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Post by swamprat on Dec 6, 2017 13:02:19 GMT -6
I read it; I still have no idea what it is, how it works, or where it's taking us.....Bitcoin’s energy needs are out of controlGiven its rapidly growing climate footprint, bitcoin is a malignant development, says meteorologist Eric Holthaus. Today, each bitcoin transaction requires the same amount of energy used to power nine US homes for one day. AT ITS CURRENT GROWTH RATE, BY FEBRUARY 2020 BITCOIN MINING WILL USE AS MUCH ELECTRICITY AS THE ENTIRE WORLD DOES TODAY. grist.org/article/bitcoin-could-cost-us-our-clean-energy-future/How much energy does bitcoin mining really use? It's complicatedBitcoin hype has reached an all-time high. But if running the bitcoin network uses up as much yearly electricity as a medium-sized country, is it worth it? By Nicole Kobie, WIRED 2 December 2017
Bitcoin chews through masses of energy, but exactly how much is up for debate. Regardless of the actual number, it's climbing — so is the environmental cost of the digital currency becoming too high? In short, it’s complicated. So let’s look at the numbers…
This being bitcoin, the numbers are confusing and largely made up. Power consumption is one of the major costs of bitcoin mining, as dedicated machines crunch the algorithms that build a record of every single bitcoin transaction and are rewarded with tiny fractions of a bitcoin for their efforts. As mining gets more difficult, it requires increasingly powerful hardware to be competitive. As the value of the digital currency goes up — and it's skyrocketed this year — miners are more likely to invest in ever more sophisticated hardware. Back in 2009, you could mine competitively with your desktop computer, but now you'll need specialist hardware, such as the Antminer S9 – a dedicated mining rig that weighs six kilos and costs well over £1000 before you even start thinking about the electricity bill
That evolution, as well as the global spread of miners, makes it difficult to assess exactly how much energy is spent on the digital checks that underpin bitcoin, but there are plenty of people trying to get a handle on just how much power it's chewing through.
Why does energy consumption matter? Regardless of whether bitcoin is a bubble or not, we're investing heavily in infrastructure and burning through huge amounts of energy. If this is going to be a viable alternative financial system, it needs to be financially and environmentally sustainable. And if it never has a chance of being truly useful, and is just a get rich quick scheme, are we destroying the climate for something totally trivial?
Of course, if you own bitcoin, which has leapt in value from $1,000 earlier this year to above $10,000, even a fraction of a bitcoin is no longer a trivial amount of money. No matter how lucrative, is a currency experiment worth churning through oodles of energy for?
What are the estimates? It's nigh on impossible to know exactly how much energy is being used, but cryptocurrency tracking site Digiconomist is the source of one oft-cited estimate. According to its Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index, the network of computers that verify bitcoin transactions draw 3.4 Gigawatts (GW) — a single watt is a joule per second, and your laptop probably probably uses about 60W. That 3.4GW adds up to 30.1 terrawatt hours (TWh) per year of energy — that doesn't mean that much energy is used per hour, every hour, but is instead a measurement that equates to the amount of work those 30 terrawatts would do over an hour. In this case, that 30.1TWh is equivalent to the energy used by the entire nation of Morocco annually. Some dispute this figure. Fervently. Oscar Lafarga, co-founder from cryptocurrency consultant and developer SetOcean, reckons the real answer is likely half as much. In Bitcoin Magazine, Marc Bevand suggests it's likely lower still at between 470MW and 540MW.
There are other figures, if those don't appeal. In 2014 a pair of Irish researchers published one of the first papers on this topic. Karl O'Dwyer and David Malone estimated the total power use of bitcoin would be somewhere between 100MW and 10GW, but decided it was somewhere in the middle, choosing 3GW – comparable to their home country's consumption. Malone now pegs it at around 0.5GW, but also agrees with Digiconomist's overall estimate, because it's also within the realm of possibility. Others have picked different figures: in 2015, researcher Hass McCook pinned it at 120MW, while in 2016, a paper in the International Symposium on Computer Architecture said the power used by ASIC clouds, purpose-built datacentres of specialised mining equipment, alone was between 300MW and 500MW.
That's a lot of numbers (sorry, but it gets worse). There are plenty of other estimates, but the key point is they're all very different. The real range is probably somewhere between 100MW to 3.4GW. That's like guessing someone's age as between 15 and 65, while admitting there's a margin of error of ten years.
