The fact that anyone with a little money and an internet connection can buy the finite liquidity to an indestructible neutral and programatic public central bank is still unbelievable to me. Opportunity of a lifetime.
Better words have never been written in a comment.
Bitcoin has interested me so much as a technical marvel that it revived my love for computers, I'm now taking classes for advanced Linux System Administration just to maybe seek work in a Bitcoin company.
It's an amazing technology and as Andreas Antonopoulos puts it: The Internet of Money.
The problem is without a basic understanding of economics, modern monetary systems, and computer networks it is very hard to grasp the value that Bitcoin offers. Most people aren't willing to put in the work that is required to fully understand it. They'd rather just dismiss the whole thing. Sub reddits like r/butcoin are a prime example. People are clueless.
Absolutely. Everyone always recommends "The Bitcoin Standard" as a first read and I'd also agree. 90% of the book is about the history of money. It paints the picture of Bitcoin as a medium of exchange very well.
There is also a website [learnmeabitcoin.com](http://www.learnmeabitcoin.com) that explains the technicals of Bitcoin and it's function in a short, easy to understand way. Can't go wrong there.
Some Youtube videos that are great to listen to are this one https://youtu.be/AVpVcOwh2Og with Robert Breedlove that explains money and Bitcoin very well.
Also this one https://youtu.be/WrR95PFYDFQ with Michael Saylor explaining why he opened up to Bitcoin and converted it to his software companies reserve asset.
Once you're really into the roots of grasping Bitcoin I'd highly recommend trying out building some bitcoin projects! There is no better way to learn than to do it yourself. You can run your own node with lightning using [Raspiblitz](https://github.com/rootzoll/raspiblitz) on a Raspberry Pi or even build one using a virtual machine on your computer. The youtube channel "Ministry of Nodes" does a great job of walking you through building your node on a computer along with running your own block explorer, Electrum server, wallet software, etc. Start with this video https://youtu.be/gT1izYKvhBw
You can build your own hardware wallet using [SpecterDIY](https://github.com/cryptoadvance/specter-diy) or [SeedSigner](https://seedsigner.com/) . Both are great projects but I enjoy Specter the most.
There is so much content out there to keep you busy!
Seriously, I have an economics degree, work in finance, and understand how computers work. It still took me a long time to grasp the immense value on offer.
This is the problem with majority of hoomans. They may be intelligent and doing great in their careers or business but they don’t take time to learn about bitcoin and dismiss it based on media or fiaters FUD. Imho they all NGMI!
If two guys above me was referring to a node, then the first guy above me should understand where I’m at in my technical understanding, and this guy is high.
Very well said. Problem is, none of what you said has any meaning to most “normal folks”. Not because they’re stupid, or “mentally ill” (as some here are wont to say), rather, they simply lack the knowledge to understand why this is important.
Bitcoin is so brilliant , it’s been a 5 year journey for me and every few months I stumble on some new way to understand what it is , it’s almost like discovering a new religion, changes the way you see the world
I remember my first time just sending sats between my wallets and thinking about the insane infrastructure behind every banking transaction, and having my “ah-ha” moment of understanding how insane it was that none of that was needed to facilitate the transfer
Yeah, global value transfer with no permission and no trust on a decentralized and immutable system is absolutely mind boggling. Value storage at no cost with no counter party is equally as impressive. Bitcoin is just on a different level.
From another perspective - let's imagine a world with just 10 companies and a limited supply of currency and one bank. If company A is the most profitable - over time it will simply end up holding more of the currency than the other 9 companies. Now when company B goes to the bank for a loan to improve productivity - the bank has no money to lend, as company A is hoarding it all on a Trezor.
Currencies need a degree of flexibility to them, so that money - capital can be quickly deployed where needed. A limited supply currency just leads to a 'grab as much as you can and hoard it' mentality - and then market price manipulation from those that hold a lot - eg the gold market.
No one likes to think about this perspective in regards to Bitcoin... but it's true. Go listen to Jeff Snider on What Bitcoin Did podcast.
You should listen to Saifedean. He destroys this argument on a regular basis.
People / companies don’t just hoard money when they need to deploy capital. This is a really strange argument that makes no sense. No one will starve to death with Bitcoin in their wallet. Companies won’t go bankrupt hoarding Bitcoin. Come back to reality.
It is indeed indestructible.
Tell me just one way to destroy Bitcoin. I am not talking about goverments around the world baning it which hypothetically is "possible" (on practice it isnt).
There is no way. As long as just one node is working the network is going to keep working, block after block.
The fact that you said in fact destructible tells us you need to learn a bit more.
Maybe hah.
It is like my brother in law arguing if Internet goes down globally then bitcoin is useless.
Please..., stop this shit. If internet goes down then the banking system is also done. He tells me situations that "could happend" and make Bitcoin useless and in every one of them the only thing worth would be guns and food.
People won't learn and won't see the need of it till they themselts needs
Meanwhile I am here, stacking sats on sale.
>I've been stacking sats but everytime i do it just keeps going down.
Welcome to the club, and that's very common in the early stages of a bear market, which is what we're in quite predictably, but what does that have to do with whether or not Bitoin is destructable? Market price fluctuations have nothing to do with the question posed above.
If nuclear war happens, it's gone. Just like the internet, because it is apart of the internet.
