Parasite Pool Mines Second Bitcoin Block, Proving Hybrid Model's Effectiveness

A novel Bitcoin mining pool, designed to challenge traditional pay-per-share and pure lottery models, has successfully mined its second block. Parasite Pool achieved this milestone on Friday, about 48 days after mining its first block in late February. The block contained 7,398 transactions and 0.002 BTC in fees, with Bitcoin trading at $76,213 at the time. This pool operates on a hybrid model, where the winning miner receives 1 BTC, and the remaining 2.125 BTC plus fees are distributed proportionally among all participants based on their shares submitted since the previous block. There are no fees associated with participating in this pool, and payouts are made through the Lightning Network. The pool's founder, ZK Shark, aims to support home miners, and its model has now been validated twice. With a current hashrate of 52 petahashes per second, Parasite Pool is testing whether its hybrid approach can sustain participant engagement during periods without block rewards. The success of this model could have significant implications for the mining landscape, as it seeks to balance the interests of both individual miners and the broader mining community.