Why Ethereum is outpacing Bitcoin

#1

Post by bpierre » Mon, Jun 12, 2017, 10:31 AM UTC

Why Ethereum is outpacing Bitcoin
venturebeat.com

Re: Why Ethereum is outpacing Bitcoin

#2

Post by opportune » Tue, Jun 13, 2017, 5:33 PM UTC

Could someone that understands crypto better than me explain why Bitcoin's fees and transactions times have become so high all of a sudden? Is it just a matter of network congestion, or does it have as its root some underlying mathematical factor instead?

Hoping to get a better answer here than on reddit. /r/bitcoin and /r/btc are both biased echo chambers.

Re: Why Ethereum is outpacing Bitcoin

#3

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Jun 13, 2017, 5:33 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Why Ethereum is outpacing Bitcoin

#4

Post by JohnJamesRambo » Tue, Jun 13, 2017, 5:37 PM UTC

opportune wrote: post #2

Could someone that understands crypto better than me explain why Bitcoin's fees and transactions times have become so high all of a sudden? Is it just a matter of network congestion, or does it have as its root some underlying mathematical factor instead? Hoping to get a better answer here than on reddit. /r/bitcoin and /r/btc are both biased echo chambers.

The miners only process transactions that have higher and higher fees. This makes lower fee transactions take forever to be processed or never happen at all. Since bitcoin limits how many transactions that can occur in a set amount of time it creates this awful fee-based backlog. The self-serving and shortsighted bitcoin community has argued and bickered amongst itself so long about how to fix this that it may be too late now.

Re: Why Ethereum is outpacing Bitcoin

#5

Post by yellowapple » Tue, Jun 13, 2017, 5:37 PM UTC

"In a world where people are used to online payments being confirmed instantly, Bitcoin transactions can take anywhere from tens of minutes to several hours, depending on how busy the network is."

Online payments (via traditional means) are by no means "confirmed instantly". The authorization happens more-or-less instantly, but that's only the first of multiple steps in the transaction process; the actual transfer of funds often takes at least one business day, if not more.

Re: Why Ethereum is outpacing Bitcoin

#6

Post by Tommek » Tue, Jun 13, 2017, 5:38 PM UTC

So a guy from a company selling Ethereum is telling us why it's better then the stuff they've copied?

Re: Why Ethereum is outpacing Bitcoin

#7

Post by opportune » Tue, Jun 13, 2017, 5:38 PM UTC

JohnJamesRambo wrote: post #4

opportune wrote: post #2

Could someone that understands crypto better than me explain why Bitcoin's fees and transactions times have become so high all of a sudden? Is it just a matter of network congestion, or does it have as its root some underlying mathematical factor instead? Hoping to get a better answer here than on reddit. /r/bitcoin and /r/btc are both biased echo chambers.

The miners only process transactions that have higher and higher fees. This makes lower fee transactions take forever to be processed or never happen at all. Since bitcoin limits how many transactions that can occur in a set amount of time it creates this awful fee-based backlog. The self-serving and shortsighted bitcoin community has argued and bickered amongst itself so long about how to fix this that it may be too…

Is this a conscious decision on behalf of the miners themselves, or is it a result of mining becoming increasingly more difficult?

Re: Why Ethereum is outpacing Bitcoin

#8

Post by zachaller » Tue, Jun 13, 2017, 5:39 PM UTC

opportune wrote: post #2

Could someone that understands crypto better than me explain why Bitcoin's fees and transactions times have become so high all of a sudden? Is it just a matter of network congestion, or does it have as its root some underlying mathematical factor instead? Hoping to get a better answer here than on reddit. /r/bitcoin and /r/btc are both biased echo chambers.

There are a few things that contribute to this bitcoin has a block size of 1MB and they only add new blocks every 10min. There are only so many transactions you can fit in that block size. The other thing is as the block reward gets half'ed miners will ask for more fee's as well as miners will mine blocks with higher fee's first. So as a way to combat some of the congestions people increase the amount of fee they are willing to pay to get included into a block faster.

Re: Why Ethereum is outpacing Bitcoin

#9

Post by dpc_pw » Tue, Jun 13, 2017, 5:39 PM UTC

The whole reason why Ethereum is "outpacing" Bitcoin is easiness of taking money from clueless "investors" that feel like they missed the boat on becoming rich through Bitcoin. https://medium.com/@WhalePanda/i-was-wrong-about-ethereum-80...

It's going to be a big mess, one this bubble pops.

Re: Why Ethereum is outpacing Bitcoin

#10

Post by plokiju » Tue, Jun 13, 2017, 5:40 PM UTC

opportune wrote: post #2

Could someone that understands crypto better than me explain why Bitcoin's fees and transactions times have become so high all of a sudden? Is it just a matter of network congestion, or does it have as its root some underlying mathematical factor instead? Hoping to get a better answer here than on reddit. /r/bitcoin and /r/btc are both biased echo chambers.

Early on in bitcoin, a 1MB limit was added to the block size, which puts a cap on the number of transactions that can be included in each block. Now that bitcoin is more popular, there are more transactions then can fit in each block, which means miners will only include the transactions that include the highest fees. There are a number of ways to solve this (the easiest being expanding the block size), but the community is split on the best way forward, so the congestion is getting worse