[Pandher]

Crypto Currency is being speculated as the next big thing in the connected world. Crypto or digital currency is basically a form of digital coins having a public and private key. The public key is available to everyone and the private key is in possession of the individual holding the coins. It is a public ledger system. All you have to do is download a wallet which will hold your crypto money and that wallet can be used to send and receive payments.


Crypto currency can be earned, bought or mined.

The term mining means finding coins by solving complex cryptographic puzzles. Mining can be done with your CPU or GPU. Graphic processors are much more fast and efficient at mining coins. Coins can only be mined till there maximum coin limit has been met.


Crypto Currency is a decentralized system which is being said to free us all from banking slavery and governmental moderation and control. As crypto addresses are completely anonymous, no one can find who holds how much money and how much money did he receive from someone . Sending money only takes seconds as opposed to slow international transactions today.

The most popular example of crypto currency can be Bitcoin


A little bit about myself - I am a crypto enthusiast and an active miner(though i have little hashing power)

Anyone interested can read more about crypto and bitcoins on wikipedia. I will also be updating this thread regularly.

[iamswift]

@pandher
bitcoin.org only talks about getting it and paying through bitcoin.
But you are talking about earning and mining. Is it different?

Mining can be done with your CPU or GPU

Does this mean we lend our computing power to solve someone else's problem and earn ecurrency for that?

Maybe you can post something like a FAQ in this thread?

[GTO]

Thread moved from the Assembly Line to Shifting Gears. Thanks for sharing!

[Pandher]

Originally Posted by iamswift

@pandher
bitcoin.org only talks about getting it and paying through bitcoin.
But you are talking about earning and mining. Is it different?


Does this mean we lend our computing power to solve someone else's problem and earn ecurrency for that?

Maybe you can post something like a FAQ in this thread?

Yes, it is different. Mining is like minting your own money

Mining can be pictured as finding coins spread out in a lawn. The GPU finds blocks and in order for a block to be claimed, a puzzle needs to be solved. If the GPU finds the solution faster than any other miner on the network, the block is claimed. That means the faster GPU you have, more the coins generated.

A block has x no of coins. x is decided by the developer of the coin.

It can be 50 coins per block or 50000. It depends on the total no of coins to be minted.

Mining is done by running a mining program through the command prompt. The GPU or CPU does all the mining work.

[alpha1]

How do you transact bitcoins?
What is the point in mining and accumulation unless you can use it for transactions?

[Guite]

Originally Posted by Pandher

A block has x no of coins. x is decided by the developer of the coin.

Who is this developer? What are the credentials required to be a developer? Can he/she release any number of coins / block at his/her whims and fancy?

[alpha1]

Oh goodness ... so I read about Bitcoin and crypto currency.
Its a great concept - a true Laissez-faire affair!

However, its utility will only be there if all sellers and buyers accept its usage.
The conversion rates for fiat currencies (govt issued currency) and bitcoin will stabilize only when a sizable portion of human beings use bitcoins for transactions rather than hoard it for speculative purpose (which most do today).

Akin to using gold pieces as a currency. Or stamps. Or any such arbitrary token (like cigs in prison). The first criteria is that general public HAS to accept it as a means of transaction.

Also there is another issue. Since this has no govt control, I believe sooner or later most govts will ban the usage. Then people will have to use this unofficially in a parallel economy (like hawala)

[bhardwhu]

It is an informative thread about the newly evolving currency. I would like to know what are the possible threats to using such currency. The recent Mt Gox exchange failure is another point that needs explanation.
What is the foundation of such currency like gold in the case of regular ones?
Who controls the distribution of these currencies?

Expert advise is sought on this please.

[one-77]

Seems like the biggest financial scam of our times is taking shape as crypto-currency.
This utopian currency is currently being made use of by drug and black money cartels to bypass international laws.
Strange some of us are keen to join the bitcoin bandwagon!

[Pandher]

Originally Posted by Guite

Who is this developer? What are the credentials required to be a developer? Can he/she release any number of coins / block at his/her whims and fancy?

As there are no laws and regulations at the time, anyone having programming skills and deep knowledge about the protocol and blockchain can come out with his own Coin.

