An Introduction To Bitcoin

The technology I will be looking at is Bitcoin. It is a digital currency that uses peer-to-peer technology and does not involve any central authority or banks in order to operate. “Bitcoin is open-source; its design is public, nobody owns or controls Bitcoin and everyone can take part”. The purpose of Bitcoin is to globalize currency, create secure transactions that do not require personal information, and most importantly, allow transparency and neutrality, meaning that no individuals can manipulate Bitcoin and transactions can be seen by everyone so Bitcoin can be trusted neutrally. By downloading the free software, a user acquires a personal wallet that allows them to trade Bitcoins. Each individual wallet has a distinct alphanumeric address which is a string of letters and numbers. A transaction with Bitcoins is protected by a cryptographic signature which is a private key associated with each wallet. In order to acquire Bitcoins, one can: purchase Bitcoins on a Bitcoin Exchange, obtain through payments, or obtain by earning them through Bitcoin Mining. Miners use mining software to solve mathematical algorithms in order to obtain Bitcoins. The more Bitcoins that are in circulation, the more difficult mining becomes, and now, miners must use ASIC (Application-Specific Integrated Circuit Chips). ASIC is designed strictly for Bitcoin mining because other processors take up too much power, produce a lot of heat and use a lot of electricity which make them difficult for mining. Bitcoin will revolutionize digital currency/the currency market because of its peer-to-peer trading, no third-party involvement, minimal transaction fees, no charge-backs, full transparency, minimal time delay for transactions, no restrictions on trading, and also globalizes the way you can spend money.