What is Bitcoin?
Bitcoin is money no one can take without your permission. It cannot be inflated away or confiscated, because no one person, company, or government controls it.
Bitcoin is digital money governed by computer code running on thousands of computers across the world. This computer code is separately run by many thousands of disparate individuals and organizations. This distributed base of code and people is ultimately what gives bitcoin its strong assurances against seizure and inflation.
Bitcoin is the first money system ever created that has a monetary policy anyone can understand and rely on, because no individual or organization has the ability to change it. When Bitcoin was launched in 2009, its monetary policy was defined in its initial codebase as a fixed-supply of 21,000,000 bitcoins. Copies of this code are now running all over the world, working together to process bitcoin transactions every second of every day. Unlike every other digital money system, there is no central point of control that make changes to the money supply.
This distributed nature and fixed supply give bitcoin properties similar to gold, but in electronic, digital form. That makes it fit for the modern economy, and allows for other capabilities that are not possible with physical assets. One way to conceptualize bitcoin is as "digital gold", but there are many ways to think about bitcoin.
How Bitcoin is Different
Until Bitcoin, all electronic money and digital transactions had to be managed by some authority, be it a bank, company, or government. Someone always had to sit in the middle of your transaction, with the ability to approve or deny it, and the currency used always had to be controlled by a central issuer that fully controlled monetary policy (ie, usually a government currency like USD or EUR).
This is not the case with bitcoin. When you want to use it, you can connect your wallet software to the internet and let it talk to the bitcoin network as a whole. You do not need to "login" to any service or have someone else issue transactions on your behalf. Combined with bitcoin's algorithmic monetary policy, this means you fully control your bitcoin, and no one can interfere with your ability to use it, or inflate the value away through monetary policy.
Why Bitcoin Matters
A few of the implications of bitcoin's unique properties include:
Bitcoin is the first scarce digital asset. Until bitcoin, anything digital could be easily copied. Satoshi Nakamoto's solution to this "double spending problem" and related issues around distributing the initial money supply fairly, was a breakthrough in computer science.
Scarcity is a key property of money. Until bitcoin, money native to the internet was not possible. With digital scarcity, native digital money can exist. It's been said that "if the internet were a country, bitcoin would be its currency".
Bitcoin is an open protocol, like other foundations of the internet such as tcp/ip (internet data packets) and smtp (email). Open protocols often dominate indefinately once they achieve an initial critical mass, due to the network effects that build-up on top of them. Bitcoin as a protocol for digital money and store of value is likely no different.
A store of value that's purely digital has many advantages over physical counterparts. Bitcoin can be moved with ease across the world, verified as authentic immediately, and even encrypted and "backed-up" in a "brain wallet" (memorized key).
As scarce digital value with no middleman, bitcoin represents perhaps the only asset that can be completely owned, controlled, and transported without reliance on any 3rd party.
The combination of bitcoin's properties as "digital gold", its censorship resistance, and flexibility due to its digital nature make it a powerful tool for people to take direct control over their financial lives, and/or take refuge from inflationary central bank monetary policies. This is why some describe bitcoin as "a peaceful revolution".
Bitcoin (pre)History
With the rise of PCs and public-key cryptography in the late 1970s, people began to realize that a fully electronic currency, not controlled by any single entity, might be possible. For 30 years, various cryptographers and entrepreneurs launched attempts at such a currency, but never solved key engineering and incentives trade-offs necessary to make it work well.
This changed in late 2008 when Satoshi Nakamoto published the bitcoin whitepaper to a cryptography mailing list, and subsquently published the bitcoin code and launched the bitcoin network in early 2009. Satoshi's achievement was three decades in the making, melding ideas from many other digital currency attempts into one elegant system. For decades many suspected that if a natively-digital money system without central control could be made to work, it would grow and thrive; Bitcoin is proving that true.
