letter to company’s investors that high demand for crypto mining has increased computational power many folds.Brin mentioned that Google witnessed a surge of their own processors by 200,000x (times) in just 20 years! There are numerous factors that resulted in this surge, one is that computational power per square inch in a chip has almost doubled every alternate year! (“Steady hum of Moore's Law")
Another factor which has increased demand for computational power is slightly due to Gamers who installs top-notch GPU’s for their gaming PC’s, but it’s hard to say that GPU’s are only used by gamers, nowadays most GPU’s are used to mine Proof-of-work, algorithmic Cryptocurrencies such as Ethereum. However, use of GPU’s for mining has drastically decreased after the arrival of BITMAIN’s specially tailored miners which uses ASIC chips.It is notable that A single miner can create more hashes than 500 top notch GPU’s combined and it also saves much electricity compared to GPU’s.
Sergey also feels that the ultimate factor which might have contributed most is machine learning, the technology behind AI systems that can drive cars, recognize faces or translate texts without human programming.
Google itself has been exploring blockchain technology. In March, the internet mogul filed a patent for a “tamper-evident” a log that stores signatures and tracking any kind of changes in data.The patent document describes that,
“The method may include, by the electronic device, adding a new block to the target blockchain, by linking the new block to both the existing block and the block of the second blockchain that is identified by generating a signature for the new block that is based on the first signature and the second signature, and associating the signature with the new block, The target blockchain and the second blockchain may be part of a block lattice.”
Google spokesperson denied in a statement to Bloomberg that the developments are just commenced and it will be too early to speculate any possible outcomes.Despite this exploration of the blockchain, Google is not so sure about cryptocurrencies as it has patiently made the decision to ban advertisements on crypto-related products and services earlier this year.
