Silk Road forums

Discussion => Newbie discussion => Topic started by: barney010278 on March 06, 2013, 01:33 pm

Title: What holds up BTC?
Post by: barney010278 on March 06, 2013, 01:33 pm
I used to understand egold, that your money was put into gold, but what is BTC,
is it shares in a company or something?
Title: Re: What holds up BTC?
Post by: Arcturian on March 06, 2013, 01:35 pm
Bitcoins are a solved equation, there's a capped limit of coins, i believe its something like 21 million. And what keeps it up is simply demand
Title: Re: What holds up BTC?
Post by: barney010278 on March 06, 2013, 01:46 pm
Bitcoins are a solved equation, there's a capped limit of coins, i believe its something like 21 million. And what keeps it up is simply demand

thanks Arcturian, could they like companies on a share market devalue the equation, for example making 42 million coins and halving the value of your portfolio
Title: Re: What holds up BTC?
Post by: kgfcfdq on March 06, 2013, 01:52 pm
Nope, the amount of coins that will be generated is finite (21 million sounds about right), and they will be generated increasingly slowly. No one should be able to change that aspect of the system. They are infinity divisible though, so even if deflation continues at the same rate as it is just now forever then they will always still be usable, just that in the future we might be buying a gram of coke for 0.00000023 BTC instead of like 10 BTC :D
Title: Re: What holds up BTC?
Post by: Arcturian on March 06, 2013, 01:53 pm
I've asked the same thing and in my eyes i dont see why then couldnt create a new algorithm, and having a whole new 21 million solutions or however many. But for whatever reason (Im sure its more complicated then i make out) they cant. And no they cant devalue them or value them. Bitcoin themselves dont run any btc trading sites. Its purely controlled by demand. A few months ago they were £6. SR is pegged to the value and changes accordingly so it doesnt really matter, the price of items is still the same £