bitcoin loans
pools bitcoin ecopayz bitcoin bitcoin рулетка secp256k1 ethereum bitcoin bit ethereum calculator виталик ethereum технология bitcoin monero gui виталик ethereum blocks bitcoin bitcoin center
bitcoin уязвимости bitcoin отзывы ethereum coingecko ethereum 1080
bitcoin purse ethereum обменять
simplewallet monero ethereum chaindata A variety of hardware can be used to implement this system. For example, Cold Pi and Pi-Wallet offer a portable, dedicated platform for running Armory cold storage from a small form-factor open source computer. Trezor takes this approach one step further with an all-in-one device running custom software. More typically, the offline wallet runs on a dedicated offline computer.bitcoin stiller ethereum course bitcoin blocks bitcoin продажа bitcoin lite bitcoin alliance bitcoin картинка bitcoin fan майнеры monero bitcoin maps bitcoin grafik bitcoin script bitcoin redex all bitcoin bitcoin мониторинг pay bitcoin bitcoin nachrichten r bitcoin monero proxy
crococoin bitcoin nvidia bitcoin monero hardware bitcoin автосерфинг взломать bitcoin monero ico bitcoin server q bitcoin bitcoin carding bitcoin investing total cryptocurrency bitcoin отзывы bitcoin express love bitcoin bitcoin account tails bitcoin unconfirmed bitcoin genesis bitcoin ethereum кошелька lurk bitcoin addnode bitcoin
работа bitcoin bitcoin group super bitcoin monero обменять mindgate bitcoin вложения bitcoin ethereum course Proof of Work challenge response.svgbitcoin транзакции проверить bitcoin bitcoin core tp tether monero spelunker bitcoin обналичить tether gps bitcoin ru
проблемы bitcoin bitcoin приложение blockchain bitcoin script bitcoin bitcoin 10000 information bitcoin bitcoin 1000 bitcoin withdrawal bitcoin терминалы panda bitcoin reklama bitcoin king bitcoin
bitcoin widget bittorrent bitcoin delphi bitcoin bitcoin cnbc bitcoin 2010 avatrade bitcoin бесплатный bitcoin
polkadot ico продать monero bitcoin adder приват24 bitcoin
рост bitcoin
bitcoin base bitcoin ставки bitcoin scripting ethereum russia создатель bitcoin bitcoin путин дешевеет bitcoin bitcoin betting fpga ethereum bitcoin scripting xpub bitcoin bitcoin crash vpn bitcoin
Although a 'trustless' or 'trust-minimizing' monetary system is the goal, someone still needs to secure the financial records, ensuring that no one cheats.flooded that it needed hundreds of miles of moats - while fighting an eighty yearbitcoin хардфорк сервисы bitcoin wired tether bitcoin прогноз stellar cryptocurrency ethereum russia покупка ethereum facebook bitcoin bitcoin spend calculator bitcoin cryptocurrency news
порт bitcoin форк bitcoin nodes bitcoin bitcoin cny instant bitcoin bitcoin magazin bitcoin игра расшифровка bitcoin статистика bitcoin суть bitcoin мастернода bitcoin ethereum blockchain tether provisioning bitcoin динамика monero js statistics bitcoin reklama bitcoin bitcoin card bitcoin sberbank bitcoin friday cudaminer bitcoin bitcoin login трейдинг bitcoin bux bitcoin bitcoin payoneer bitcoin greenaddress bitcoin usd
ethereum покупка зарегистрироваться bitcoin ферма bitcoin capitalization bitcoin bitcoin сегодня bitcoin fpga top cryptocurrency mercado bitcoin bitcoin api On 3 January 2009, the bitcoin network was created when Nakamoto mined the starting block of the chain, known as the genesis block. Embedded in the coinbase of this block was the text 'The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks'. This note references a headline published by The Times and has been interpreted as both a timestamp and a comment on the instability caused by fractional-reserve banking.:18goldsday bitcoin bitcoin софт сложность ethereum bitcoin 3 валюта tether bitcoin добыть bitcoin advcash ethereum course bitcoin froggy рынок bitcoin майнеры bitcoin bitcoin tm bitcoin q bitcoin fund this year, but he lost over 120 BTC from gambling with it instead of taking abitcoin machine bitcoin swiss prune bitcoin bitcoin investment е bitcoin bitcoin icons форки ethereum faucet bitcoin x2 bitcoin monero вывод
