Bitcoin Mining Council required to combat ‘hostile’ narrative: Michael Saylor

Michael Saylor, the CEO of MicroStrategy has described and thinking behind the formation of the Bitcoin Mining Council.

Bitcoin Mining Council required to combat ‘hostile’ narrative: Michael Saylor

The council was formed on May 25 after Saylor brokered a successful meeting between Elon Musk and several top North American Bitcoin mining firms. The miners involved in the council will provide current and planned renewable usage transparency, and will lobby other mining operations across the globe to do so as well.

While speaking at the virtual Consensus 2021 conference, Saylor emphasized that the council was formed out of the need to provide greater transparency on the Bitcoin mining industry and promote sustainable initiatives moving forward.

He said, “The only reason we had the meeting is because we wanted to ensure the success of a decentralized cryptocurrency, and the source of decentralization is energy usage.”

“It turns out that Bitcoin miners don't actually have a good forum for communicating how they generate their energy. We don't have a standard model for Bitcoin energy usage right now, and we don't have a future forecast model that we commonly use,” he added.

The Bitcoin Mining Council, however, has proven controversial in some quarters with comparisons to the oil production cartel OPEC. 

Marty Bent, a podcaster and the co-founder of Great American Mining, drew comparisons to the controversial Bitcoin scaling plans emerging out of the 2017 New York Agreement, in his May 24 newsletter:

“Do they not recall the last time there was a closed door meeting that involved stakeholders who attempted to speak on behalf of an entire industry?”

Saylor was quick to rebuff notions there was anything clandestine or non-transparent about the meeting. 

“If it was a secret meeting, I wouldn't have told millions of people the next day that it was a secret meeting. Trust me, you know, we told everybody in the world that we had a meeting,” Slayor said.

MicroStrategy CEO emphasized the need to fight back against a hostile anti-cryto narrative portrayed by some institutions and media outlets:

“We need to make sure the people that are hostile to Bitcoin and hostile to the crypto industry aren't defining those narratives and defining those models and defining those metrics. In the absence of any good information or any response on our part, they will define those models.”

The North American miners which are in council include Argos Blockchain, Blockcap, Galaxy Digital, Hive Blockchain, Hut 8 Mining, Marathon Digital, and Riot Blockchain.