- A decentralized peer-to-peer network (the bitcoin protocol)
- A public transaction ledger (the blockchain)
- A set of rules for independent transaction validation and currency issuance (consensus rules)
- A mechanism for reaching global decentralized consensus on the valid blockchain (Proof-of-Work algorithm)
from: Mastering Bitcoin, 2ed, Chapter 1, by Andreas Antonopoulos
It’s always a lot easier for me to “anchor” an idea to make it stick, when I have some pictures to go with it!
I watched a youtube video recently which told how to do it free. Basically, coinbase also runs gdax, which is a more complicated interface but has the same capabilities as coinbase. So create an account with gdax, and save a few percent with every altcoin transaction. (You can save 4% by using a bank account rather than a credit/debit card.)
Hello People. I am totally new in bitcoin. I downloaded Exodus, and when I simulator a bitcoin transaction of 0.001 (send) and it says that the fees are 21$. Is it correct? for sending 4$ I have to pay 21$?
–Taken from an Exodus forum on Tuesday, July 22, 2017.
Unfortunately, the bitcoin price of a transaction is rather a lot nowadays, because the blockchain is getting more transactions per 10 minutes than will fit in the blockchain. Hopefully, the segwit code will help alleviate that in the short run, and lightning will work in the long run.
Just as I was reading up on flexbox, as a better way of organizing layout objects, while I was reading up on bootstrap, another front-end framework for layout, I see a new grid layout, and my brain is kind of exploding… Anyway, not yet implemented in Microsoft Edge, so maybe by the time I learn it it will be a standard across all the browsers, not that many people currently use Edge.
I just watched a video by Andreas M. Antonopoulos on youtube, called “The Killer App: Engineering the Properties of Money.” In technology, entrepreneurs are always searching for the “killer app”, the program/application that will popularize whatever technology that the company is developing. He’s also written a couple books, Mastering Bitcoin and The Internet of Money.
I just got my own ethereum (approaching bitcoin in popularity, the up and coming cryptocurrency) miner working as a proof of concept on an old PC:
I have no idea how I got interested in bitcoin and cryptocurrencies! I think it’s because I know someone who was mining in bitcoin and making money a long time ago, and I thought–hey, I’m good with computers, and I’d like to make a little money on the side, why don’t I check it out?
So last night I started installing an ethereum (geth.exe) program, and then waiting around to see if I could get my PC to create some virtual currency, based on an article that said in the first sentence: “you can get it up and running and start your own ethereum mining project in 15 mins”.
I was OK until step 7, running a program in a dos window: “the screen should start downloading the blockchain for Ethereum…. ” My problem is that it never seemed to complete itself, so this morning, after 12 hours of continuous running with no end in sight, I killed it and started looking for another way to get mining.
This requires some faith and patience. And I’m not very patient. I came across an intriguing youtube channel called Boxmining:
And this person seems rather knowledgeable and interested in learning more about finances and technology. (Notice how the coin on the far right column has been grayed out–this is where he lost money–all part of the process of learning, and I think it would be better to color it red instead of trying to visually dismiss it.) I feel in the long run being patient and investing in technical knowledge will work out. It seems like technology applied to finances is another “internet wave” in the making in its power to disrupt traditional businesses.
Well, a few hours go by and I’m still impatiently waiting!