The Kodak-branded cryptocurrency mining scheme labelled by many as a “scam” has officially been shelved.
Launched in January by Spotlite USA – a company that licenses Kodak’s brand – the bitcoin mining computer sold as the ‘Kodak Kashminer’ went on display at the CES tech show in Las Vegas, and made headlines as many within the industry questioned its advertised profitability.
According to reports published today by the BBC however, Spotlite has officially cancelled the mining scheme – with the company’s CEO – Halston Mikail – saying that the SEC (the US Securities and Exchange Commission) had prevented the scheme from going ahead.
Telling the BBC that the company would continue its private mining operation in Iceland, the report also explains that Kodak themselves have denied all involvement – with a spokesperson remarking:
“While you saw units at CES from our licensee Spotlite, the KashMiner is not a Kodak brand licensed product. Units were not installed at our headquarters.”
Spotlite originally advertised the scheme by offering customers the opportunity to rent a Kashminer for an up-front cost of $3,400 – with the promise of a 50% share of the mined bitcoins.
With many at the time labelling the proposed plan a “scam,” critics pointed out that the advertised revenue failed to take into account the increasing mining difficulty of bitcoin – as more hash power is progressively added to the network.
Moreover, it is likely that many investors were unaware of the rapidly-changing bitcoin mining landscape, with new ASICs (Application Specific Integrated Circuits) – chips designed specifically to mine different cryptocurrencies – released every few months, drastically changing the profitability of any given hardware.
With cryptocurrency mining a complicated and often less attractive process than it can at first appear, many in the industry will applaud the cancellation of what they saw as a dubious capitalisation upon investor naivety.