That wide gap is partially down to timing and methodology, but a fair chunk of the difference is quite likely individual bias.
Let's start with timing. When you make your guess skews the figures, because the bitcoin network changes so quickly — there's always more activity and more processing power, but it's somewhat balanced by more efficient hardware. Harald Vranken, associate professor at Netherlands' Open University, studied the energy draw of bitcoin earlier this year, positing that it was in the 100MW to 500MW range, versus Digiconomist's 3.4GW. "At first glance, it appears that these are quite different figures, however this is not the case," Vranken says, because when it comes to bitcoin, numbers that are an order of magnitude apart are actually kind of the same.
As he explained to WIRED, his numbers are for January of this year and since then the network hash rate — a measure of the bitcoin network's processing power, looking at how quickly it solves the equations that run the network — has leapt by a factor of 4.2. The revenue from mining in January was $716 million, while now it's $8 billion — a factor of 11.4. Feed those factors into Vranken’s equation and bitcoin’s energy draw is between 5GW and 7GW. That's more than Digiconomist's figure, but that methodology has other inputs. "Digiconomist furthermore considers that miners nowadays spend 60 per cent of their revenues on operational costs, which would mean that my figures now would be 3GW to 4.3 GW," he says, adding that means the Digiconomist figure "is in line with my figures."
So while those two figures look different, they're roughly the same. What a difference a year makes.
How to calculate power use Another factor influencing these figures is methodology. There are a few pieces of information we know: how hard it is to solve the proof of work, how much energy various hardware uses, how much revenue miners stand to make, and how much energy is used by the entire world as a useful top-line figure. Using those pieces of the puzzle, we can attempt to fill in the rest.
For example, Vranken notes in his paper that in January power consumption could vary from 45MW when using ASIC hardware versus 450TW when using standard CPUs — but we know the latter isn't likely. "Since the worldwide annual electricity consumption is about 2.3TW, it is clear that 450TW is completely unrealistic," he notes. Bitcoin is popular, but it hasn't actually taken over the world, yet.
That first Irish paper used a similar methodology that examined the types of hardware used, explains David Malone, one of the authors from Maynooth University. "In our paper, we estimated a range, with the top end based on everyone using either old inefficient hardware and the bottom end based on everyone using new efficient hardware," Malone explains. "This gave us a range with Ireland's energy consumption somewhere in the middle. You can also try to get estimates by balancing the cost of electricity for mining against the value of mining, but the idea is very similar."
See next post for page 2
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Post by swamprat on Dec 6, 2017 13:05:10 GMT -6
Page 2
Malone has actually reduced his estimate, saying that while it's hard to know exactly what hardware is being used, it's likely all professional grade at this point, which is much more efficient. "The difficulty [of mining] has also increased, but I reckon a significant portion of the increase in difficulty may have been counterbalanced by the increase in efficiency."
Digiconomist, meanwhile, works on the premise that miners spend a certain amount on operational costs, improving their hardware when prices go up, shifting from standard desktop PCs to GPUs then to specially designed ASIC machines. And that evolution in hardware can have a huge impact on the amount of power used.
"The index is based on the idea that more hashpower will be added as long as it's profitable to produce more," says Digiconomist founder Alex de Vries. "The costs are mainly electricity and capital equipment costs. It can be calculated that the lifetime electricity costs are then about 60 per cent of the total, based on past performance. This doesn’t mean costs are always 60 per cent, since that wouldn’t factor in production limits. It takes a few months for machines to be produced and installed. Costs are estimated at less than 20 per cent now by the index."
Tweak, correct or otherwise fiddle with any of the factors in the various equations, and the result changes — that's just how maths works, apparently, but it means it's no wonder we have such a wide estimate.
What's the cost of cash? Bitcoin may well have merit above and beyond making miners rich, but compared to traditional payment systems — gold, cash, credit cards — is it an energy hog? The consumption range leaves bitcoin either much more expensive in terms of energy than existing transactional systems or much cheaper. Once again, it's how you pick your data.
To put these figures in some context, Digiconomist suggests Visa's payment systems uses the energy equivalent of 50,000 US households to run 350 million transactions, while bitcoin uses the energy equivalent of 2.8 million US households to run 350,000 transactions on a good day — in short, Visa does more with less. As the site’s rationale explains, bitcoin is increasingly becoming a tool for the rich but we’re all paying the price for a system that uses 20,000 times (give or take) more energy than traditional systems per transaction.