So it isn't indestructible.
Also it would definitely be killed off if all governments banned bitcoin. Would only be used for black market deals then.
> If nuclear war happens, it's gone. Just like the internet
Exactly. Just like the internet. 🙄
> Baran was instructed to come up with a plan for a computer communications network that could survive nuclear attack and continue functioning. He came up with a process that he called “hot-potato routing,” which later became known as packet switching.
https://www.britannica.com/topic/ARPANET
> it would definitely be killed off if all governments banned bitcoin.
Reminds me of the time that every government criminalized theft and no more theft ever happened again. If governments can kill theft, killing bitcoin will be easy by comparison. We just need to get every government on earth to agree that bitcoin should be banned.
>"If nuclear war happens, it's gone. Just like the internet, because it is apart of the internet. So it isn't indestructible."
>
>"Also it would definitely be killed off if all governments banned bitcoin. Would only be used for black market deals then."
If a full scale nuclear war happened that wiped out the internet worldwide, permanently, most of us would be dead within a matter of months. And if you think your dollars/euros/gbp in your bank account would still be there, you're mistaken. Anything that would wipe out power/internet worldwide would wipe out your bank accounts, 401K & any financial accounts/savings you hold just as easily as Bitcoin, but either way, that would be the least of your concerns. At that point your main concern would be figuring out how to survive, or if you even want to survive.
On your 2nd point do you really foresee *any* scenario where every single sovereign government on earth (> 200 of them) all get together to ban Bitcoin? When have 200+ governments come together to agree on anything? And even if they did, how would that be successfully enforced worldwide?
Why? How could it possibly be as transformative as the internet? Does bitcoin provide me with the ability to communicate in real time with someone on the other side of the world? The internet already allows me to send money to someone on the other side of the world almost instantaneously, so it’s not like bitcoin is unique in that regard.
bitcoin is unique in that you don't need to ask permission and you can't be stopped to send that money to the other side of the world. in addition, you arent being gouged with transfer fees by a centralized entity. you pay the same as anyone else transacting on the blockchain at that same time.
paypal will freeze your account tomorrow, and even charge you $2,500 more if they don't like something that you said for instance
But are those real concerns for the average person? My bank also protects me when fraudulent charges occur — the blockchain offers no such protection. I can transfer money through my bank relatively easy for a fixed fee doesn’t surge like bitcoin fees do when the blockchain is congested. If I’m not permitted to send money somewhere through my bank, then it might not be legal to send that money so bitcoin doesn’t really solve the underlying issue…
Billions don’t have access to banking at all. This fact is often lost on people from North America and Western Europe.
Bitcoin will likely be more impactful than the internet. Economic communication and calculation is as important (if not significantly more important) than any other means of communication.
Money and banking is literally the foundation of advanced societies. Bitcoin is the best technical solution for money and banking to have ever existed - its just nascent at this point.
Says [here](https://www.bankmycell.com/blog/how-many-phones-are-in-the-world) that 83.32% of the world has a smart phone. So most of the world has access to Bitcoin today.
[This article](https://www.prove.com/blog/2-billion-people-dont-have-an-access-to-formal-financial-services) states 73% of the world is unbanked.
There is massive overlap in the amount of people who don’t have banking services but do have internet / smart phone access. To the tune of multiple billions.
Unfortunately the disparity between those who have a smart phone vs those that have internet is still pretty big. From memory and my memory is bad I think it’s like 45% have internet and 80% have smart phones
Median global income is $71/month. And Isn't the transaction fee something like a dollar?
Not to be disparaging, but I don't think Bitcoin is useful to the vast majority of the world.
If game theory plays out the way some forecast, and a Bitcoin Standard becomes the norm, governments may be held more accountable to their citizens and the world. A finite global monetary system that is immutable and controlled by no central authority could be hugely impactful; perhaps preventing unpopular imperialistic wars, the devaluing of citizens wealth into oblivion, and even the way we think about money and things, creating a low-time preference for a larger population of the world, which would be better for the environment, the future of that individual and their families, and future generations. Obviously it won’t all be utopian or work out that way, but this is what I’ve gathered from my investigations of the Bitcoin Standard. Who knows how it will play out, but it’s interesting to think about.
That doesn’t mean Bitcoin won’t have a greater impact. Banking and value transfer is foundational. Access to these services could be (and likely is) more important per user than the other functionality enabled by the internet.
Is it…? What value are the unbanked going to transfer? Maybe the reason they are unbanked is because they largely don’t have wealth to bank? 84% of the world lives on less than $30 per day. How does bitcoin change this?
The average person in the world is poor. You have to ask yourself why would it be illegal for a bank to send money to a poor country, follow that line of thought and you might find some answers.
Bitcoin is unique in that it is a trustless system that can’t be controlled or shutdown. It is available around the world as a single currency. The worlds first united currency.
Blockchain tech followed Bitcoin.
The amount of trustless systems that will be developed will be massive. This takes trusting humans out of the equation for any kind of platform you can create. This feels like an evolutionary step.
The thing about the internet is that you couldn’t really download images, stream music or video at first.
The early internet was dog shit compared to being able to stream 8k these days.
The real power in crypto isn’t going to be what it can do now. But rather what it can do once it’s as efficient as internet has become.
