That someone is the miner and they are rewarded for mining the block. But what does "mining" actually describe. Let's use a simpler math problem. You take the bits in the transactions for the block and you turn them into 50 digit numbers. A block is only "good" and part of the block chain when the sum of all the 50 digit numbers ends with 50 zeros.

Sep 21, 2013 · The bitcoin network records transactions in a "block chain". Each block contains a list of transactions that have occured since the last block. The chain has a new block added roughly every 10 minutes. Miners have mining machines that try to make blocks, by taking all the new transactions and attempting to build a block with them.

Nov 28, 2023 · Basically, when you buy mining hardware you are buying an "option" to buy some amount bitcoin for whatever you pay for electricity, but the amount you can buy moves down as hashrate moves up. Likewise, the value of your hardware decays as hashrate moves up or as newer models are released.

Mining increases the bitcoin network's security and fights fraud by calculating what's effectively a checksum for transactions. By contributing their computing power to the bitcoin network for mining, individuals are rewarded with newly minted bitcoins by the community. This also provides a way to distribute new bitcoins in a fair manner. The ...

Nov 26, 2021 · Bitcoin mining is a guessing competition. Hashing is a randomness algorithm Using a target range, the average number of guesses required is equal to half of the size of the number domain (for SHA256, this is 2 256 ) divided by the size of the target range

Aug 1, 2015 · If the bitcoin game stops, that is to say everyone on the planet decided that mining is not something they want to do anymore, then bitcoin will end. As long as their are some people playing the game, the currency will continue. All it takes to be a player in the mining game is to install the bitcoin mining software on a computer you own.

Sep 4, 2018 · Bitcoin is the currency of the Internet: a distributed, worldwide, decentralized digital money. Unlike traditional currencies such as dollars, bitcoins are issued and managed without any central authority whatsoever: there is no government, company, or bank in charge of Bitcoin. As such, it is more resistant to wild inflation and corrupt banks.

Jan 19, 2023 · Bitcoin is basically just math. To "mine" bitcoin, you solve very hard mathematical problems--problems that can basically only be done by repeatedly guessing and checking to see if the answer is right. This means that the difficulty of these problems can be adjusted (which happens automatically, i

Nov 20, 2020 · GPU mining is not a thing in bitcoin anymore, you need special hardware for that called ASICs (short for Application Specific Integrated Circuit). They are expensive, loud as hell, hot and hungry for electricity, so you need to keep all that in mind before buying one.

Feb 4, 2024 · This is considered important enough that mining a block has a reward. Essentially, Bitcoin is created out of thin air. The miner can now just send a transaction saying "I want to transfer the 2 Bitcoin I got as a reward for mining block 123543532 to Alice". So why is it worth money? Because we human collectively decided that this is worth money.