What Is Bitcoin And Bitcoin Mining?

What is Bitcoin?

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Bitcoin (₿) is a decentralized digital currency, without a central bank or single administrator, that can be sent from user to user on the peer-to-peer bitcoin network without the need for intermediaries. Transactions are verified by network nodes through cryptography and recorded in a public distributed ledger called a blockchain. The cryptocurrency was invented in 2008 by an unknown person or group of people using the name Satoshi Nakamoto. The currency began use in 2009. when its implementation was released as open-source software.

Bitcoins are created as a reward for a process known as mining. They can be exchanged for other currencies, products, and services, but the real-world value of the coins is extremely volatile. Research produced by the University of Cambridge estimated that in 2017, there were 2.9 to 5.8 million unique users using a cryptocurrency wallet, most of them using bitcoin.

Bitcoin has been criticized for its use in illegal transactions, the large amount of electricity (and thus carbon footprint) used by mining, price volatility, and thefts from exchanges. Some economists and commentators have characterized it as a speculative bubble at various times. Bitcoin has also been used as an investment, although several regulatory agencies have issued investor alerts about bitcoin.

The word bitcoin was defined in a white paper published on 31 October 2008. It is a compound of the words bit and coin. No uniform convention for bitcoin capitalization exists; some sources use Bitcoin, capitalized, to refer to the technology and network and bitcoin, lowercase, for the unit of account. The Wall Street Journal, The Chronicle of Higher Education, and the Oxford English Dictionary advocate the use of lowercase bitcoin in all cases.

What is Bitcoin Mining?

Bitcoin mining refers to the process of digitally adding transaction records to the blockchain, which is a publicly distributed ledger holding the history of every bitcoin transaction. Mining is a record-keeping process executed through immense computing power. Each Bitcoin miner around the world contributes to a decentralized peer-to-peer network to ensure the payment network is trustworthy and secure.

To securely add to the blockchain ledger, Bitcoin mining computers solve complex mathematical problems. When a solution is found, the latest block of confirmed transactions is added as the next link in the blockchain.

As an incentive to mine and contribute to the network, the miner who solved the problem is rewarded a block of Bitcoin.