Tag: Bitcoins

This – for me- from where I am coming from, (mostly ignorance) – whole deal about bitcoins is pretty weird. What are they? According to at least two articles I read on BBC news they are either a commodity – like pork belly and coffee – or they are a token like the Italian “getone,” which you had to buy – usually in a bar with a good coffee machine – before you could use a public telephone. So, bitcoins – or getones – weren’t currency because they (the latter anyway) had no monetary value but they were worth the duration of a telephone call. This was well before Skype, I suppose.

Anyway, the point is, that these yokes, bitcoins, are something that can be traded and swapped, – like, I suppose, pork bellies and Euros. (By who and where, and what for?)

So, where do they come from? Who makes money from them? Why was it all a big secret? Why didn’t the Japanese guy – or did he? – say something like – I am not the inventor.

I remember reading something somewhere where it mentioned that if you ever wanted to be mega rich from absolutely nothing, then start your own religion. Ron L Hubbard did apparently – as well as write books – did he write Genesis or was that God?

So, bit coins are “mined” from something – obviously – but a 64-digit number is the answer to some increasingly complex cryptographically engrossing problem and then you need a bitcoin address. And a wallet in the cloud? Mother of god! It’s all getting a bit too fancy for me – a bit rich for my blood and I still have not done anything about the copyright issue for photos and that kind of stuff. Something to look forward to later, this month!

Can’t believe it is May already.