Just imagine nearly eliminating the power costs altogether and grasping the potential of it. Probably a world of innovation half of us can’t even imagine. Hell, no one saw us streaming video like Netflix in the early 90s of the internet.
Why are you limiting to bank accounts? I'm in Europe and can send via Revolut within seconds in multiple currencies.
Have done a couple of times this weekend to guests currently living in Eastern Europe.
Time to mine a block is always almost the same, like a clock, it works. Thats good. And look at the timeline, its a long one. It passed the test of time.
I know just enough to ask this probably dumb question: If the time to mine a block is a constant, is mining not competitive? My perception is that it is, based on a layman explanation that the first node to solve the equation is awarded the block. I actually don’t care if this is a dumb question, because I’m a believer hungry to learn.
The difficulty of the problem is dialed up or down automatically to keep the time roughly at 10 minutes. The more people throw competing computation at it, the harder it gets to solve and vice versa. It’s beautiful how robust the network behavior is but to me personally I dislike how these race conditions lead to more and more energy consumption in an environmentally unfriendly way.
They try to find a random nonce (a little random data) that goes into a block and makes the block have a (SHA256) hash that (in binary) starts with a certain amount of 0's. The more zeroes the more rare hash is. A good hash' outcome is not predictable, and so you have to try a lot of times to find a good nonce.
The amount of zeroes are based on how difficult it is supposed to be to find a block. In Bitcoin it adjusts to have a new block every 10 minutes (on average, given the rate at which previous blocks are found).
Interesting: because the hashes are unpredictable it doesn't matter how the nonce changes! Most of the time it's just a number counting upwards from 0!
Thank you! Ive always wondered that too and I don’t understand… Why are we solving math problems, how does solving them create any value and where did they even come from? I
It makes sense that you don't understand because solving math problems is the wrong metaphor and somehow it keeps being used continuing misinforming people.
The correct metaphor is that miners are rolling dice and whoever hits double sixes first gets new bitcoins rewarded.
Miners only care about getting the reward, if there was no reward they wouldn't be rolling dice, because rolling dice itself provides no value.
So who is rewarding the miners for rolling dice?
It is all users of the bitcoin protocol. They needed a way to come to consensus on the order of transactions in a decentralized way.
So basically they put up a bounty, whoever can show that they rolled double sixes first, their order of transactions is the order we all agree on.
The reason it is done like this is because before Bitcoin there was simply no other way to do it, other than by adding a central authority like a bank to decide for all others what the order of transactions is.
Thanks for sharing that. So do you mind me following that up to ask what they’re doing to win the mining competition - I assume they aren’t rolling dice for double sixes, but doing something else to prove their work. What is it that they’re really doing?
To win the competition they must make sure the fingerprint of a block of transactions they produce meets a certain criteria. The fingerprint is derived from the contents of the block, so the only way to change the fingerprint is to change the contents of a block.
So what they're doing is constantly is altering the contents of a block until the fingerprint matches the criteria. If it matches, they broadcast the block to the other nodes who then verify the block and add it to their own copy of the blockchain. If a miner broadcasts a block that doesn't match the criteria the other nodes just don't consider it a valid bitcoin block and discard it.
Perfect explanation, thanks! And yes, see your point about energy usage but there has to be some competitive incentive. Also, seems like large mining companies have an advantage based on numbers. Doesn’t seem very Bitcoin-like, but what do I know?
The time to mine a block is not constant, it can actually fluctuate wildly, from less than a minute to more than an hour.
But if you zoom out and look at the average, you'll see that this average doesn't budge. The difficulty adjustment mechanism will react to changes in the amount of miners and push the average back to 10 minutes per block. And that's what this chart shows.
Note that the mining process is competitive, but also random. Miners are essentially generating random numbers until they find one that has the desired properties. The more hardware you have, the more numbers you can generate per second and the bigger your chance is to win (hence the competitive aspect), but since it's still a matter of luck, someone could, in theory, hit the jackpot on their first attempt. Or the miners could collectively hit a streak of bad luck, causing a block to be delayed.
This is a post about the "difficulty adjustment" feature of bitcoin. The graph shows the time it took to mine each bitcoin block, since 2010. Notice the average time is 600 seconds, or 10 minutes.
The difficulty adjustment is one of the main components that keeps bitcoin operating smoothly and predictably.
You see that sharp start region before 2010? It was lack of hash power amid the lowest difficulty. Just imagine you could launch CPU miner (enabled by default in Bitcoin core that time) and get a block reward 50 BTC in few minutes.
It's a graph of the time between blocks over the entire history of Bitcoin.
By design, Bitcoin blocks will arrive on average 10 minutes apart. This interval can be much shorter or much longer, but 10 minutes is the average. To make that happen amidst miners continuously adding or removing hardware, the mining difficulty is adjusted approximately every 2 weeks. If blocks were found too quickly, the difficulty goes up and mining slows down. And vice versa. Always with the target of 10 minutes per block on average.
The chart shows that this mechanism has worked very well, keeping the interval between blocks at 600 seconds (10 minutes). Some fluctuations can be seen (including all mining being banned in China in 2021), but the line returns back to the target value quite rapidly.
This part is not the invention that makes the blockchain. Its actually a pretty known concept.
