There has been a lot of confusion and misinformation on how the exclusion of projects from the Gridcoin superblock actually affects the POR rewards of crunchers. I would like to take this opportunity to explain how the system is actually affected by project exclusions, and why there is nothing for crunchers to be concerned about.
On Superblocks
Superblocks are generated by the Gridcoin network on average every 24 - 48 hours, and are used to propagate the statistics from the BOINC project servers. This will update user contributions, and thus adjust their magnitude, which in turn affects the payout of every user until the next superblock. Recently, some superblocks have been excluding projects, which means all users who crunched for the excluded project will show a magnitude of zero for that work. As such, they are not paid for that project in the current superblock period. To see all past blocks, and superblocks, please visit any of the Gridcoin block explorers. The one I frequent most is hosted on www.gridcoinstats.eu, here.
The current superblock only includes a single project, Amicable Numbers. As a result, any user who has not been doing work for this project will have a magnitude of zero. Further, all users who have been running Amicable Numbers work are expected to receive exceptionally large amounts of GRC if they stake, until the next superblock. You can check your magnitude on www.gridcoinstats.eu or in your wallet on the overview page:
How the System Corrects for This
There is a metric maintained by the blockchain that records how much a user has been overpaid or underpaid for their contributions over time. As a result, when the problematic superblock has passed GRC rewards will be paid out to users in volumes that return everyone to 100% fulfillment of their POR rewards. What this means for you is:
If you do have magnitude due to having contributed to Amicable Numbers recently, you will be overpaid today and your fulfillment percentage will climb well above 100%. Your payouts in upcoming days will be reduced until this number drops back to 100%.
If you have not been contributing to Amicable Numbers, you will not be paid today, and your fulfillment percentage will drop. As a result you will be paid out at a higher rate after the next superblock until you are returned to 100 % fulfillment.
No matter what bracket you fall into, you will not have gained or lost any POR. Therefore, there is no need, nor benefit, in switching projects in response to project exclusion from a superblock.
Proof for Those Unconvinced
At the time of the last superblock project exclusion, my magnitude dropped to 0.36 (as good as zero). The reason it was not exactly zero was due to the fact that I had recently contributed a tiny amount of work to one of the included projects. This resulted in a payment gap seen in the block explorer here:
My staking gap during this period was from Block 960452 to Block 963382, which is roughly 44 hours. Most of this time I was at a magnitude of zero. Using this time period and my estimated mint of 722 GRC/day before the project exclusion, I would expect to have missed roughly 1323 GRC. Block 963382 paid me out 1289.6 GRC, with the difference being due to my magnitude and thus mint not actually having been constant during the entire period.
I hope this has allayed some of your fears about the effect of project exclusion - there is absolutely nothing to worry about!
Image credit, in order of appearance:
Banner, @joshoeah
Wallet, Screencap
Block List, Gridcoinstats Screencap