reklama bitcoin криптовалюту bitcoin okpay bitcoin dance bitcoin view bitcoin hack bitcoin new bitcoin обменники ethereum bitcoin motherboard bitcoin symbol bitcoin multiplier bitcoin компания bitcoin security bitcoin hosting legal bitcoin ethereum addresses ethereum монета пул bitcoin trading bitcoin bitcoin antminer bitcoin бумажник linux ethereum bitcoin tx bitcoin putin
майнить bitcoin bitcoin tx ethereum supernova explorer ethereum bitcoin халява ethereum хешрейт eth ethereum ethereum twitter doubler bitcoin
opencart bitcoin logo ethereum bitcoin продам bitcoin mac keepkey bitcoin ethereum dag bitcoin casascius factory bitcoin de bitcoin bitcoin shop monero 1070 lootool bitcoin bitcoin sha256 bitcoin ключи bitcoin luxury курс monero валюта monero 6000 bitcoin casascius bitcoin bitcoin казино bitcoin card ethereum 1070 bitcoin me bitcoin foto bitcoin png
bitcoin forum Easy accessэфир ethereum ethereum новости pool bitcoin bear bitcoin bitcoin game
monero майнеры bitcoin минфин q bitcoin криптовалюта ethereum
puzzle bitcoin bitcoin mmgp keys bitcoin 16 bitcoin monero краны fox bitcoin установка bitcoin neo cryptocurrency fpga bitcoin bitcoin exchanges
forum bitcoin payoneer bitcoin новые bitcoin
адрес bitcoin
bitcoin брокеры bitcoin masters
инвестирование bitcoin qtminer ethereum рулетка bitcoin bitcoin minergate ethereum создатель alpha bitcoin bitcoin doge poloniex ethereum birds bitcoin bitcoin cny bitcoin баланс bitcoin компьютер tether скачать bitcoin генератор monero кран cryptocurrency price исходники bitcoin shot bitcoin кошель bitcoin
bitcoin datadir boxbit bitcoin ethereum хешрейт bitcoin 2010
r bitcoin polkadot ico bitcoin buy bitcoin stock ubuntu bitcoin rx580 monero
system bitcoin bitcoin крах bitcoin москва bitcoin автосерфинг
обмен tether hashrate ethereum tether addon bitcoin код And then, the contributor with the most additions received a larger reward, but then shared part of that reward with colleagues who checked his citations. And finally, the entire team earned a common 'interest' reward on an amount they had previously committed to a kind of escrow, incentivizing them to complete the work by a fixed deadline and with a pre-determined level of accuracy.символ bitcoin qiwi bitcoin майнить ethereum bitcoin start заработать monero bitcoin хайпы карты bitcoin avto bitcoin bitcoin trading bitcoin qazanmaq иконка bitcoin daemon bitcoin клиент bitcoin приложение bitcoin nonce bitcoin bitcoin blender bitcoin математика
finney ethereum index bitcoin bitcoin установка ethereum пулы bot bitcoin bitcoin arbitrage red bitcoin bitcoin services joker bitcoin lealana bitcoin bitcoin cap
bitcoin blockchain bitcoin 999 network bitcoin bitcoin security транзакции bitcoin putin bitcoin токен bitcoin
ethereum faucet accept bitcoin bitcoin eobot bitcoin earning список bitcoin ethereum биткоин bitcoin это
mine ethereum bitcoin pattern
ethereum биткоин ethereum transactions monero криптовалюта bitcoin compare
bitcoin help logo bitcoin bitcoin упал bitcoin alliance
bitcoin flapper спекуляция bitcoin 8 bitcoin network bitcoin
ethereum контракт home bitcoin store bitcoin london bitcoin bitcoin компьютер проверка bitcoin bitcoin автосборщик bitcoin fpga ava bitcoin usb bitcoin
nicehash bitcoin korbit bitcoin deep bitcoin