But in his paper, Vranken counters that in the 100MW to 500MW range, bitcoin mining requires between 0.8KWh to 4.4KWh per year, but the energy required for mining and recycling gold – which backs US currency – is 138KWh a year, while printing paper notes and minting coins is 11KWh. He pins the banking system, including not only its data centres but also its branches and ATMs, at 650KWh. In other words, there's more to our traditional financial system than one brand of payment card. That said, he notes bitcoin is a much, much smaller system than cash and traditional banking, but as bitcoin scales up, so does the energy required for mining.
Using a Visa card may well be less of an energy suck than bitcoin, but in a way that point is moot — we still have both, and will for the foreseeable future, no matter how successful bitcoin is going mainstream. You're likely using them in tandem, such as selling off bitcoin to earn the dollars to pay off your Visa bill.
Is bitcoin worth it? Whether researchers choose the high end or low end of the energy consumption range largely seems to depend on what they think of the currency itself. Digiconomist founder de Vries has a long list of criticisms regarding sustainability, so his number trends a bit higher. His critics are bitcoin fans, so they push the consumption guess down to suggest it's not a wasteful activity – Bevand notes that at his figures, mining eats up around 4TWh annually, less than the energy used by Christmas lights in the US by a third.
Regardless of how much energy bitcoin chews through now, those figures are helpful as a baseline, as its consumption is going to increase. Bitcoin's proof of works gets harder to solve as time goes on and returns fewer coins – go back to Vranken's maths at the beginning, and that's the increase in power consumption over less than a year, despite massively more efficient hardware. The system works by rewarding miners for computation, so they keep on computing.
Is there another way? Aside from pushing for more efficient hardware, there are other "proof" techniques that are less demanding, though may introduce security concerns. Proof of stake is the frequently mooted solution which uses a less demanding system to prove ownership of coins and dole them out via a raffle-like scheme, Vranken says. There's also proof of space, which he explains sees the miner use a specified amount of memory to compute the proof. There's also proof-of-space-time, which adds in a temporal element, but at this point that sounds a bit like he's trolling us all.
Bitcoin-style currencies might get more efficient, but don't expect them to get any easier to understand.
www.wired.co.uk/article/how-much-energy-does-bitcoin-mining-really-use
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Post by auntym on Dec 7, 2017 19:30:56 GMT -6
money.cnn.com/2017/12/07/investing/banks-bitcoin-futures-trading-cftc/index.html?sr=twCNN120717banks-bitcoin-futures-trading-cftc0505PMStory Big banks say bitcoin futures could be dangerousby Ivana Kottasová @ivanakottasova December 7, 2017 Wall Street banks are warning about the dangers of bitcoin futures. The Futures Industry Association, which represents big banks and brokers, has warned U.S. regulators that the risks of trading bitcoin futures contracts have not been properly studied. In an open letter to the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the FIA said that the speedy certification of bitcoin futures does "not allow for proper public transparency and input." The Chicago Mercantile Exchange and the Chicago Board Options Exchange plan to start listing the contracts later this month. The Nasdaq will launch its own bitcoin futures in 2018. Analysts say that announcements from the exchanges have helped propel bitcoin prices to new heights, because the moves were seen as signs that big mainstream investors are becoming interested. Bitcoin (XBT) prices have gained over $4,000 in the past 48 hours to smash through $16,000. Related: What's driving the bitcoin frenzy? / money.cnn.com/2017/12/07/investing/bitcoin-what-is-going-on/index.html?iid=ELThe FIA, which counts Goldman Sachs (GS) and Morgan Stanley (MSPRF) among its members, is concerned that exchanges regulated by the CFTC have been allowed to "self-certify" their new bitcoin contracts. The decision will leave regulators with limited time to review futures offerings. The FIA said that a "more thorough and considered process" would have allowed exchanges and clearinghouses more time to study trading limits and other ways to protect against price swings. The group is worried that its members, which act as intermediaries between buyers and sellers, could be left holding the bag if something goes wrong. "The recent volatility in these markets has underscored the importance of setting these levels and processes appropriately and conservatively," the group said in its letter. "We remain apprehensive with the lack of transparency and regulation" of bitcoin and "whether exchanges have the proper oversight to ensure [bitcoin is] not susceptible to manipulation, fraud, and operational risk," it said. Related: Bitcoin boom may be a disaster for the environment The CFTC has itself warned investors about the dangers of bitcoin, noting that cryptocurrency exchanges are largely unregulated and outside the agency's purview. "Bitcoin ... is a commodity unlike any the commission has dealt with in the past," CFTC chairman J. Christopher Giancarlo said in a statement on December 1. "Investors should be aware of the potentially high level of volatility and risk in trading these contracts," the agency added. WATCH VIDEO: money.cnn.com/2017/12/07/investing/banks-bitcoin-futures-trading-cftc/index.html?sr=twCNN120717banks-bitcoin-futures-trading-cftc0505PMStory
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Post by auntym on Dec 7, 2017 19:42:01 GMT -6
just in case you're interested...