Heck, there are services to get a coin made even if you have zero programming knowledge. Because of no one being incharge, a huge number of alternate coins have popped up in a very short time. Some non serious examples can be - Kitteh Coin, Elephant Coin, Troll Coin, Midlifecrisis Coin, a huge list actually.

Originally Posted by alpha1

Oh goodness ... so I read about Bitcoin and crypto currency.
Its a great concept - a true Laissez-faire affair!

However, its utility will only be there if all sellers and buyers accept its usage.
The conversion rates for fiat currencies (govt issued currency) and bitcoin will stabilize only when a sizable portion of human beings use bitcoins for transactions rather than hoard it for speculative purpose (which most do today).

Bitcoin is gaining significant acceptance worldwide. There are bitcoin atm's in USA, Canada, UK, Australia etc. There is also a website http://bitcoinatmmap.com/ for finding btc atm's in the world.

A lot of merchants are now accepting bitcoin. There is even an Indian shopping store similar to flipkart that accepts bitcoins.

Originally Posted by bhardwhu

It is an informative thread about the newly evolving currency. I would like to know what are the possible threats to using such currency. The recent Mt Gox exchange failure is another point that needs explanation.
What is the foundation of such currency like gold in the case of regular ones?
Who controls the distribution of these currencies?

Expert advise is sought on this please.

There are no threats as such, Mt Gox failure had something to do with the working of their systems, it had several loopholes which could be exploited. And that is exactly what happened. Mt Gox lost 750k bitcoins of traders. The only way to secure your btc investment is NOT to store at any online service. Only keep your btc in offline vaults.

Bitcoin distribution is not controlled by anyone, it is purely decentralized.

Originally Posted by one-77

Seems like the biggest financial scam of our times is taking shape as crypto-currency.
This utopian currency is currently being made use of by drug and black money cartels to bypass international laws.
Strange some of us are keen to join the bitcoin bandwagon!

I dont know what makes you think so, but it seems that you are not very clear about the Crypto Currency. I urge you to understand the concept fully.

[msdivy]

Originally Posted by Pandher

There are no threats as such, Mt Gox failure had something to do with the working of their systems, it had several loopholes which could be exploited. And that is exactly what happened. Mt Gox lost 750k bitcoins of traders. The only way to secure your btc investment is NOT to store at any online service. Only keep your btc in offline vaults.

Right. There is no reason to store the bitcoins with some exchange. It is like keeping your cash with some road-side peddler - he can run away with your cash. An exchange may be required to convert virtual currency to hard currency or vice versa. But that is only for short duration, till you complete the transaction. So store your bitcoins files in a offline storage (like USB stick) & back it up. Storing on your PC with Internet connection is not recommended since a virus or spyware can steal your currency (before you notice). If you lose the files, you will lose your money.

Yesterday, US Internal Revenue Service (IRS) laid out a formal set of policies for how it will handle Bitcoin and other virtual currencies for tax purposes.
Here is the document: http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-drop/n-14-21.pdf

Takeaway from this document is for tax purpose, IRS treats bit-coins & other virtual currency as 'property' instead of cash.

[Pandher]

Quite a lot has happened the past year, many new merchants have started accepting Bitcoin. Things are looking bright

[Tanmay K]

As of now it seems there are a few major sites/exchanges for buying-selling bitcoins (for India), Zebpay, Unocoin, Coinsecure and BTCxindia.

Zebpay and Unocoin seem the more established of the lot.

Anyone has used any of these sites before?

I've used LocalBitcoins happily in the past, but it can get costly making any trades there.

[avingodb]

The other side of this issue is that government is closely monitoring bitcoin to see if Hawala and terror financing is using this route to transfer money. So work is certainly underway to develop a white paper that will clarify on cryptocurrency.
I can tell you that government agencies are not comfortable with this concept from national security point of view. So everyone must deal with caution.

[chandras]

I've been using ZebPay for about an year. But feels that the rates are not favorable due to high commissions.
1. Is there any other bitcoin wallet/exchange that I can use?
2. Can I transfer my existing bitcoins from ZebPay to another overseas wallet (say Coinbase)? Is there a cost associated to that or the transfer is free?

Anyone who have done such transactions, please advise