These are some of the basics that I will cover in my presentations on bitcoin and blockchain for a non-technical audience. I can go into depth on each slide, talk folks into creating their own bitcoin wallet and send them their first satoshis, as well as explore more potential uses of blockchains. Caterina Rindi.
2. Bitcoin
https://www.weusecoins.com/en/
• Digital currency – doesn’t exist physically
• Decentralized – not controlled or issued by
any bank, government, or company
• Peer-to-peer – completely run & supported
by individuals on computers worldwide
3. Bitcoin
• Invented in 2009 by Satoshi Nakamoto
https://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf
• Open-Source – code is viewable by anyone
https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin
• Bitcoin miners “create” new bitcoins by
“securing” transactions; can also earn
small fee by verifying transactions
- originally individuals, now pools
• 21 million bitcoins total – we’re a bit over
14m so far
4. How to use Bitcoin
• Expedia
• Dell
• Overstock
• Rakuten
• Amazon (via Purse.io)
• Bitcoin ATMs
worldwide
• Gyft cards
5. How Bitcoin is used
• Speculation (trading)
• Purchases & payments (Top: coffee/food,
electronics, phone bills, travel, poker/betting,
gaming)
• Tipping (ChangeTip)
• Donations
– BitGive Foundation - http://bitgivefoundation.org
– WikiLeaks - https://shop.wikileaks.org/donate
– Khan Academy - https://www.khanacademy.org/donate
6. • Micropayments via Twitter, Reddit, Facebook,
Github, YouTube, Slack, Wordpress, Google+,
Tumblr, SoundCloud, more
• Connect bank account/credit card (US)
• Charity donations
• Follow me on Twitter @CaterinaRindi for $1
17. The Blockchain
Potential 2.0 (ledger) uses:
•contracts
•private records - mortgages, loans, etc
•public records - vehicle registrations, ID, etc
•crowdfunding (Swarm)
Blockchain 3.0 - programmable units
•smart contracts & smart property – if this then that
– e.g. inheritance at age 18
Introduction
Who has heard of Bitcoin?
Bitcoin is a decentralized, peer-to-peer, digital currency (and protocol).
Bitcoin can be divided up to 8 decimal points (100,000,000 units), called bits (.000001) and satoshi (.00000001), so you can do very small transactions. This opens up a lot of possibilities for people in developing countries, or countries with unstable or corrupt organizations.
Bitcoin is also used to refer to the software or protocol.
(This video is a quick explainer.)
History
Satoshi Nakamoto is a pseudonym – it’s not publicly known who wrote the original whitepaper. There have been theories, and Newsweek magazine found Dorian Nakamoto in 2014, but it wasn’t him. There is some speculation that bitcoin was created by a group of people.
Bitcoin code is on GitHub and is called Bitcoin Core. There are about 300 developers who volunteer and collaborate to improve it as needed.
Bitcoin transaction securing is complicated. It’s basically a difficult math problem; the first one to solve the problem is rewarded with some bitcoin. Several miners work on a problem at a time; once the correct solution is found, then other miners confirm the answer. These “confirmations” take between 10 and 40 minutes, with 6 confirmations being sort of the magic number for the transaction to complete. The small transaction fees support this process. The transaction itself is instant.
Originally, a single computer could mine bitcoins, but now the difficulty of the math problem has increased dramatically. Chips and processors have been designed specifically for this purpose (ASICs) and so miners pool their resources together & share the bitcoin.
It is estimated that the last bitcoin will be mined in 2140.
Wallet & Uses
This is what a wallet address looks like. It is slightly anonymous, in that your name is not visible in transactions, but most transactions can be tracked, especially by powerful organizations (eg. NSA).
Bitcoin can be exchanged or traded, and you can use it to buy things just like fiat (government controlled) currency.
Some big companies take Bitcoin. You can buy gift cards via Gyft for major retailers. Amazon partners with Purse.io for bitcoin transactions.
In SF there is a bitcoin-only store called Nakamoto’s, at Mission & 20th.
There are Bitcoin ATM’s worldwide.
Bad reputation: Mt. Gox, Silk Road (dark market for illegal drugs, medical supplies, counterfeit merchandise, hacking guides, weapons, etc)
Uses
Top 10 Ways Bitcoin Spent - http://cointelegraph.com/news/114235/top-10-ways-people-spend-bitcoins-today?utm_content=buffer8f379&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
ChangeTip
Sponsor shout-out to ChangeTip.
Better than a Like or a Thumbs-Up!
More creators are using ChangeTip (Wordpress, SoundCloud, Github, etc)
Up to $50 tips (raised by request)
If you follow me on Twitter, I will send you $1 after the presentation.
Bitcoin Wallets – Blockchain – I’m going to discuss four that I use.
Servers based in Luxembourg.
Offices in NY, London.
One of the first bitcoin wallets.
Limited information requested because does NOT link to a bank account or credit card.
Site is more tech-friendly than non-tech.
Bitcoin Wallets - Coinbase
Based out of San Francisco.
Abides by KYC (Know Your Customer), so ask for identifying information.