FYI... BITCOINS are DIGITAL CURRENCY... and as of today they are worth $16,000 dollars a piece
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Post by swamprat on Dec 7, 2017 20:10:17 GMT -6
"FYI... BITCOINS are DIGITAL CURRENCY... and as of today they are worth $16,000 dollars a piece"
OK, but explain to me how and why bitcoins consume so much power?
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Post by auntym on Dec 7, 2017 22:55:23 GMT -6
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Post by auntym on Dec 10, 2017 14:37:54 GMT -6
money.cnn.com/2017/12/10/investing/bitcoin-chicago-board-options-exchange/index.html?sr=twCNN121017bitcoin-chicago-board-options-exchange1244PMStory New step for Bitcoin's wild ride: Futures tradingby Jackie Wattles @jackiewattles December 10, 2017 For more than four decades, the Chicago Board Options Exchange has allowed investors to place their bets on commodities from corn to steel. On Sunday, the exchange will offer options to bet on something very different: bitcoins. Why is it different? With stocks and commodities, there's an underlying asset. For stocks, it's a company and the goods or services they produce. For commodities, it's the actual item, like oil, fruit or copper. With bitcoin, there's nothing like that. Unlike traditional commodities, there's not a physical asset behind it. And unlike currencies, there isn't a central bank ready to back bitcoin up. Bitcoins live on computer servers. They are produced by complex algorithms and recorded in a digital ledger. The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, which certified bitcoin futures for trading, acknowledged the unprecedented step taken by the Chicago Board Options Exchange. Bitcoin "is a commodity unlike any the commission has dealt with in the past," CFTC chairman J. Christopher Giancarlo said in a statement December 1. There's more to come. Bitcoin futures will also begin trading on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange on December 17-18, while the Nasdaq will debut the options sometime next year. Currently, bitcoins are bought and sold on unregulated virtual exchanges -- and it's been extremely volatile. The price of a single bitcoin recently soared on some exchanges from less than $10,000 to $17,000 before dropping back to near the $15,000 mark, spurring renewed warnings of a bubble. Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz told Bloomberg TV that the currency "ought to be outlawed." But some people -- particularly in the hedge fund world, where there's a healthy appetite for risk -- say bitcoin futures present an opportunity. Futures are contracts that let investors buy or sell something at a specific price in the future -- in this case, bitcoin. Trading in futures contracts makes bitcoin more accessible to fund managers who don't want to own bitcoin directly but do want to speculate on whether it will go up or down in price. Stephen Bielecki, an attorney with Kleinberg Kaplan, said his law firm received two inquiries last week, amid the wild price swings, about setting up new bitcoin-focused funds. "I think the volatility presents opportunity," he told CNNMoney. It "makes those bets via futures feel more extreme, or feel more pronounced, because you might be saying, 'We're betting on an 80% gain three weeks from now.'" And Joshua Klayman, who heads the cryptocurrency unit at law firm Morrison & Foerster, said bitcoin's debut on the futures market means investors can bet on bitcoin's performance without having to actually own any. "I think if it is a bubble, my impression is that we're just getting started here," she said. "I do think there'll be continued volatility, but I'm bullish on cryptocurrency in general." While interest in bitcoin is growing, some establishment players are warning about futures trading. Last week, the Futures Industry Association, which represents brokers and big banks like JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs, wrote an open letter to the CFTC. It warned that the certification of bitcoin futures "did not allow for proper public transparency and input." The association said that a "more thorough and considered process" would have allowed exchanges and trading clearinghouses more time to study ways to protect against extreme price swings. The group is worried that banks could be on the hook if something goes wrong. For its part, CFTC head Giancarlo said in his statement this month that futures exchanges have agreed to "significant enhancements to protect customers and maintain orderly markets" for bitcoin. He also warned investors "should take note" that the underlying bitcoin market is "relatively nascent" and remains "largely unregulated." --CNNMoney's Ivana Kottasová and Daniel Shane contributed to this report. WATCH VIDEO : money.cnn.com/2017/12/10/investing/bitcoin-chicago-board-options-exchange/index.html?sr=twCNN121017bitcoin-chicago-board-options-exchange1244PMStory
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Post by auntym on Dec 22, 2017 13:59:29 GMT -6
