One CPU, One Vote:
Why This Old Bitcoin Rule Still Matters

About Guardians of Blockchain

Guardians of Blockchain is a Czech-led movement co-founded by František Kohout (a software developer who got into Bitcoin in 2012 via a Silk Road purchase and later ran a family tech company, Galasoft, plus a 1,000+ GPU Ethereum operation before returning to Bitcoin). The mission is to defend the 'one CPU, one vote' principle by teaching people what decentralization actually means, grounded in František's university thesis on the centralization and monopolization of Bitcoin mining.

Their product is the Guardian Mini Miner, an open-source solo-mining kit built around Bitaxe/NerdMiner hardware. Buyers can 3D-print the case, solder the board, flash custom firmware, and run the device at home, with an upcoming Guardian Max boost version pushing ~250 GH/s from a single recycled S19-class ASIC chip. It is distinct because it is sold as an education tool and a decentralization statement, not a profit product.

This conversation is worth watching because František walks through the concrete centralization numbers (three pools and six data-center providers each controlling more than 51% of hashrate), explains the security-budget and 51% attack risk in plain language, debunks the coal-mining environmental myth with European emission-allowance math and a real Finnish heat-reuse project, and lays out a tangible future where ASIC coils replace heating elements and phones mine in the background.

What was said

1. 07:40 František recounts buying roughly 10 BTC for $50 from a nerdy classmate in late 2012 and the 'click' moment when his Silk Road textbook package actually arrived in the mail.
2. 13:40 After running Galasoft Crypto at scale he concluded it was exhausting to compete with big miners, so he deliberately stepped down to solo mining where he feels more useful.
3. 26:20 He confesses a 2018-2020 detour running over a thousand GPUs mining Ethereum in a Czech industrial-park cafeteria until COVID, chip shortages, and Ethereum's switch to proof-of-stake killed the setup.
4. 33:30 Citing his university thesis, he states that more than three pools already hold over 51% of hashrate and more than six data-center providers host over 51% of physical miners, concentrated across the US, China, and Russia.
5. 36:30 He explains the 51% attack threat: a state-level actor could censor transactions from specific regions, but sustaining it is economically brutal because consensus would cause miners to flee any misbehaving pool.
6. 57:30 He debunks the coal-mining myth by pointing to EU emission allowances that make coal-based mining uneconomical, and describes Guardians' Finnish project preheating district water from 40C to 80C using miner exhaust near the Oulu power plant.
7. 61:30 He reveals the upcoming Guardian Max: a single 2018-era S19 ASIC chip shrunk into a palm-sized open-source box pushing roughly 250 GH/s, with NerdMiner-class devices collectively hitting a block about once per month.