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Bitcoin Essentials

You're reading from   Bitcoin Essentials Gain insights into Bitcoin, a cryptocurrency and a powerful technology, to optimize your Bitcoin mining techniques

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Product type Paperback
Published in Feb 2016
Publisher
ISBN-13 9781785281976
Length 130 pages
Edition 1st Edition
Tools
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Author (1):
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Albert Szmigielski Albert Szmigielski
Author Profile Icon Albert Szmigielski
Albert Szmigielski
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Toc

Can we do without mining?


Mining is the way by which we currently secure the Bitcoin blockchain and in conjunction with PoW it is used to distribute the newly minted bitcoins. But is mining, as we know it today, necessary? Can we do away with it and replace it with something better, something perhaps more efficient?

Replacing or eliminating mining

Theoretically, we can eliminate or replace mining with some other form of securing the blockchain. As discussed earlier, by replacing PoW with Proof of Stake we could eliminate mining, as we know it today. Of course, a secure blockchain is the number one concern, so we must be sure that switching to another algorithm will not compromise security. Therefore, mining as we know it today is technically not necessary, but it is the only secure way we know of today. There has not been enough research done regarding other algorithms to switch Bitcoin over to something else. Unless some amazing new way of securing the blockchain gets discovered soon, we...

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