www.rollingstone.com/culture/features/bitcoin-and-cryptocurrency-what-you-need-to-know-w514552 Bitcoin and Cryptocurrency: What You Need to KnowOnline currencies were created to circumvent traditional money – but does the spiking cost of Bitcoins and others mean a bubble is about to burst? By Zachary Zane / www.rollingstone.com/contributor/zachary-zane12-22-2017 The value of Bitcoin has spiked in the past few weeks – but will the bubble burst? On Halloween of 2008, a pseudonymous math genius named Satoshi Nakamoto officially unveiled to the public a white paper which detailed the mechanics of a new form of currency: Bitcoin. At its core, that's all Bitcoin is, a digital currency. One that you could buy, trade, and invest in online. Even though a number of cryptographers saw its potential as early as 2009, there still needed to be a way for the general population to use cryptocurrencies. That's where the illegal online bazaar, Silk Road, comes into play. In the two years and a half years of its existence – from 2011 to 2013 – Silk Road only accepted Bitcoin. That was because Bitcoin transactions could be anonymous, secure, irreversible and you could trade it from anywhere in the world with an Internet connection. By the time Silk Road was shut down in October 2013, it had nearly 1 million registered users, according to the FBI. That means at least 1 million individuals were probably using Bitcoin on that one site alone. But even though Silk Road shut down, Bitcoin remained. By that point, enough people saw the benefit of using cryptocurrency, not just for illegal activity, but as a new investment and form of digital currency with seemingly unlimited potential. In the past year, however, interest in Bitcoin has peaked – and is being employed by some much more legitimate users. Stories of Bitcoin have graced the cover of numerous magazines, including Time, Newsweek, Forbes and Bloomberg Businessweek. In the past three weeks alone, the New York Times has published over a dozen articles about Bitcoin. On December 13th, Google released its "Year in Search" for 2017 which revealed that "What is Bitcoin?" was the second most searched "what is" question in the United States, following "What is DACA?" As the frenzy over Bitcoin reaches an all-time high, here's everything you need to know about the past, present and uncertain future of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency. How does Bitcoin differs from cash?The currency is completely digital and has multiple safeguards to prevent hacking and theft. One of the main allures of the new form of currency, however, is the fact that it doesn't rely on a third-party banking or other financial institution. Bitcoin is decentralized, and rather than be secured by people or trust, it is secured by math, specifically strong cryptography – or techniques for secure communication – hence then name cryptocurrency. Cryptocurrencies use a complex cryptographic approach to tracking and exchanging digital currency, one that builds on a digital ledger called a "blockchain." More simply, a blockchain or "digital ledger" is a way for many people to have one common record of all transactions. It would be similar to if everyone had a digitally connected notebook. Each time someone wrote in it, recording the purchase or sale of an item, the words appeared in yours and everyone else's notebook. This notebook also has safeguards to prevent people from lying about their purchases, or buying items with money they don't have. Bitcoin ATMs allow people to trade cash for bitcoins. Christopher Morris/Getty How did the 2008 financial crisis affect Bitcoin? Following the financial collapse, many individuals lost trust in the current financial system, including fiat currencies. Fiat currencies, like the US dollar, are controlled by the national government's supply and creation. Therefore, they are solely backed by faith and trust in the government. Compare to this to natural resources sometimes used as currency, like gold. Gold holds an inherent value because it is scarce. Additionally, gold doesn't have a central authority that arbitrarily regulates its creation and distribution. This means that gold is unlikely to experience hyperinflation, as the government cannot produce five metric tons of gold out of thin air, where they can simply print more money. Bitcoin, too, is finite, with only 21 million Bitcoins in existence. They are being mined (or acquired) at a steadily controlled rate. In fact, it's estimated that the final Bitcoin will be mined in the year 2140. It's because of these properties that Bitcoin has been repeatedly called "digital gold." What are other forms of cryptocurrency?Others saw the power in having a digital currency that was decentralized, requiring no trust in a third-party financial system. This led to the creation of other forms of cryptocurrency, sometimes called altcoin (i.e., alternative coins to Bitcoin). These various forms of cryptocurrencies, like Litecoin and Ether, use slightly different cryptographic algorithms and/or have other technical differences from each other. One, NEO, a Chinese-based cryptocurrency, supports up to 10,000 transactions per second, compared to Ethereum, currently the most heavily traded cryptocurrency other than Bitcoin, which only supports about 15 transactions