What is Bitcoin?
by Ryan Shea of onename.io
the simplest way to learn how Bitcoin works(in under 5 min)
Let’s talk about Bitcoin
But rather than discuss whatBitcoin is...
Let’s independently designsomething that resembles Bitcoin
Yes,we’re going to re-invent Bitcoin
Here we go...
Let’s imagine we’re playing a board game like Monopoly
Where we have tradable assets(such as houses and hotels)
To trade effectively, we need mutually interchangeable tokens
that we all agree have some value
In other words, we need a currency
Now, with this currency, we’ll want to easily trade in any
denomination, as getting exact change can be a hassle
And we’ll also want it to beimmune to counterfeiting
So, we’ll avoid paper bills
And instead, we’ll give ourselves“balances” and record them in a
notebook
AliSam
Trevor Arianna
100 tokens100 tokens100 tokens100 tokens
We’ll refer to this list of balances as our ledger
A book or other collection of financial accounts of a particular type.
ledg·er/’lejer/noun
e
This ledger is “law”
In other words, one’s balance iswhatever the ledger says
And that’s final
But what if we have a large game with say 20 or 30 players?
Then who holds the ledger?
If only I have the ledger, I can increase my balance and cheat
So... we give everyone a notebook with a copy of the ledger
And when balances are updated, the changes are propagated
AliSam
TrevorArianna
100 tokens100 tokens100 tokens100 tokens
AliSam
TrevorArianna
100 tokens100 tokens100 tokens100 tokens
AliSam
TrevorArianna
100 tokens100 tokens100 tokens100 tokens
AliSam
TrevorArianna
100 tokens100 tokens100 tokens100 tokens
Now, let’s say Ali sells something to Sam for 7.5 tokens
On Ali’s copy of the ledger, he decreases Sam’s balance by 7.5
and increases his by 7.5
AliSam
TrevorArianna
107.5 tokens 92.5 tokens100.0 tokens100.0 tokens
Then Ali shows everyone his copy and says “make these updates”
AliSam
TrevorArianna
AliSam
TrevorArianna
107.5 tokens 92.5 tokens100.0 tokens100.0 tokens
107.5 tokens 92.5 tokens100.0 tokens100.0 tokens
AliSam
TrevorArianna
AliSam
TrevorArianna
107.5 tokens 92.5 tokens100.0 tokens100.0 tokens
107.5 tokens 92.5 tokens100.0 tokens100.0 tokens
But wait!
If Ali walks to Arianna to show her the update, how does she know that
Sam consented to the exchange?
Well, Ali simply has Sam sign herpaper to express approval of her
balance going down
But there’s another issue
Relaying changes to 20-30 peopleevery time an exchange occurs can be
time-consuming and impractical
Further, what if we want to have even more players in the game?
And what if some of them are halfway around the world?
How do we synchronize all of these paper ledgers?
Well, we could just move from paper records to digital records
We’ll have some fancy software that does the ledger syncing for us
And fancy math to ensure that ourdigital signatures can’t be forged, & thus nobody can spend our money
And... we’ll have balances listed next to account numbers instead of names
(our ledger needs unique lookup values, and names are not guaranteed to be unique)
With these modifications, our game will allow millions and even billions
of people to transact and trade
Come to think of it, we could probably even use this system as a real world global currency and
payment mechanism
Notice that with this system,nobody owns it or controls it
Just as with in-person cashtransactions, only the sender and
recipient are involved -there are no middle men
And because there are no middle men, no fees are required
So for the 1st time, you and I can trade directly online and from
anywhere in the world
We just record atransaction amongst ourselves and broadcast it to the world,
proving that it actually occurred
Our currency and payment system is powerful but simple, and we
designed it together
And we’ll call it Bitcoin
Thank you
Ryan Sheaonename.io
P.S. To get started with Bitcoin, you can create a Bitcoinprofile at onename.io
P.P.S. Remember that fancy sync-ing software we glossed over?
That’s actually a big part of what makes Bitcoin so innovative, and it’s made possible by a process
called Bitcoin mining
Coming soon:“What is Bitcoin mining?”