Cryptocurrency

[Stigmata]

I'm thinking about buying some litecoin during the dip but am too lazy to do my own research. Can someone ELI5? From everything I'm reading thus far it seems like bitcoin but with lower transaction fees and faster transaction speeds.

[Utisz]

I'm thinking about buying some litecoin during the dip but am too lazy to do my own research. Can someone ELI5? From everything I'm reading thus far it seems like bitcoin but with lower transaction fees and faster transaction speeds.

Never heard of Litecoin, but can try to translate the Wikipedia page to ELI5.

In technical details, Litecoin is nearly identical to Bitcoin.

The Litecoin Network aims to process a block every 2.5 minutes, rather than Bitcoin's 10 minutes. This allows Litecoin to confirm transactions much faster than Bitcoin.

You know the way that when your daddy loves you mommy very much they do a special hug for 10 minutes? Well that's like Bitcoin.

But what you might not know is that mommy and daddy are competing to finish their special hug faster than thousands of other mommies and daddies all over the world, because like how you got a gold medal for winning that race last Thursday, mommy and daddy will get a special prize too if they finish their special hug faster than all the mommies and daddies. Instead of a gold medal though they get something called "Bitcoin", which rewards them at being very fast at the special hugging.

But it's not easy to finish faster than all the other mommies and daddies. There are so many mommies and daddies trying to win the special prize at the same time, because the prize is so special, and some of those mommies and daddies get really really good at doing the special hug really quickly. But if they get too good, then lots of prizes are given out, which makes the prizes less special. The reason why it's nice to win a gold medal is because only one little boy or girl wins one in each race.

So as the mommies and daddies compete more and get faster at finishing their special hug, the rules of the race change making it harder to finish the special hug faster. Like how a race might be made longer to take more time, these rules might require mommy doing a handstand during the special hug, or might require daddy to drink lots and lots of alcohol before the special hug, which makes them slower at finishing the race. These rules get harder to make sure that no matter how good the mommies and daddies get at the special hug, and no matter how many mommies and daddies are trying to win the race, some mommy and daddy finish their special hug and win a prize only every ten minutes or so. But it works the other way too. If fewer mommies and daddies are competing, or they get worse at finishing the special hug, then the rules get easier so a prize is still won every ten minutes or so.

When a mommy and daddy win a prize, there's something special engraved on it. Anything can be engraved on the prize, but in this competition, the mommies and daddies agree that the engravings should be used for something special because they will be remembered forever. So the engravings are used to remember buying special things, like when your mommy buys something special for you in a store with a card, the store remembers how much she paid for the special thing. Otherwise if it wasn't remembered, anyone could buy special things from the store as many as they liked and they would be all gone before mommy arrived. Well the engravings on the prizes remember things like that too, like who bought what and for how much, so if prizes are won more quickly, more prizes are won, and things can be remembered in the engravings more quickly, like who bought what at which store, and for how much. Being able to remember these things more quickly is good because mommy doesn't need to wait so long at the store to pay for things.

But how are the things on old engravings remembered?

There is another special thing about this special competition. The other mommies and daddies must know what is engraved on the last prize in other to enter the competition for the next prize in 10 minutes because the next prize will have an engraving that contains the previous engraving in really small writing, which in turn contains the previous previous engraving in really really small writing, and so on, so that all the engravings are remembered for all time, even the ones on prizes won long ago!

Now there's another type of competition, called Litecoin, that some mommies and daddies compete in too. This time the rules are not made harder unless the mommies and daddies can finish their special hug in 2.5 minutes rather than 10 minutes. In this competition, someone will win a smaller prize every 2.5 minutes, which is good because there will be more frequent prizes, and more engravings, so more things can be remembered faster. So it's not that the mommies and daddies in that competition are better than your mommy and daddy at the special hugging, it's just that the rules are made easier so that prizes are won more quickly.

