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The Bitcoin Blockchain Visualized in 3D

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Re: The Bitcoin Blockchain Visualized in 3D

#71

Post by keymone »

_ph_ wrote: post #68
keymone wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you pay ransom with cash. because cash has certain properties. which bitcoin also has. which is why bitcoin is being used as digital cash. which in itself isn't a problem and if it is - you need to fight against cash, there's orders of magnitude more illegal stuff being paid for using cash than using bitcoin.

I was specifically talking about ransomware in all of my comments you answered to. You might disagree, but please don't put words into my mouth I didn't write. Also, while ransom is paid in cash, these kind of crimes are not very common because the police can intercept at the cash exchange. It is really the ability to send money over the internet but off any official channels, which enables ransomware. Also, like wit…

> You might disagree, but please don't put words into my mouth

i don't disagree, i'm trying to help you understand that what (allegedly) makes bitcoin popular for ransomware and illegal transactions is a set of properties that are also shared with cash.

either your argument is that those properties are evil and you're in favor of cashless society where big brother is always in control of all money flows - in which case that's the root of our disagreement and we can stop there.

or you value those properties but you're worried about all the illegal activities enabled by them, in which case bitcoin should be way down on the list of your concerns, top spot being held by the almighty USD.

Re: The Bitcoin Blockchain Visualized in 3D

#73

Post by _ph_ »

keymone wrote: post #71
_ph_ wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was specifically talking about ransomware in all of my comments you answered to. You might disagree, but please don't put words into my mouth I didn't write. Also, while ransom is paid in cash, these kind of crimes are not very common because the police can intercept at the cash exchange. It is really the ability to send money over the internet but off any official channels, which enables ransomware. Also, like wit…

> You might disagree, but please don't put words into my mouth i don't disagree, i'm trying to help you understand that what (allegedly) makes bitcoin popular for ransomware and illegal transactions is a set of properties that are also shared with cash. either your argument is that those properties are evil and you're in favor of cashless society where big brother is always in control of all money flows - in which ca…

And you still haven't explained how you would pay for ransomware over the internet via cash. We are talking here about the ransomers being in a different continent even.

And we have strict limits on cash to provide a stop of a complete abuse of it for criminal activities. Cash transactions over a certain limit have to be logged, there are physical controls at the borders as well as searches. So having a suitcase of cash cannot be concealed easily.

Yes, especially with local crime, there are cash transactions. That is regretteable, but cannot be avoided. The difference is, that physical cash servers a very important practical purpose: making legit payments easy. From using vending machines with coins to just paying for your groceries, you can do that easily with cash.

However Bitcoins don't seem to have a large practical values beyond the illegal actions. I am not aware of a large econommy based on Bitcoin transactions. It also can be shown that the pure time required to perform these transactions would be a hurdle. So most of Bitcoin is just speculation, the practical aspect largely based on the shady uses.

Re: The Bitcoin Blockchain Visualized in 3D

#74

Post by remarkEon »

gibybo wrote: post #47
akuji1993 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay, that makes waaay more sense. Thanks for explaining. Do I understand correctly, though? If I want to send a small amount of bitcoin, with a minimal fee, there is a possibility that that transaction won't go through, because no miner picks it up?

That is correct, there is a maximum number of transactions that can occur on the main Bitcoin chain (it was ~7/second at the beginning, and I think it still is) so there is effectively an auction to get on the chain. As ignaloidas explained in another comment though, this doesn't include the Lightning Network which is where most everyday transactions would occur.

>this doesn't include the Lightning Network which is where most everyday transactions would occur.

This is something I've never fully understood. Is the Lightning Network essentially a separate ledger of transactions that are "floating", if you will, off chain until (eventually) they get verified at some later time in a "final" state? What is the timing mechanism for when they get verified?

Re: The Bitcoin Blockchain Visualized in 3D

#75

Post by [deleted] »

ThomPete wrote: post #60
ir77 wrote: post #59

All his effort and the site is completely unusable on mobile Safari and barely/confusingly usable on mobile Firefox - I gave up about 20 seconds into it. what’s the point of all the nerdiness if it’s unusable.

What's the point of seeing it on mobile? It's way too rich to be experienced on such a small screen.

[deleted]

Re: The Bitcoin Blockchain Visualized in 3D

#76

Post by latchkey »

akuji1993 wrote: post #54
gibybo wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is correct, there is a maximum number of transactions that can occur on the main Bitcoin chain (it was ~7/second at the beginning, and I think it still is) so there is effectively an auction to get on the chain. As ignaloidas explained in another comment though, this doesn't include the Lightning Network which is where most everyday transactions would occur.

Alright, so there's always a way to get my transaction through, nice. Would you have any resource that is worth checking out to learn more about blockchain? I don't care about market analysis, economy. I just want to understand the underlying technology to know what's happening there. Book would be fine too.

The way to get a transaction through is to pay a fee to have it validated. The higher the fee, the more incentive for miners to add your transaction to their blocks since they will earn that fee if they can validate the block the fastest.

Right now, the fees are relatively low because miners are primarily living on the block rewards for validating transactions. As those block rewards decrease (halvenings), transaction fees will need to pick up the slack. Smaller miners may also leave the network as the competition picks up, which will lower the difficulty and increase the chances of validating the block the fastest (and thus getting paid the rewards/fees).

Halvenings means less inflation, so the theory/practice is that the price will also go up over time... thus the transaction fees will go up, but not substantially because the price is also going up. This will also incentivize outside transactions like lightning network.

Re: The Bitcoin Blockchain Visualized in 3D

#78

Post by woah »

remarkEon wrote: post #74
gibybo wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is correct, there is a maximum number of transactions that can occur on the main Bitcoin chain (it was ~7/second at the beginning, and I think it still is) so there is effectively an auction to get on the chain. As ignaloidas explained in another comment though, this doesn't include the Lightning Network which is where most everyday transactions would occur.

>this doesn't include the Lightning Network which is where most everyday transactions would occur. This is something I've never fully understood. Is the Lightning Network essentially a separate ledger of transactions that are "floating", if you will, off chain until (eventually) they get verified at some later time in a "final" state? What is the timing mechanism for when they get verified?

The lightning network is a bunch of running tabs between people which can theoretically route transactions to a destination.

Re: The Bitcoin Blockchain Visualized in 3D

#79

Post by woah »

ignaloidas wrote: post #9
_ph_ wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most valuations make sense as they are tied to the intrinsic value of things. A potatoe will feed you for a while. The value can vary - a potatoe farmer won't be hungry, so the value is to learn a living, a hungry person will value a potatoe very high. The price at each step in the chain between the farmer and the hungry person is determined by a lot of factors - distance and the scarcity vs. need at each point. Same…

You can't eat a dollar too. Intrinsic value of a dollar is smaller than a piece of paper, as it's not even that good for taking notes. It's valuation is the same: based on artificial demand.

They will put you in jail if you receive a lot of some useful asset and don’t give them enough dollars.

Re: The Bitcoin Blockchain Visualized in 3D

#80

Post by milesokeefe »

lpellis wrote: post #22

This looks like something from Tron, trippy. The height of the block is the amount of BTC, there are some huge (thousands of BTC) transactions happening. On a semi related note, I built a 3D visualization (globe) to see where these blocks are geographically mined. https://coinminingstats.com/globe

Would be cool to see a heat map of this, or a historical view you can scrub through.
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