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What is Crypto and how do you get it
Cryptocurrencies are the digital alternative to real money.
It can be used to buy goods or services or, alternatively, act as a form of investment.
Unlike real-life currency, cryptocurrency isn’t issued by a government and isn’t subjected to the same kinds of regulatory requirements.
Any group or individual can create a cryptocurrency and, likewise, anyone can mine, or purchase some.
Instead of a bank account, crypto revolves around ‘wallets’ – the name for software or hardware that can be used to buy, sell, trade or invest in these online currencies just like traditional money Of course, it’s a double-edged sword. On one hand, crypto democratises currency completely, but it can also be exploited for scams and criminal activity.
The most high-profile cryptocurrency is Bitcoin, which was created anonymously in 2009, but there are thousands of others with new coins being created all the time. These coins are divisible, so small amounts of them can be bought and traded at any time.
The price of Bitcoin and other coins is volatile – its price can change rapidly – while there have also been high profile attacks on centralised exchanges (sites where people buy and sell cryptocurrency). Cryptocurrency works without a bank or central authority (barring, sometimes, the creator of the coin) controlling it. Therefore, it is usually exchanged from person-to-person when sold or exchanged.
There is rarely anyone working in-between to overlook the transaction, which is instead recorded on a publicly-accessible database called the blockchain. It is also completely anonymous as wallets don’t have to be linked to names, addresses, or other personally-identifying information. One user can hold multiple wallets. In order to protect the system and reinforce their value, some cryptocurrencies are engineered to be finite.
For example, only 21 million Bitcoins can ever be created and in circulation around the globe. If a traditional country requires more money, it can just print it – but that devalues the currency and leads to inflation.
This won’t happen with Bitcoin. To create more, they must be ‘mined’, which involves using computer software to follow complicated mathematical formulas to produce them. As of January 2022, roughly 18.9 million Bitcoins have been mined, leaving 2.1 million Bitcoins still to be created.
The computational power needed to create and facilitate cryptocurrencies is extremely energy intensive and carries a significant environmental cost.
Some countries, most notably El Salvador have embraced Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies. Others, like China and Russia, are attempting to control or ban its usage.
What is Bitcoin mining and how does it work?
How are bitcoin created? This is where mining comes into the equation – literally. Only 21 million bitcoins can ever be created in order to protect the value of the bitcoin system.
Bitcoins can be ‘mined’, which is the process of actually creating bitcoins, or they can be bought using regular currency.
Bitcoins can be mined using computer software and a mathematical formula designed by the Bitcoin founder Satoshi Nakamoto, who is anonymous.
Essentially you take your computer and download a program that uses your computer’s horse power to solve certain data processes, then based on how much data you process you, in turn, get paid for doing that work in Bitcoins.
The cryptocurrency, like bitcoin, can then be used to carry out transactions, which gives them monetary value.
Once a miner has mined bitcoin they can then sell the bitcoin for cash. They do this by getting a bitcoin wallet, and if you want to buy bitcoin you need to get a bitcoin wallet and then you can transfer bitcoins from wallet to wallet for cash.
Bitcoins are created digitally by a community of people that anyone can join.
Each machine that mines bitcoins makes up part of the network and each machine works together. Bitcoins are created when ‘miners’ solve the particular equation and they are then rewarded with bitcoins.
The speed at which miners solve data processes is quicker now, due to better processing hardware in computers. You can actually get computer processors with chips that are specifically designed for bitcoin mining.
As more miners join the network, it becomes more difficult for an individual to solve the equations and so ‘pools’ of miners pop-up where the workload is shared and the bitcoins are distributed according to who did what.
The cost of mining bitcoins can be super high due to the amount of electricity it takes to mine the bitcoins on your computer.
In this way miners will have to weigh up the costs of electricity against the value of bitcoin in monetary value.
If you want to know or learn more go ask google and read because now its time to have a look at the software by clicking on the Cryptomining-software link at the bottom of this page.