Introduction:
Bitcoin is the world's first cryptocurrency and it works because of the world's first public blockchain network.
Bitcoin lets you send and receive value, to and from anyone in the world using nothing more than a computer and an internet connection.
What makes it special?
- Bitcoin is different from every other tool used to send money over the internet because it works without the need to trust a middleman or trusted intermediary.
- This absence of private ownership means that bitcoin is the world's first publically owned digital payment infrastructure that is accessible by everyone with access to the internet.
- A brief explaination of Bitcoin I read and repeat here is this:
Bitcoin's main reasons for success could be attributed to the fact it removes and eliminates the need for an intermediary to access or conduct transactions; it's a more secure means of payment or transfer of value while also being transparent, which promotes trust. Bitcoin's technology offers all these features because it is built on a blockchain.
A blockchain is a digital ledger that keeps account of every transaction on a digital version of paper called a block, and everyone running a bitcoin wallet with. On the digital ledger the transaction and the record are one thing, so there are no errors in the record or ledger. And a complete copy of the historical ledger is called a Node, and after every transaction the entire network is updated simaltaneously and this includes the thousands of people running nodes worldwide, who make up the Network. Thus all on the Network, can view all the transactions and by all updating the record they verify them. The blockchain employs cryptographic algorithms to encrypt every data or transaction on it. This way, the security of the blockchain is the best available and unbreakable by any known Super computer. This enables peer-to-peer transactions, without using banks .
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What about Cash?
- Before Bitcoin, cash was the only public payments infrastructure. But it only works in face-to-face transactions.
- If you wanted to pay someone over the phone or over the internet then you could not use this public infrastructure. You had to use a private infrastructure; a private bank to open their books and add a ledger entry that debits you and credits the person you're paying, and if you both don't use the same bank, well then there'll be multiple banks and multiple ledger entries in between.
- But with bitcoin the ledger is the public blockchain and anyone can add an entry to that ledger transferring their bitcoins to anyone else. - Anyone can for absolutely no cost create a bitcoin address in order to receive payments digitally.
- And now you know what Bitcoin is, how it works and why it's special.
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