DEMAND Launches World’s First Stratum V2 Bitcoin Mining Pool

Bitcoin mining company DEMAND has announced today the world’s inaugural Stratum V2 mining pool, according to a press release sent to Bitcoin Magazine. This pool, built on the open-source Stratum Reference Implementation (SRI), aims to usher in a new era for mining by introducing enhanced security, flexibility, and performance.

The Stratum V2 protocol marks a significant leap forward from its predecessor, according to the release, offering a suite of improvements that not only elevate mining capabilities but also champion a more decentralized mining landscape.

Alejandro de la Torre, DEMAND’s co-founder and CEO, stated, “With Stratum V2 and our new solo mining pool, we aim to make home mining more attractive, which should in effect help decentralize the Bitcoin mining ecosystem and improve the health of the Bitcoin network overall.”

A key feature of Stratum V2 is its empowerment of individual miners to construct their own block templates. Traditionally, mining pool operators wielded control over transaction selection, posing centralization risks vulnerable to potential regulatory pressures for transaction censorship. Stratum V2 now grants mining pool users the autonomy to select transactions for block inclusion, fostering a more decentralized network resistant to censorship.

“Because Bitcoin mining is overwhelmingly done through mining pools, transaction selection has become relatively centralized: only a few mining pool operators can essentially decide to collude and prevent that certain transactions ever confirm,” DEMAND cofounder and SRI project lead Filippo Merli said. “Stratum V2 gives the power of transaction selection back to the individual miners, to make the mining ecosystem more decentralized and Bitcoin more censorship resistant.”

To harness Stratum V2's capabilities, miners will need to run SVPool’s translator proxy using the pool's config file alongside a job declaration client and set up a Bitcoin Core node to receive transactions via Bitcoin’s peer-to-peer network. DEMAND plans to incentivize miners to create block templates by reducing fees for these users, promoting increased full node participation and bolstering the Bitcoin ecosystem.

Currently, DEMAND exclusively caters to solo miners, providing them with the opportunity to find blocks independently, ensuring the entire block reward accrues to the successful solo miner. Additionally, DEMAND facilitates hash power resale on a marketplace, ensuring users maximize their earnings either by participating in mining or redirecting hash power to the highest bidder.

Looking ahead, DEMAND anticipates expanding its services to encompass pooled mining, fostering a collaborative environment where users share profits among themselves.