per second. This becomes important as more consumers begin to use cryptocurrency. Having more transactions per second allow more people to use the cryptocurrency, instead of just a few. This doesn't mean that one cryptocurrency will eventually beat out the rest. Each one offers something slightly different with regards to safety, privacy and efficiency. In fact, given the relative ease of exchange between various cryptocurrencies, it's possible that multiple cryptocurrencies remain once the market settles. There's not only room competitively, but there's actually a necessity, because of scale and function of different currencies. In this regard cryptocurrency are likes cars. There are trucks, SUVs, sedans and two-doors – while every automobile gets you from point A to point B, each one provides something different with regards to speed, storage and functionality. Why has the value of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies skyrocketed in recent weeks?A combination of hype and actual potential is why Bitcoin has seen such huge rises in value in the past few weeks. In addition to the great potential for cryptocurrencies, as well as its theoretical advantages to fiat currency, hedge funds and investors have just begun to invest in cryptocurrencies, which potentially means further growth for the cryptomarket. However, this growth hasn't been linear. It took 8 years for the crypto market to reach 200 billion dollars. In the past month, the market cap has reached nearly 600 billion dollars (at the time of writing). Kumesh Aroomoogan, is the co-founder and CEO of Accern, an artificial intelligence startup that alerts users of stock and cryptocurrency trading opportunities by scanning about 1 billion websites, message boards and niche blogs. He believes that when institutions, like asset management firms and hedge funds, become more involved in cryptocurrency, the market will stabilize. "Right now, individual consumers are buying Bitcoin, as opposed to institutions," he says. "Institutions are more systematic in their approach, and don't involve their emotions in their investment strategies." Currently, the value of Bitcoin other altcoins isn't inherently linked to the value of the coins – the vast majority of folks aren't buying Litecoin right now because they believe that its differences from Bitcoin make it a superior form of cryptocurrency. They're probably buying it because it's relatively cheap, tradable on easy-to-use exchanges like Coinbase (which allows you to easily buy and trade cryptocurrency), and hoping that it will skyrocket in value like Bitcoin. Everyone is hoping to make a quick $100,000. As the price of Bitcoins skyrocketed recently, many are warning that the bubble could soon burst. Alain Pitton/NurPhoto/Sipa/AP This is why there's a high degree of speculation that the crypto will inevitably lose its value. In fact, in the past two days, Bitcoin has dropped nearly 30 percent. While this could be a sign of the bubble beginning to burst, the drop in price could be more related to various end-of-the-year factors. For example, folks perhaps wanted to sell off their cryptocurrency before the holidays because they were going out of town, and knew they wouldn't be able to check or sell at a moment's notice. Additionally, the stock market often dips the last week of the trading year, and increases again in January. That's what could be happening with Bitcoin. Lastly, it could have something to do with taxes. People are pulling out of Bitcoin now to make taxes easier for 2017, but are then planning to reinvest come January. Or then again, maybe it is the beginning of the end…Many people are currently investing large sums of money in cryptocurrencies at random. There are new cryptocurrencies that have seen 500- to 1000-percent returns overnight without any news or development announcements from the company. On coinmarketcap.com, you can view the 1,360 cryptocurrencies currently on the market, many of which do not offer any new advancements in blockchain technology or cryptocurrency. At the present time, many individuals entering the market are working irrationally and operating out of fear of missing out. Is too late to invest in cryptocurrencies and other blockchain technology companies?The short answer is no, as long as you don't think the crypto bubble will burst in the near future. However given the trends of the past 48 hours, it's necessary to invest with great caution. If you're looking to make a quick million by jumping on the cryptocurrency bandwagon right now, understand that you're playing with fire. Nevertheless, even with the dip in value of cryptocurrencies in the past two days, there are plenty of undervalued cryptocurrencies that are designed with newly-developed advancements in blockchain technology. If you do invest, it's worth spending the time to understand the technology and who is developing it – just like investing in a tech stock. www.rollingstone.com/culture/features/bitcoin-and-cryptocurrency-what-you-need-to-know-w514552
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Post by jcurio on Dec 22, 2017 15:20:30 GMT -6