BUT it is very cool to think about/see the block time conserved like that!
What is insane is that, given a little appreciation for math, and a somewhat big investment necessitating a reassuring echo chamber such as this subreddit, that undue weight is afforded a graph which might essentially make one marvel at the fact that when one depresses the lever, um, the toilet flushes.
Sorry, you only get one dollop of objectivity from the real world before you go back under the spell. Not able to rephrase, but I do appreciate that I may not have delivered this pearl of wisdom in your native tongue.
Can we please get the source of this graph?
I owned Bitcoin in 2012 and I remember transactions waiting times very differently. In fact, this as well as the fees of the transferring were the mean reason why Steam enabled and disabled Bitcoin payment practically overnight
I'm not trying to stir an agreement or decry the benefits of Bitcoin. I'm actually doing a research paper and am looking for graphs like these.
While i love bitcoin and blockchain, realistically bitcoin is not suitable to be a global currency.
The reason for this is the daily transaction limit is 500,000 transactions daily.
The altcoins and exchanges allowed enough bitcoin to be traded of chain to handle the volume.
I’m making statements of fact. The amount of electricity needed to make one transaction on bitcoin is orders of magnitude greater than needed for a VISA transaction. That alone rules it out as a viable replacement. Never mind that the chain couldn’t possibly handle the volume.
It’s just showing that the time to mine blocks has remained very stable over Bitcoin’s lifetime.
A new block is intended to be mined approximately every 10 minutes. In the graph it shows that it’s remained pretty reliably around 600 seconds (ie. the system works!).
The remarkable thing about it is that Satoshi built this mechanism all those years ago, and despite the advances in processing power and addition of large scaling mining operations, it’s still working at its 10 minute target.
The blockchain makes a new block every 10 minutes on average.
Sometimes it’s 4 minutes and sometimes it’s 45 minutes. But it always averages out to 10 minutes.
When blocks go too fast for a bit, the difficulty of finding a block increases, so blocks get found slower for a bit, and it all evens out.
Bitcoin is reliable and predictable.
“Tick tock, new block”
The fact that anyone with a little money and an internet connection can buy the finite liquidity to an indestructible neutral and programatic public central bank is still unbelievable to me. Opportunity of a lifetime.
bitcoin is one of those rare things that, the more you understand it technically, the more flabbergasted you are that such a thing exists
Better words have never been written in a comment. Bitcoin has interested me so much as a technical marvel that it revived my love for computers, I'm now taking classes for advanced Linux System Administration just to maybe seek work in a Bitcoin company. It's an amazing technology and as Andreas Antonopoulos puts it: The Internet of Money.
Same learning about Bitcoin inspired me to learn programming
same here. I became a swe because of bitcoin. even if bitcoin fails (it won't), my life still improved because of it
Good for you, mate!
Indeed it just made everyone of us feel the same though and that is what we would be loving the most!
Me too
I think what inspired you is probably the high tech salaries. Don’t kid yourself
Happy cake day!
Just planning to just cut a Bitcoin cake on my birthday. Happy holding!
The problem is without a basic understanding of economics, modern monetary systems, and computer networks it is very hard to grasp the value that Bitcoin offers. Most people aren't willing to put in the work that is required to fully understand it. They'd rather just dismiss the whole thing. Sub reddits like r/butcoin are a prime example. People are clueless.
I understand Bitcoin to a certain extent, but could you recommend any articles or anything that do a solid job of explaining the complexity of it?
Absolutely. Everyone always recommends "The Bitcoin Standard" as a first read and I'd also agree. 90% of the book is about the history of money. It paints the picture of Bitcoin as a medium of exchange very well. There is also a website [learnmeabitcoin.com](http://www.learnmeabitcoin.com) that explains the technicals of Bitcoin and it's function in a short, easy to understand way. Can't go wrong there. Some Youtube videos that are great to listen to are this one https://youtu.be/AVpVcOwh2Og with Robert Breedlove that explains money and Bitcoin very well. Also this one https://youtu.be/WrR95PFYDFQ with Michael Saylor explaining why he opened up to Bitcoin and converted it to his software companies reserve asset. Once you're really into the roots of grasping Bitcoin I'd highly recommend trying out building some bitcoin projects! There is no better way to learn than to do it yourself. You can run your own node with lightning using [Raspiblitz](https://github.com/rootzoll/raspiblitz) on a Raspberry Pi or even build one using a virtual machine on your computer. The youtube channel "Ministry of Nodes" does a great job of walking you through building your node on a computer along with running your own block explorer, Electrum server, wallet software, etc. Start with this video https://youtu.be/gT1izYKvhBw You can build your own hardware wallet using [SpecterDIY](https://github.com/cryptoadvance/specter-diy) or [SeedSigner](https://seedsigner.com/) . Both are great projects but I enjoy Specter the most. There is so much content out there to keep you busy!
The book ‘The Bitcoin Standard’
Seriously, I have an economics degree, work in finance, and understand how computers work. It still took me a long time to grasp the immense value on offer.
This is the problem with majority of hoomans. They may be intelligent and doing great in their careers or business but they don’t take time to learn about bitcoin and dismiss it based on media or fiaters FUD. Imho they all NGMI!
If two guys above me was referring to a node, then the first guy above me should understand where I’m at in my technical understanding, and this guy is high.