But if prizes are won too quickly, it gets hard to know which mommy and daddy won the race, because mommies and daddies are competing all over the world, and there's no teacher organising the race. Instead the mommies and daddies have to call other mommies and daddies to tell them they won and tell them what was engraved on their prize so the other mommies and daddies can compete for the next prize. So if the rules get too easy, and the mommies and daddies finish their special hugs within a second, then there'll be fights over who won the prize, and which engravings to use for the next prize, because everyone will be trying to call each other to say they won the prize at the same time!

Litecoin uses scrypt in its proof-of-work algorithm, a sequential memory-hard function requiring asymptotically more memory than an algorithm which is not memory-hard.

It's important that the special hugs in these competitions are difficult because otherwise it would be too easy to win a prize. Like if there were a really really easy race that was only two steps long, then it would be hard to know who won because everyone would finish so quickly and cross the line at almost the same time and there would be lots of arguments over who won! That's why it is important that the special hugs in Bitcoin and Litecoin are hard to do: so there's a clear winner most of the time and few arguments.

So you know the way that math is hard because it requires a lot of thinking, but geography is hard because it requires remembering a lot of things? Like they are hard for different reasons?

Well in the Bitcoin competition, the special hug that mommy and daddy have to do is hard because it requires a lot of thinking.

But in the Litecoin competition, the special hug that mommy and daddy have to do is hard because it requires remembering lots of things.

Bitcoin and Litcoin are both hard, but they are hard for different reasons. Much like daddy.

[Mashy]

NFT's are leaving crypto for dead...

Wait why? You buy NFTs with crypto

At least you can buy something with it

Don't forget hard drugs on the darkweb.

[Mashy]

I'm thinking about buying some litecoin during the dip but am too lazy to do my own research. Can someone ELI5? From everything I'm reading thus far it seems like bitcoin but with lower transaction fees and faster transaction speeds.

I've done the research for ya

Stay away from Litecoin. There's no innovative tech behind it. I don't see many reputable tech people or investors interested in it, only noobs sitting in front of a market cap list. Always look at the fundamentals of each coin when investing. Unless you're just looking for a pump & dump, then I have no advice for you.

Ethereum is the most valuable out of all the coins, even more than bitcoin. Bitcoin is just a decentralised incorruptible ledger of transactions. Ethereum a whole goddamn open source platform that allows for dApps (decentralised apps), deFi (decentralised finance), smart contracts, etc. All that NFT craze? That's all on the ethereum blockchain. On the ethereum platform, the currency is called Ether, which is what you'd be investing in.

BTC is just secure p2p money, Eth is the new internet.

Once Ethereum implements scalability solutions it's gonna moon imo. Even if it doesn't, I'm just happy to invest in tech I believe in. I trade penny crypto for fun tho

Also look into ethereum-based blockchains, like gaming tokens - Decentraland, Enjin coin, Polygon (Matic).

Honestly your best bet is just investing in BTC and ETH and hodling for years, maybe set a date you want to withdraw like March 2026 or something. That's the most rational way to go about it.

[C.J.Woolf]

@Utisz, your metaphor of Bitcoin mining as a computational Kama Sutra contest is something I will never forget.

[Utisz]

@Utisz, your metaphor of Bitcoin mining as a computational Kama Sutra contest is something I will never forget.

In a good way I hope.

I'm starting to think it might actually be feasible to build a cryptocurrency like that.
If sex isn't proof-of-work, then I don't know what is.

[Mashy]

If sex isn't proof-of-work, then I don't know what is.

This needs to be quoted on the index header, STAT

[Utisz]

This needs to be quoted on the index header, STAT

[Mashy]

Minted my second NFT

https://mintable.app/art/item/I-Know-Wh ... 9iAJ4fMYfY

[Utisz]

Minted my second NFT

https://mintable.app/art/item/I-Know-Wh ... 9iAJ4fMYfY

I really have to read more into this NFT thing. I don't really get it yet.