Bitcoin transactions are verified by the work of software run by other people using the currency, a process that takes on average 10 minutes and can be much longer, an hour in the case of many exchange sites. Lee says that hinders operators of online stores from using the currency. “With Bitcoin, sometimes merchants are forced to accept unconfirmed transactions because confirmations are way too slow,” he says. “Faster confirmations lead to a more useful currency.” Litecoin transactions are confirmed on average every 2.5 minutes, which Litecoin’s developers say is more practical for businesses.
Tag Archives: economics
Bitcoin crashes, losing nearly half of its value in six hours
On Wednesday afternoon, the Bitcoin bubble appears to have burst. As of this writing, its current value is around $160—down from a high of $260. (It fell as low as $130 today.) There is no obvious explanation for why the digital currency has fallen so far and so fast, although the market correcting after such a huge rise might be a good explanation. (Update 4:05pm CT: Bitcoin seems to have somewhat recovered and appears to be hovering around $200.)
via Bitcoin crashes, losing nearly half of its value in six hours | Ars Technica.
More info from Slashdot and Techcrunch. From: Bitcoin Suffers A Correction Amid Apparent DDOS Attacks On Some Exchanges
This also happened last week when Mt. Gox when Bitcoin reached $142 and hackers attacked the exchange. At that point, Mt. Gox said it had suffered ”its worst trading lag ever.”
World’s longest high-speed rail line opens connecting Beijing with southern China
The opening of the new line brings the total distance covered by China’s high-speed railway system to more than 9,300 km (5,800 miles) — about half its 2015 target of 18,000 km.
Halving day is almost upon us!
Bitcoin is built so that this reward is halved every 210,000 blocks solved. The idea is as bitcoin grows the transaction fee’s become the main part of the reward and the introduction of new bitcoin’s slows down to a trickle. This also means that there will only ever be 21,000,000 bitcoins in circulation.
Well, in less than 4 days the block count will reach the first of these 210,000 block milestones and the reward for solving a Bitcoin block will half from 50BTC to 25BTC. (Have a look at bitcoinclock.com)
Russia reveals shiny state secret: It’s awash in diamonds
They claim the Popigai site is unique in the world, thus making Russia the monopoly proprietor of a resource that’s likely to become increasingly important in high-precision scientific and industrial processes
via Russia reveals shiny state secret: It’s awash in diamonds – CSMonitor.com.
Russian scientists say the news is likely to change the shape of global diamond markets, although the main customers for the super-hard gems will probably be big corporations and scientific institutes.
Inside the real economy behind fake Twitter accounts
Fake Twitter accounts need some information — an image to use as an avatar, perhaps some bio content, maybe even some tweets. For merchants that need to create an inventory of 20,000 accounts quickly, this simply cannot be done manually
via Inside the real economy behind fake Twitter accounts.
By now, though, even this process has been open sourced. First-page results on a Google search for “program to make fake twitter accounts” return this forum on Freelancer.com, titled “Software create fake twitter users jobs.” There, several development projects are posted for bidding that request a program that grabs information from Twitter users’ accounts.
What garbage can tell us about the direction of the economy — in 1 chart
It turns out that what we throw out or, more accurately, how much we throw out, tells us a lot about the general economic direction of the country.
via What garbage can tell us about the direction of the economy — in 1 chart – The Washington Post.
A Brief History of Money
Kublai Khan was ahead of his time: He recognized that what matters about money is not what it looks like, or even what it’s backed by, but whether people believe in it enough to use it. Today, that concept is the foundation of all modern monetary systems, which are built on nothing more than governments’ support of and people’s faith in them. Money is, in other words, a complete abstraction—one that we are all intimately familiar with but whose growing complexity defies our comprehension.
via A Brief History of Money – IEEE Spectrum.
There is, to be sure, something a bit eerie about all this, and periods like the recent housing bubble, when banks made an extraordinary number of bad loans, should remind us of the dangers of runaway credit. But it’s a mistake to yearn for a more “solid” foundation for the monetary system. Money is a social creation, just like language. It’s a tool that can be used well or poorly, and it’s preferable that we have more freedom to use that tool than less.
Jevons paradox
In economics, the Jevons paradox (sometimes Jevons effect) is the proposition that technological progress that increases the efficiency with which a resource is used, tends to increase (rather than decrease) the rate of consumption of that resource.[1] In 1865, the English economist William Stanley Jevons observed that technological improvements that increased the efficiency of coal-use led to the increased consumption of coal in a wide range of industries. He argued that, contrary to common intuition, technological improvements could not be relied upon to reduce fuel consumption.[2]