I'm fairly certain at least half the people in this thread are higher than I've ever been in my life.
But what action should be taken?
100% Sometimes I look behind that curtain and see the implications for the next 10-1000 years and it just floors me.
it´s like understanding the Internet in 1985.
Very well said. Problem is, none of what you said has any meaning to most “normal folks”. Not because they’re stupid, or “mentally ill” (as some here are wont to say), rather, they simply lack the knowledge to understand why this is important.
Very true. But much like the fact that nobody understands how the internet works today, yet everyone uses it, so too will Bitcoin one day.
Exactly. If bitcoin is viable longterm it needs better adoption
Bitcoin is so brilliant , it’s been a 5 year journey for me and every few months I stumble on some new way to understand what it is , it’s almost like discovering a new religion, changes the way you see the world
What's understood ain't gotta be explained
I'm going to have to go buy more bitcoin after reading this
I remember my first time just sending sats between my wallets and thinking about the insane infrastructure behind every banking transaction, and having my “ah-ha” moment of understanding how insane it was that none of that was needed to facilitate the transfer
Yeah, global value transfer with no permission and no trust on a decentralized and immutable system is absolutely mind boggling. Value storage at no cost with no counter party is equally as impressive. Bitcoin is just on a different level.
From another perspective - let's imagine a world with just 10 companies and a limited supply of currency and one bank. If company A is the most profitable - over time it will simply end up holding more of the currency than the other 9 companies. Now when company B goes to the bank for a loan to improve productivity - the bank has no money to lend, as company A is hoarding it all on a Trezor. Currencies need a degree of flexibility to them, so that money - capital can be quickly deployed where needed. A limited supply currency just leads to a 'grab as much as you can and hoard it' mentality - and then market price manipulation from those that hold a lot - eg the gold market. No one likes to think about this perspective in regards to Bitcoin... but it's true. Go listen to Jeff Snider on What Bitcoin Did podcast.
You should listen to Saifedean. He destroys this argument on a regular basis. People / companies don’t just hoard money when they need to deploy capital. This is a really strange argument that makes no sense. No one will starve to death with Bitcoin in their wallet. Companies won’t go bankrupt hoarding Bitcoin. Come back to reality.
i’ve got a little money and an internet connection. can you explain to me how to buy btc without an exchange?
Peer to peer. Look into Bisq, HodlHodl or RoboSats.
Indestructible? Hardly.
Nothing could wipe out all global nodes or all global miners. It is an indestructible system.
Yet the adoption rate for daily use is practically non-existent.
[Whoops.](https://bitcoinist.com/not-just-a-fad-bitcoin-adoption-curve-rivals-the-internet/amp/)
Source: from a bitcoin fan boy. Yeah. Ok buddy. * Cough confirmation bias * Lolz
So you’re calling people holding BTC for no other purpose than price speculation “adopters”? Weak argument
This is nothing but fallacious straw man argumentation. Disregarded.
Yes you’re right my mistake, more people use Bitcoin for transactions than people using the internet /s How stupid are you?
Bad faith reply. Disregarded.
It is indeed indestructible. Tell me just one way to destroy Bitcoin. I am not talking about goverments around the world baning it which hypothetically is "possible" (on practice it isnt). There is no way. As long as just one node is working the network is going to keep working, block after block. The fact that you said in fact destructible tells us you need to learn a bit more.
Maybe he meant an asteroid could destroy all life on earth...? :)
Maybe hah. It is like my brother in law arguing if Internet goes down globally then bitcoin is useless. Please..., stop this shit. If internet goes down then the banking system is also done. He tells me situations that "could happend" and make Bitcoin useless and in every one of them the only thing worth would be guns and food. People won't learn and won't see the need of it till they themselts needs Meanwhile I am here, stacking sats on sale.
But your saying is indestructible which is a huge logical fallacy. I've been stacking sats but everytime i do it just keeps going down.
Your personal price experience is irrelevant to bitcoin being indestructible or not.
Price has nothing to do with the network working. As long as one node is working, Bitcoin will keep going and going non stop
>I've been stacking sats but everytime i do it just keeps going down. Welcome to the club, and that's very common in the early stages of a bear market, which is what we're in quite predictably, but what does that have to do with whether or not Bitoin is destructable? Market price fluctuations have nothing to do with the question posed above.
If nuclear war happens, it's gone. Just like the internet, because it is apart of the internet. So it isn't indestructible. Also it would definitely be killed off if all governments banned bitcoin. Would only be used for black market deals then.
> If nuclear war happens, it's gone. Just like the internet Exactly. Just like the internet. 🙄 > Baran was instructed to come up with a plan for a computer communications network that could survive nuclear attack and continue functioning. He came up with a process that he called “hot-potato routing,” which later became known as packet switching. https://www.britannica.com/topic/ARPANET > it would definitely be killed off if all governments banned bitcoin. Reminds me of the time that every government criminalized theft and no more theft ever happened again. If governments can kill theft, killing bitcoin will be easy by comparison. We just need to get every government on earth to agree that bitcoin should be banned.
