I wanted to get in on some ASICs at one point. Years ago me and a few coworkers were going to all put our money together and buy one, then buy more as we make money. But the more we looked into it the more scammy it seemed. It was just not possible to actually GET one without prepaying, and waiting in line, or other weird stuff like that. Then we started thinking, why would manufacturers sell these and not use them instead, if using them would yield more money. And if it's more profitable to sell them, then why should I buy one if I'm making less money in the end than what it costs? The more we started to think of it the more we decided it was not worth the risk. I guess long term you will make more money than the 1 time cost of buying it, but if it takes 10+ years for that, is it really worth it? The idea seemed fun at the time though. Having server stuff humming away in my basement and actually getting paid for it sounds cool on the surface. I mean sure, I could do web hosting but most ISPs don't allow servers, so it rules that out, but mining is not really a server or a bandwidth intensive operation.
I GPU mined ethereum for a while and was making money, but it was not enough to make it worthwhile as it's too hard to buy GPUs at scale to actually grow the operation. When I found out they tax it then I just got out of it as by the time I figure out all that stuff, possibly hire an accountant etc it was just not worth it. I'd lose more than I gain. With a good accountant there could have been a way to set it up as a corporation though, and actually write off equipment.