A closer look at Bitcoin
What is it and why does it matter?
Bitcoin is the first decentralized and censorship-resistant, verifiable, scarce digital money.
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In Summary
A quick summary of the topics discussed in this lecture.
Bitcoin is the first decentralized and censorship-resistant, verifiable, scarce digital money. It introduced the concept of digital private property on the Internet.
Bitcoin’s protocol limits it to 21 million coins. It’s scarcity and fundamental transactional properties combine with its network effect to give it value.
Bitcoin combines the scarcity of gold with the portability and fungibility of fiat currencies. This makes it ideal for the digital age.
Bitcoin uses a proof-of-work consensus mechanism. Mining is the process by which new blocks are created new transactions are added to the blockchain.
Bitcoin mining requires computational work, which consumes electricity, contributing about 0.1% to the world’s greenhouse gas emissions.
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