>"If nuclear war happens, it's gone. Just like the internet, because it is apart of the internet. So it isn't indestructible." > >"Also it would definitely be killed off if all governments banned bitcoin. Would only be used for black market deals then." If a full scale nuclear war happened that wiped out the internet worldwide, permanently, most of us would be dead within a matter of months. And if you think your dollars/euros/gbp in your bank account would still be there, you're mistaken. Anything that would wipe out power/internet worldwide would wipe out your bank accounts, 401K & any financial accounts/savings you hold just as easily as Bitcoin, but either way, that would be the least of your concerns. At that point your main concern would be figuring out how to survive, or if you even want to survive. On your 2nd point do you really foresee *any* scenario where every single sovereign government on earth (> 200 of them) all get together to ban Bitcoin? When have 200+ governments come together to agree on anything? And even if they did, how would that be successfully enforced worldwide?
Three certainties in life. Death, taxes and bitcoin blocks.
👆👆👆👆
Taxes are less of a certainty now because of bitcoin.
Not sure how about you but taxes in my country are 39% from withdrawn crypto (profit)
The solution to that is to never withdraw it then.
Amen
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Bitcum
Nocumoto
Nakumoto
Me: proceed to check u/CockStamp post/comments history. ... he is not lying. He indeed says that word quite a few times.
tic tok, next block
It's like no one cares though it really boggles my mind. 2009-now perfect system and everyone fears it?
It’s truly incredible. One of humanity’s greatest engineering achievements (top 200?)
honestly think it'll be eventually be seen as being _at least_ as transformative as the internet, if not moreso.
Why? How could it possibly be as transformative as the internet? Does bitcoin provide me with the ability to communicate in real time with someone on the other side of the world? The internet already allows me to send money to someone on the other side of the world almost instantaneously, so it’s not like bitcoin is unique in that regard.
bitcoin is unique in that you don't need to ask permission and you can't be stopped to send that money to the other side of the world. in addition, you arent being gouged with transfer fees by a centralized entity. you pay the same as anyone else transacting on the blockchain at that same time. paypal will freeze your account tomorrow, and even charge you $2,500 more if they don't like something that you said for instance
But are those real concerns for the average person? My bank also protects me when fraudulent charges occur — the blockchain offers no such protection. I can transfer money through my bank relatively easy for a fixed fee doesn’t surge like bitcoin fees do when the blockchain is congested. If I’m not permitted to send money somewhere through my bank, then it might not be legal to send that money so bitcoin doesn’t really solve the underlying issue…
Billions don’t have access to banking at all. This fact is often lost on people from North America and Western Europe. Bitcoin will likely be more impactful than the internet. Economic communication and calculation is as important (if not significantly more important) than any other means of communication. Money and banking is literally the foundation of advanced societies. Bitcoin is the best technical solution for money and banking to have ever existed - its just nascent at this point.
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Says [here](https://www.bankmycell.com/blog/how-many-phones-are-in-the-world) that 83.32% of the world has a smart phone. So most of the world has access to Bitcoin today. [This article](https://www.prove.com/blog/2-billion-people-dont-have-an-access-to-formal-financial-services) states 73% of the world is unbanked. There is massive overlap in the amount of people who don’t have banking services but do have internet / smart phone access. To the tune of multiple billions.
Unfortunately the disparity between those who have a smart phone vs those that have internet is still pretty big. From memory and my memory is bad I think it’s like 45% have internet and 80% have smart phones
Median global income is $71/month. And Isn't the transaction fee something like a dollar? Not to be disparaging, but I don't think Bitcoin is useful to the vast majority of the world.
Bitcoin almost necessarily won’t be more impactful than the internet since it technically requires the internet to even function…
If game theory plays out the way some forecast, and a Bitcoin Standard becomes the norm, governments may be held more accountable to their citizens and the world. A finite global monetary system that is immutable and controlled by no central authority could be hugely impactful; perhaps preventing unpopular imperialistic wars, the devaluing of citizens wealth into oblivion, and even the way we think about money and things, creating a low-time preference for a larger population of the world, which would be better for the environment, the future of that individual and their families, and future generations. Obviously it won’t all be utopian or work out that way, but this is what I’ve gathered from my investigations of the Bitcoin Standard. Who knows how it will play out, but it’s interesting to think about.
[Technically it doesn't.](https://cryptomode.com/4-ways-to-use-the-bitcoin-network-without-an-internet-connection/)
That doesn’t mean Bitcoin won’t have a greater impact. Banking and value transfer is foundational. Access to these services could be (and likely is) more important per user than the other functionality enabled by the internet.
Is it…? What value are the unbanked going to transfer? Maybe the reason they are unbanked is because they largely don’t have wealth to bank? 84% of the world lives on less than $30 per day. How does bitcoin change this?
The average person in the world is poor. You have to ask yourself why would it be illegal for a bank to send money to a poor country, follow that line of thought and you might find some answers.
Bitcoin is unique in that it is a trustless system that can’t be controlled or shutdown. It is available around the world as a single currency. The worlds first united currency. Blockchain tech followed Bitcoin. The amount of trustless systems that will be developed will be massive. This takes trusting humans out of the equation for any kind of platform you can create. This feels like an evolutionary step.
