As an example, here's an article from 2011 about mining being unprofitable after falling from the astronomical value of $33 at the peak of its bubble:
![[Image: C7njdzJ.png?1]](https://i.imgur.com/C7njdzJ.png?1)
Quote:In May one user suggested that the effort being thrown at Bitcoins was wasted: "We're all trying to profit from the high exchange rates (1BTC is 9USD at the time of writing this) that we're throwing everything we've got at the bitcoin network. We profit from our actions for a couple of days, then the network detects the increase in speed and adjusts itself down, negating all the efforts we put into it, forcing us to buy even more processing power. It's an endless cycle of stupidity that simply cannot be solved by human nature."
With the value of Bitcoins dropping so low, and the computing power required to produce them growing steadily, it is becoming uneconomic to generate more except through the use of hacked computers in "botnets".
And we can't forget the guy who paid 10000 BTC for a pizza and then made an open offer to buy at the same price any time...
Either way, as long as you think it'll go up, mining always has the potential to profitable.. it's current value shouldn't matter unless you need to sell it to cover costs.