I completely agree. Mining is no longer for the realm of the casual enthusiast (unless it's for a few pence or cents per day).

I remember reading about one of the corporate "mining" rigs set up in Russia. They built their own facility dedicated to the rigs. And then they built their own hydro-electric dam to provide electricity for the facilty (for power and cooling) - plus any surplus to be sold back to the region. And they built the facility in a cold location - so less electricity on cooling requirements (when it's zero degrees outside, just open the windows! lol). They now provide about 5-8% of the global mining.

And given that GPU providers like nvidia are deliberately slowing their cards down for mining purposes, then the casual hobbyist miner stands absolutely no chance.

But will any altcoins out there rise to the challenge and provide a different method to mine? One less power intensive? One that rewards soloist's rather than fat cats?