Can do wire transfers, which cost €30. All bank transfers take 1-4 business days & charge a fee.
Bitcoin Wallets & Merchant Accounts – a few more
Armory – was one of the first bitcoin wallets. Popular for its security, and can do multi-signature accounts. Fun fact: wallet addresses that start with a 3 are multi-sig addresses.
Counterwallet stores bitcoin and app coins.
Pheeva has great videos.
I haven’t used any of these for merchant or vendor accounts but would be happy to help someone set it up sometime to see how the process goes.
Two factor authentication adds a layer of security by having you confirm a 6-digit code that is randomly generated by your phone every minute.
It looks something like this.
You can use Google Authenticator or Authy.
Clef has a cool new tech that makes 2-factor authentication even easier with your phone.
Free!
getclef.com
Buy/Sell/Earn Bitcoin
Ways to acquire bitcoin: ask to be paid in BTC, buy from a friend or locally, use Purse.io via Amazon, deposit via ATM, use online exchanges & your bank account.
BitWage will convert a portion of your paycheck into bitcoin & other currencies.
LocalBitcoins helps you find people online & nearby, to buy/sell via Paypal, Venmo, Western Union, MoneyGram, etc.
Anyone buying/selling bitcoin here tonight?
You can buy or sell bitcoin by depositing cash at ATM’s worldwide, or via Purse.io & Amazon.
Sometimes attendees at Bitcoin Meetups will also buy/sell bitcoin in-person.
East Bay Bitcoin Meetup is 3rd Thurs/month, downtown Oakland – 12th & Broadway.
Buy/Sell Bitcoin on Exchanges
I have only tried using BitVC because it supposedly pays you an interest rate, but it’s mostly in Chinese and hard for me to navigate.
Alt Coins & App Coins
There are hundreds of Alt Coins – Dogecoin and Litecoin are two popular ones.
Alt coins try to improve upon Bitcoin in some way. Litecoin, for example, has faster confirmation times and different scripts for processing.
App coins are used to support the specific app or organizations, often as crowdsales, and they count on the future value of the app. These are some examples.
All of these coins can be tracked on CoinMarketCap.com, and traded on exchanges such as Poloniex.com.
Counterparty makes Counterwallet, another bitcoin and alt coin wallet. Fun fact – Counterwallet lets you create a “Feed Broadcast”, which is a simple way to embed text into a bitcoin transaction and store it on the blockchain.
Swarm is the company I’ve been working for.
More Bitcoin Resources
Blockchain shows bitcoin transactions in real time and can search for transactions by wallet address or other identifiers.
CoinAcademy – courses and certifications.
CoinMarketCap tracks coin values – all coins.
WeUseCoins – good basic information and videos.
ZeroBlock – news and bitcoin value.
Bitfilm Festival – collection of bitcoin+blockchain movies, documentaries, shorts, animations
The Blockchain
Public ledger of all Bitcoin transactions.
Each transaction is added on top of the other, and documented in perpetuity. Each node in the bitcoin network (whomever downloads it) has an identical, simultaneous copy of it.
The data in each transaction includes references (in the hash) to the previous one before it, and thus is unchangeable, or “trustless”.
It also includes the date and time, the amount, and participants in every transaction.
The magic & potential of the blockchain is that other data can be stored or encrypted in the transactions as well.
Bitcoin logo, Nelson Mandela image & quote, Wikileaks data. Genesis block contained “The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks.”
http://www.righto.com/2014/02/ascii-bernanke-wikileaks-photographs.html
The Blockchain
Melanie Shapiro: "If you think about it, everything in society lives on some sort of ledger. You have a driver's license, which lives on an identity ledger at the DMV, your credit card purchases are tied to a currency ledger at your bank, you buy a house and that lives on a property ledger. The blockchain is simply a ledger, like all of these other ledgers that our very lives exist on, but instead of there being thousands of different ledgers held by thousands of different central authorities, the blockchain is one global ledger that all of these things can live on."
Blockchain 2.0 - the decentralized, public & transparent transaction ledger can be used to register, confirm, and transfer all manner of contracts and property.
Ongoing list of potential uses at Ledra Capital - http://ledracapital.com/blog/2014/3/11/bitcoin-series-24-the-mega-master-blockchain-list
Remember how 1 bitcoin can be divided into 100,000,000 units? Each of those units is also programmable, and can be told to do different things, like hold this bitcoin until this date, or until a specific condition is met.
A simple example is an inheritance triggered at age 18. A smart contract on the blockchain is programmed for a specific date, at which point it will check obituaries, for example, and trigger the release of funds if all conditions are met.
Ethereum is a fundamental underlying infrastructure platform that can run all blockchains and protocols, (source: Swan, Melanie - Blockchain: Blueprint for a New Economy (Loc 815-816).
(source: http://www.michaelnielsen.org/ddi/how-the-bitcoin-protocol-actually-works/)
(source: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Contracts)
trading cards on the Blockchain - http://bravenewcoin.com/news/everdreamsoft-launches-blockchain-based-trading-cards/