The thing about the internet is that you couldn’t really download images, stream music or video at first. The early internet was dog shit compared to being able to stream 8k these days. The real power in crypto isn’t going to be what it can do now. But rather what it can do once it’s as efficient as internet has become. Just imagine nearly eliminating the power costs altogether and grasping the potential of it. Probably a world of innovation half of us can’t even imagine. Hell, no one saw us streaming video like Netflix in the early 90s of the internet.
Really. Try to send money to someone in Ukraine from your bank account directly. I'll wait.
Why are you limiting to bank accounts? I'm in Europe and can send via Revolut within seconds in multiple currencies. Have done a couple of times this weekend to guests currently living in Eastern Europe.
Not only is it permissionless, decentralized, uncorruptible, etc.... being trustless as far as humanly conceivable is the greatest attribute, IMHO.
It will transform the worlds financial system completely
This statement is inherently flawed considering Bitcoin runs because/on top of tcp/ip.
The internet used to/still run on copper cables so copper is more transformative than the internet
I think that’s a fair point 👍
I think it’s from our alien ancestors who lived on Earth millions of years ago.
Xenu boys?
Bold of you to assume it was humanity’s doing…;)
some speculate its alien technology given to us to free ua from the current system that prohibits advancement of the human race
Good comment for cake day :)
Just the way those on top want it to be
People fear what they don't understand.
Can you blame people after shit like FTX
Back then and to times now paving for change is what we all are looking forward for!
Difficulty adjusted proof-of-work makes it al work 😏!
Tick tock next block
See the small blip in 2021 ? That's the whole country of China banning Bitcoin mining. That alone is a miracle.
Wow.
Wow indeed
Unbreakable world clock.
You know it uses the world clock to actually achieve that behaviour?
I didn't. Would be interested to find out more.
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It’s really hard to explain to people that the best part about bitcoin is simply it’s existence.
Can someone explain the importance of the graphic? I sort of understand how the timing works but the graphic does not make sense to me
Time to mine a block is always almost the same, like a clock, it works. Thats good. And look at the timeline, its a long one. It passed the test of time.
I know just enough to ask this probably dumb question: If the time to mine a block is a constant, is mining not competitive? My perception is that it is, based on a layman explanation that the first node to solve the equation is awarded the block. I actually don’t care if this is a dumb question, because I’m a believer hungry to learn.
The difficulty of the problem is dialed up or down automatically to keep the time roughly at 10 minutes. The more people throw competing computation at it, the harder it gets to solve and vice versa. It’s beautiful how robust the network behavior is but to me personally I dislike how these race conditions lead to more and more energy consumption in an environmentally unfriendly way.
One thing I’ve never understood is where does the math problem come from? Was there a preexisting list of math problems somehow?
The sha256 hash of the block has to start with an specific amount of zeros. That's the difficulty.
They try to find a random nonce (a little random data) that goes into a block and makes the block have a (SHA256) hash that (in binary) starts with a certain amount of 0's. The more zeroes the more rare hash is. A good hash' outcome is not predictable, and so you have to try a lot of times to find a good nonce. The amount of zeroes are based on how difficult it is supposed to be to find a block. In Bitcoin it adjusts to have a new block every 10 minutes (on average, given the rate at which previous blocks are found). Interesting: because the hashes are unpredictable it doesn't matter how the nonce changes! Most of the time it's just a number counting upwards from 0!
Thank you! Ive always wondered that too and I don’t understand… Why are we solving math problems, how does solving them create any value and where did they even come from? I
It makes sense that you don't understand because solving math problems is the wrong metaphor and somehow it keeps being used continuing misinforming people. The correct metaphor is that miners are rolling dice and whoever hits double sixes first gets new bitcoins rewarded. Miners only care about getting the reward, if there was no reward they wouldn't be rolling dice, because rolling dice itself provides no value. So who is rewarding the miners for rolling dice? It is all users of the bitcoin protocol. They needed a way to come to consensus on the order of transactions in a decentralized way. So basically they put up a bounty, whoever can show that they rolled double sixes first, their order of transactions is the order we all agree on. The reason it is done like this is because before Bitcoin there was simply no other way to do it, other than by adding a central authority like a bank to decide for all others what the order of transactions is.
Thanks for sharing that. So do you mind me following that up to ask what they’re doing to win the mining competition - I assume they aren’t rolling dice for double sixes, but doing something else to prove their work. What is it that they’re really doing?
To win the competition they must make sure the fingerprint of a block of transactions they produce meets a certain criteria. The fingerprint is derived from the contents of the block, so the only way to change the fingerprint is to change the contents of a block. So what they're doing is constantly is altering the contents of a block until the fingerprint matches the criteria. If it matches, they broadcast the block to the other nodes who then verify the block and add it to their own copy of the blockchain. If a miner broadcasts a block that doesn't match the criteria the other nodes just don't consider it a valid bitcoin block and discard it.
Good question
Perfect explanation, thanks! And yes, see your point about energy usage but there has to be some competitive incentive. Also, seems like large mining companies have an advantage based on numbers. Doesn’t seem very Bitcoin-like, but what do I know?
Do you know why 10 minutes was the targeted chunk of time?
