What is Bitcoin and some of it's unbelievable facts!

Bitcoin is world's first decentralised cryptocurrency and payment system. It was created by a person named Satoshi Nakamoto in 2009.

To understand what Bitcoin actually is first you need to have a brief idea what is cryptocurrency. 

A Cryptocurrency is a digital or we can say virtual currency because it isn't present physically. Cryptocurrency uses different kinds of cryptographic algorithms for it's security. That's why it is not easy to counterfeit this currency. 

A cryptocurrency is different from other physical currencies. Why? because there's no central authorities who govern this currency system like other physical currencies. Either way, it is a form of digital public money that is created by hardworking mathematical computations and policed by millions of computer users called 'miners'. That's what makes cryptocurrencies so popular.

Advantages of Cryptocurrencies :

1. No Fraud : Individuals cryptocurrencies are digital and cannot be counterfeited or reversed arbitrarily by the sender, as with credit card charge-backs.

2. Easily Accessible : Cryptocurrency is easily available to the general public. Almost anyone can make use of it. It is a decentralized operation and investors from all over the world have easy access to them.

Transaction Process of Bitcoin

3. Lower Fees : Cryptocurrency transactions are actually free of costs. But many expect that most people will use the help of third party service, such as Coinbase. These services acts like PayPal does for normal currencies, provides online exchange system for bitcoin and likely charge fees a little.

4. Private : In Cryptocurrency transactions we don't need to share your personal information.

5. No third party – You are the master of your money. You can keep it in your wallet and use it as per your wishes. There is no third party involved like a bank on whom you need to trust.

Disadvantages

1. Difficult to understand : Cryptocurrencies are relatively new and people end up investing without proper knowledge and lose money to something they did not learn about.

2. Lack of knowledge : People are still not aware of how to do transaction or to cryptocurrency because it is a complex system. So without proper knowledge investing a lot of money isn't a very good idea.

3. Not accepted widely : Cryptocurrencies are still not accepted in most of countries or in companies. So you may have hard luck buying something you like with these currencies.

4. Uncertainty :

Uncertainty or fluctuations I would say.

1 bitcoin = 18,506.23 US dollars (November, 2017)

1 bitcoin = 13,703.56 US dollars (now)

As you can see from above numbers Bitcoin's value has decreased significantly since November. That's what makes these Cryptocurrencies vulnerable because if you invest your whole life's earning you might end up in lose over time.

Facts

1. The founder of Bitcoin is someone known as “Satoshi Nakamoto.” But No one knows who he is, what his real name is, or where he lives. As of 2017, he owns up to one million bitcoins which have an estimated value of $2.7 billion.

2. As different sources says the first transaction using Bitcoin was done to buy two large, Papa John’s pizzas for 10,000 bitcoins. As of August 2017, that amount is now worth $27 million.

3. Bitcoins are limited. The number of bitcoins in circulation will never exceed 21 million.

4. Bitcoin uses a public ledger called “block chain” for transactions. The invention of block chain made Bitcoin the first digital currency to solve the problem of double spending, an error in digital cash which allows the same token to be spent twice or more.

6. For every bitcoin transaction, no matter how small, uses at least enough electricity to power three average homes for an entire day.

7. The FBI has the world’s largest Bitcoin wallets consisting seized bitcoins, apart from Satoshi Nakamoto.

8. You can really buy things with bitcoins.

There is a variety of merchants who accept bitcoins as payment for items, both online stores and physical stores. Popular online stores who accept bitcoins include Newegg, Overstock, Microsoft, Dell, and more.

9. A person by the name Nakowa won 11,000 Bitcoins worth $1.3M back in 2013 (worth over $47M today) on a gambling site.

10. If you had purchased a one bitcoin in 2010 (100 rupees per 1 bitcoin at that time), then 2018 it'll be worth 884,888 INR (US$ 14,100) now.