bitcoin (btc) is a form of digital money. exists on its own network that facilitates secure online transactions directly between accounts without the need for an intermediary, such as a bank or credit card company, to mediate and validate the transactions. This means that two people can send BTC to each other from anywhere in the world, at any time of the day, without having to consult a bank or money transfer service. This revolutionary digital asset was launched in 2009 by a person or group of people under a pseudonym named Satoshi Nakamoto. The launch of bitcoin kick-started the global cryptocurrency and blockchain phenomenon, and it remains the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization today.
Bitcoin is a native internet currency that has a variety of characteristics that set it apart from non-digital money. Crucially, bitcoin is decentralized by design, meaning it’s not owned or controlled by anyone: it’s open, public, and functionally uncensorable. related, anyone can use bitcoin and contribute to the collaborative development of its software. More than 10,000 machines around the world (called nodes) run the bitcoin software that provides the network with its essential functions. operating across such a broad base makes bitcoin geographically decentralized, a quality that in turn makes bitcoin extremely difficult to shut down if any government or organization wants to try.
Reading: Bitcoin definition for dummies
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unlike the us dollar and other fiat currencies, bitcoin is not backed by a government. There is no entity or organization that guarantees its value beyond the public consensus on its value, which is indicated at any given time by the market price of BTC. Some people believe that bitcoin is valuable specifically because it is not controlled by the government. others are attracted by bitcoin’s fixed supply and highly transparent and automated monetary policy mechanisms. government-issued currency can be created indefinitely, often prompted by political concerns. this often causes problems like inflation and decreased purchasing power. on the contrary, there will never be more than 21 million bitcoins, and its inflation schedule has been hard-coded into the network since its launch.
Furthermore, the bitcoin network is auditable and immutable. every transaction is available to view, and once a transaction has been executed, it is functionally impossible to undo. That’s because every confirmed BTC transaction is added to a shared public ledger called a blockchain that is maintained by miners. In cryptocurrency parlance, miners are people who use powerful computers to help ensure that transactions are valid and to order them chronologically. valid transactions are grouped into blocks that adhere to strict rules based on cryptography. these blocks are linked in a chain, hence the term “blockchain”, and cannot be changed once added. The benefit of the blockchain is that we have a shared, unowned, public record of every bitcoin transaction that has ever been executed. that means you can always check that bitcoin is working as it should and you don’t have to trust any other party to a transaction to make sure it went through.
Finally, unlike other forms of electronic payment, bitcoin offers its users pseudo-anonymity. Instead of a username or an email address or a managed account, bitcoin users have wallets that generate addresses. these are long strings of numbers and letters that function as your identity on the bitcoin network. For privacy purposes, bitcoin wallets allow you to generate new addresses each time you want to transact, so you don’t necessarily need to maintain the same network identity over time. however, the blockchain’s public ledger of transactions limits the degree of privacy bitcoin provides, even if ownership of the address is anonymous.
People use bitcoin for a variety of reasons. For some, bitcoin is a store of value similar to digital gold, because its fixed supply makes it scarce. For others, bitcoin is an easy and inexpensive way to transfer value due to its digital nature and often inexpensive transaction fees. still, some people use bitcoin because they are intrigued by its potential and enjoy experimenting with new technology. learning and investing in bitcoin provides an excellent gateway to the exciting world of cryptocurrencies, blockchain, decentralized technology, and web3.
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