Bitcoin & Blockchain Technology
What Is the Lightning Network?
The Lightning Network facilitates instant, near-feeless payments for Bitcoin. These payments happen on a secondary network instead of Bitcoin’s blockchain.
What Is the Double Spend Problem?
The Double Spend problem describes the difficulty of ensuring digital money is not easily duplicated. Bitcoin offers a trustless solution to the double spend problem, and third parties such as banks attempt to solve it as well.
What Is a Bitcoin Address, and How Can You Get One?
Bitcoin addresses are places on the blockchain that users can send and receive bitcoin to. Bitcoin wallets generate and control addresses.
What Is Taproot and How Does It Benefit Bitcoin?
Taproot is an upgrade to Bitcoin which introduced Schnorr signatures, Pay-to-Taproot (P2TR) outputs, and new scripting capabilities. P2TR outputs offer great privacy improvements and enable Merkelized Alternative Script Types, a way for bitcoin to be locked to multiple scripts at once.
What Are Bitcoin Smart Contracts?
A smart contract is a digital agreement that is automatically executed and based on predefined criteria. Bitcoin’s scripting language enables powerful smart contracting features and additional smart contracts can be enabled on layers on top of Bitcoin.
What Are Partially Signed Bitcoin Transactions (PSBTs)?
Partially Signed Bitcoin Transactions (PSBTs) are a standardized format for communicating Bitcoin transactions before they are ready to be broadcast. The PSBT standard enables multiple parties on different devices to create and sign the same transaction sequentially.
What Is a Bitcoin Improvement Proposal (BIP)?
A Bitcoin Improvement Proposal (BIP) is a formal proposal to change Bitcoin. The BIP process organizes the Bitcoin community in the absence of a centralized leader. BIPs can propose changes to Bitcoin's consensus layer, community standards, or the development process.
The Difference Between Bitcoin and Blockchain
A blockchain is a database used to store information in batches, called blocks. Bitcoin, a monetary network, uses a blockchain as a ledger to organize its data, including a full history of transactions. Blockchains are only useful for supporting decentralized, trustless systems.
What Do Schnorr Signatures Do for Bitcoin?
Schnorr signatures offer advantages over ECDSA in several areas. The introduction of Schnorr signatures to Bitcoin will improve privacy, scalability, and flexibility. Schnorr signatures are expected to be added to Bitcoin via the Taproot upgrade, which will be activated in the near future.
What Is Segregated Witness (SegWit)?
Segregated Witness, or SegWit, is an upgrade to Bitcoin that was activated in 2017 to fix transaction malleability and help Bitcoin scale. SegWit introduced two new address types and enabled the launch of the Lightning Network.
What Is the Byzantine Generals Problem?
The Byzantine Generals Problem is a game theory problem, which describes the difficulty decentralized parties have in arriving at consensus without relying on a trusted central party. Bitcoin uses a Proof-of-Work mechanism and a blockchain to solve the Byzantine Generals Problem.
Why Should I Run a Bitcoin Node?
A node is an integral part of the Bitcoin network. Nodes enforce Bitcoin’s rule set and thus control Bitcoin. An individual should run a node to verify their bitcoin ownership trustlessly and ensure that other members follow the rules of the network.
How Bitcoin Solves the Double Spend Problem
Bitcoin uses a distributed ledger to publically record all transactions on the network. Proof-of-Work provides an objective way for Bitcoin users to agree on the state of the ledger.
The Risks of Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDC)
At face value, CBDCs seem harmless and full of potential benefits for society, but in practice, they carry enormous risks for human freedom and flourishing that are rarely discussed.