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Post by auntym on Jan 18, 2018 14:32:52 GMT -6
midnightinthedesert.com/bitcoin-created-aliens-video/ Was Bitcoin created by aliens? Posted on January 17, 2018 Bitcoin comes from outer space, send to us by an alien civilization. I know, that a bold statement to make, but lets investigate that statement together and see whether it could be true or not. I’m not going to explain what bitcoin is, how it works or what it does. I think most of you already are familiar with the main cryptocurrency ruling the cryptocurrency scene today. But I will repeat the fact that we don’t know who created bitcoin. Bitcoin just happened and it took of from there. I’m not going to say it’s a good thing or a bad thing, I’m just going to explain why it could come from outer space. Back in 2009 from out of nowhere, Bitcoin took the world by storm. Back then, people were buying pizza’s for 10.000 bitcoins and now 9 years later, people buy Tesla cars with it. Nobody knows who created Bitcoin and nobody will. Bitcoin just happened and the financial world does not know how to handle it. Financial institutions seem to struggle with the question: “should we embrace it or should we destroy it’. So why do I think Bitcoin could have come from outer space? Let’s start at the beginning? There are 2 aspects of bitcoin that point towards an extraterrestrial origin: First:” It’s 100% computer code” and second: “It’s taking over the world”. I know that sounds rather blurry but’s let’s start with these 2 statements. Let’s start with the second aspect. Bitcoin is taking over the world by storm. The price of a Bitcoin is increasing every quarter. People see value in a cryptocurrency that cannot be tempered with or can be recreated. Only 21 million bitcoin can be mind, ever! That creates a scarcity and people hate to miss out on an opportunity to make money. The value of Bitcoin is determined by the blockchain technology that offers some very useful purposes for the world to benefit from. The blockchain technology will certainly have an impact in the way data is handled in the upcoming 10 years until quantum computers will take over. But beside the blockchain technology, bitcoin shows a lot of similarities to gold which has very few real economic or scientific value. Like gold, people like to invest in bitcoin to store value. That did not stop bitcoin to take the financial world by storm. It’s current market cap (including all other cryptocurrencies) is 700 billion plus dollar. Compared to combined GDP of the world in 2015, which was 74 trillion dollar, that’s only a small percentage of the world economy, but It’s large enough for major financial institutions to worry about their future. Major banks are now investigating how they could use the blockchain infrastructure to store contractual data. Currently there are a lot of company creating bitcoin derivatives to create extra value out of thin air, like cryptokitties. It seems that every other day, people find new ways to attribute value to the bitcoin phenomenon. If you look at the job market, there’s a lot of demand for people that know how the blockchain technology works. Bitcoin was the second largest search term in google in 2017. I’m not judging any of these evolutions, I’m just showing the facts that Bitcoin is taking the world by storm and 2018 could be the year Bitcoin rises to a new level of power. I know, everybody is waiting for the proof why bitcoin could be created by an extraterrestrial intelligence. Just have some patience. If we go back a step and look at the second aspect why bitcoin could be from outer space: it’s 100% computer code. That might seem to be irrelevant, but consider this, some people say that the UFO phenomenon started when the world witnessed the power of the atom in 1944. Some theorists say that that’s the first time extraterrestrial intelligences observed the activities of mankind on earth and they started to observe what we humans were capable of. My theory is that an extraterrestrial intelligence started to observe earth when they invented the computer in 1943. Think about it. The invention of the computer ushered in a complete new paradigm to the world’s economic and mental development. The discovery of the digital binary language enabled humanity to create a vast infrastructure of machinery that changed every aspect of our everyday life. Computers have made our everyday lives so much easier. It actually very easy to explain how dependent we have become of computers these days. Just imagine all computers would stop working right now. That would mean game over for most of us. These days, most of our everyday lives is run by computers, our food supply, our energy supply, our information network, our mobility, everything would stop at an instance…. It would impossible to contain our current life style without the help of computers. Currently the world has 7.6 billion humans expecting food and information being delivered at their doorsteps every day. Whiteout computers, that would stop, at an instance… That’s quite some power computers have over humanity… midnightinthedesert.com/bitcoin-created-aliens-video/
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