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lavalamp comments on A proposed inefficiency in the Bitcoin markets - Less Wrong
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My math agrees with you. Looks like I was underestimating the effect of quantum computers.
Difficulty is currently growing at 30-40% per month. That won't last forever, obviously, but we can expect it to keep going up for a while, at least. (https://blockchain.info/charts/hash-rate) Still, it looks like you'd need an unrealistic amount of ASICs to match the output of just 1000 quantum computers.
Given that, there'll probably be a large financial incentive to mine bitcoins with the first quantum computers. The incentive goes away if you destroy the network in the process, though. It seems difficult to predict what will happen. Single pools have controlled > 50% of the mining briefly in the past.
A lot of unhappy btc holders may see a point, though. :)
In particular, the ability to roll back the blockchain breaks the patches you've mentioned for the fact that QC also breaks elliptic curve crypto.
That's true, but there's some precedent for picking a block that everyone agrees upon (that exists before quantum computers) and changing the rules at that block to prevent someone from rewriting the blockchain. A lot depends on how much warning we have.
It looks like making a cryptocoin that can survive quantum computers might be a high value activity.