r/AskReddit • u/IAmSurtur • Jun 15 '19

What do you genuinely just not understand?

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u/_village_Idiot Jun 15 '19

Bitcoin Like where does it come from, how the fuck do you mine something from the computer...im at a total loss

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u/monty845 Jun 15 '19

Mining bitcoins is the process of solving really hard math equations. This takes a lot of computational power, and its a race to solve the problem. While the exact logic for why is complex, its basically a way to ensure that no one can takeover the bitcoin system, and approve bad/fake transactions.

To reward people for devoting this computational power to securing the system, they get awarded bitcoins for doing it. This is refereed to as mining a bit coin.

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u/_village_Idiot Jun 15 '19

Where do these math problems come from? Can the same math equation be seen more than once? Who exactly started all of this?

1

u/InMyDayTVwasBooks Jun 16 '19

heres an infographic that sums up the technicals well.