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SilasBarta comments on General Bitcoin discussion thread (June 2011) - Less Wrong Discussion
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Comments (102)
Yes, I had an ulterior motive in starting this topic right this moment. See, I'm trying to close the inferential gap in explaining Bitcoin to the layperson, so I wrote up a blog post explaining the relevant cryptographic pre-requisites. (It's based on discussions with an economist who plans to write about Bitcoin soon.)
I would appreciate any corrections. Also, this is another case of me claiming to be better at explaining stuff than most people, so see if I live up to the standard (preferably from those that don't already understand this stuff). The economist I talked to found my explanation must more helpful than Wikipedia (and I, too, found the site's explanations not very helpful in my self-education about cryptography).
(Edited to fix typo)
Edit2: Now my long-time frenemy and economist Bob Murphy links the post with approval, though yes, he doesn't specify that it's more of a "cover of the pre-requisites" than an explanation of Bitcoin itself.
re-requisites -> pre- ?
I skimmed it and nothing jumped out at me. I understand public key crypto.
Your blog post made me think an explanation of bitcoin mining and transfer would occur. It never did. There was this:
... which isn't a very complete. The only thing I learned (I know nothing about Bitcoin mining or transaction protocols) is that apparently lots of nodes end up knowing about every transaction (paying attention only to transactions moving a particular coin that are signed by its last known owner).
So, I gather your explanation of Bitcoin is yet to be written.
What Tim Tyler said. Remember, the layperson has a HUGE inferential gap between their knowledge and Bitcoin, and closing that gap requires solving the problem -- itself very difficult for most -- of explaining cryptography and what it can accomplish. Otherwise, people can't grasp how the scarcity and security come about.
Silas did say this was:
It doesn't have much about Bitcoin - and instead covers the basics of digital signatures and hash functions.
Update: I've attempted a more "big picture" summary of how Bitcoin works as a whole, rather than just the prerequisites.
I'm interested in hearing comments about clarity or accuracy.
It's new info for me, so I can only hope it's accurate.
It's a good explanation. I'd know where to mount further details if I wanted to find them.
Thanks, glad it provides some of the clarity you were looking for.
the jump in interest generally comes when you explain that there will only ever be 21 million. this seems to completely change the character of the conversation.
or did you mean explaining it to intelligent people? :p
Only 21 million bitcoins, but there is nothing preventing other "issuers" from copying the design of Bitcoin and creating "Cryptotokens", and "Liberty Hashes," "Stealth Gold," "African Bitcoins," etc.
Cryptokens, surely?
That's not a bad thing. Bitcoin is going to have to be majorly upgraded with a new blockchain when SHA-256 is broken, and money is not the only scarce things to be decentralizedly allocated - I previously commented on Namecoin.
Bad thing or good thing, it makes a huge difference to the expected long-term value of a bitcoin, which is of interest to anyone thinking of holding bitcoins.
Not insurmountable but it is the chicken and egg problem. Bitcoins are the most secure by virtue of having the most hashing power.