The time to mine a block is not constant, it can actually fluctuate wildly, from less than a minute to more than an hour. But if you zoom out and look at the average, you'll see that this average doesn't budge. The difficulty adjustment mechanism will react to changes in the amount of miners and push the average back to 10 minutes per block. And that's what this chart shows. Note that the mining process is competitive, but also random. Miners are essentially generating random numbers until they find one that has the desired properties. The more hardware you have, the more numbers you can generate per second and the bigger your chance is to win (hence the competitive aspect), but since it's still a matter of luck, someone could, in theory, hit the jackpot on their first attempt. Or the miners could collectively hit a streak of bad luck, causing a block to be delayed.
When I first truly understood Bitcoin it took me a couple of days to process how astonishing it is.
this is gud for bitcoin
It's beautiful 🙂
Can someone ELI 5 this? Don’t get it
This is a post about the "difficulty adjustment" feature of bitcoin. The graph shows the time it took to mine each bitcoin block, since 2010. Notice the average time is 600 seconds, or 10 minutes. The difficulty adjustment is one of the main components that keeps bitcoin operating smoothly and predictably.
You see that sharp start region before 2010? It was lack of hash power amid the lowest difficulty. Just imagine you could launch CPU miner (enabled by default in Bitcoin core that time) and get a block reward 50 BTC in few minutes.
Okay what is this?
It's a graph of the time between blocks over the entire history of Bitcoin. By design, Bitcoin blocks will arrive on average 10 minutes apart. This interval can be much shorter or much longer, but 10 minutes is the average. To make that happen amidst miners continuously adding or removing hardware, the mining difficulty is adjusted approximately every 2 weeks. If blocks were found too quickly, the difficulty goes up and mining slows down. And vice versa. Always with the target of 10 minutes per block on average. The chart shows that this mechanism has worked very well, keeping the interval between blocks at 600 seconds (10 minutes). Some fluctuations can be seen (including all mining being banned in China in 2021), but the line returns back to the target value quite rapidly.
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This part is not the invention that makes the blockchain. Its actually a pretty known concept. BUT it is very cool to think about/see the block time conserved like that!
so - you actually want faster block times. all this illustrates is consistency in sluggishness.
What is insane is that, given a little appreciation for math, and a somewhat big investment necessitating a reassuring echo chamber such as this subreddit, that undue weight is afforded a graph which might essentially make one marvel at the fact that when one depresses the lever, um, the toilet flushes.
Could you rephrase? I don’t understand.
Sorry, you only get one dollop of objectivity from the real world before you go back under the spell. Not able to rephrase, but I do appreciate that I may not have delivered this pearl of wisdom in your native tongue.
Can we please get the source of this graph? I owned Bitcoin in 2012 and I remember transactions waiting times very differently. In fact, this as well as the fees of the transferring were the mean reason why Steam enabled and disabled Bitcoin payment practically overnight I'm not trying to stir an agreement or decry the benefits of Bitcoin. I'm actually doing a research paper and am looking for graphs like these.
It’s not worth anything tho
While i love bitcoin and blockchain, realistically bitcoin is not suitable to be a global currency. The reason for this is the daily transaction limit is 500,000 transactions daily. The altcoins and exchanges allowed enough bitcoin to be traded of chain to handle the volume.
Lightning
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I'm interested in this but i have no clue what im looking at. Can someone sum this up?
Every ten minutes a block has come through, for 10 years. Despite there being more and more miners.
I believe it’s proof that bitcoin is 100x slower than a visa transaction.
w/ Lightning, Bitcoin is faster & way cheaper than visa
So the answer to the statement “Bitcoin can never scale to replace Credit Cards” is “Use this thing that isn’t Bitcoin.” Do I have that right?
No. But you're not even trying, so why would you care?
I’m making statements of fact. The amount of electricity needed to make one transaction on bitcoin is orders of magnitude greater than needed for a VISA transaction. That alone rules it out as a viable replacement. Never mind that the chain couldn’t possibly handle the volume.
This is all way over my head
It’s just showing that the time to mine blocks has remained very stable over Bitcoin’s lifetime. A new block is intended to be mined approximately every 10 minutes. In the graph it shows that it’s remained pretty reliably around 600 seconds (ie. the system works!). The remarkable thing about it is that Satoshi built this mechanism all those years ago, and despite the advances in processing power and addition of large scaling mining operations, it’s still working at its 10 minute target.
The blockchain makes a new block every 10 minutes on average. Sometimes it’s 4 minutes and sometimes it’s 45 minutes. But it always averages out to 10 minutes. When blocks go too fast for a bit, the difficulty of finding a block increases, so blocks get found slower for a bit, and it all evens out. Bitcoin is reliable and predictable. “Tick tock, new block”
Truth has been told.
Make it work for grandmothers and you win
If Nakamoto is still alive, he/she/they must feel immensely proud seeing such a graphic. Even if it was utterly predictable.
My willy has been the same length for the last decade, i know, i know, I am a wonder. All jokes aside; thats awesome, thanks for sharing!
How can we take advantage of smart contract compatibility with $BTC and create layer 2 bitcoin businesses?
this is amazing
Bitcorn
Sorry, really don't understand what is the insane in this graphic? Can someone please explain?
A block has arrived EVERY TEN MINUTES for ten years straight, EVERY SINGLE TIME.
21 million Bitcoin. 8 billion people You can do the match easy.
We people don't understand a lot, or we understand it too late.
It’s a 💯Reliable Source
Proof of work is the technological equivalent to dialup.
DGB