All
currencies involve some measure of consensual hallucination, but
Bitcoin, a virtual monetary system, involves more than most. It is a
peer-to-peer currency with no central bank, based on digital tokens
with no intrinsic value.
Rather
than relying on confidence in a central authority, it depends instead
on a distributed system of trust, based on a transaction ledger which
is cryptographically verified and jointly maintained by the
currency’s users.
Transactions
can occur directly between the system’s participants at almost zero
cost, without the need for a trusted third party or any other
intermediary, and are irreversible once committed to a permanent and
fully public record.
Bitcoin’s
mathematically elegant design ensures that the money supply can
increase only at a fixed rate that slows over time and then stops
altogether. Anonymity, while not assured, is possible with the right
precautions and tools. No wonder Bitcoin is so appealing to geeks,
libertarians, drug dealers, speculators and gold bugs.
Source:
economist
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