Bitcoin

What Bitcoin Is

Bitcoin is a consensus network that carries a payment system and a digital money. bitcoin.org describes it as the first decentralised peer-to-peer payment network, powered by its users, with no central authority and no middlemen, and states that nobody owns the Bitcoin network any more than anyone owns the technology behind email. The first Bitcoin specification and proof of concept was published in 2009 by Satoshi Nakamoto.

Who Runs It

No company operates Bitcoin. The reference software is maintained by the Bitcoin Core project, which describes itself as an open-source project and a direct descendant of the original client released by Satoshi Nakamoto. Because there is no operator, there is also no customer-service desk, no chargeback and no central party able to reverse a payment.

Where It Works

bitcoin.org states that bitcoins can be sent and received anywhere in the world at any time, so the network itself is not limited by country. That is a statement about the network, not about gambling law: whether a casino may accept a crypto deposit, and whether a player may make one, depends on the market and on the operator's own licence conditions.

Supply and Irreversibility

Only twenty-one million bitcoins will ever be created; the number issued each year halves over time until issuance stops at that total. A Bitcoin transaction cannot be reversed by the sender — it can only be refunded by the person who received the funds. What that does and does not mean is worth stating precisely, because the difference is a real one. bitcoin.org states that Bitcoin can detect typos and usually will not let a sender send money to an invalid address by mistake, while adding that it is best to have controls in place for additional safety and redundancy. So an address that fails its checksum is normally refused before a payment is made; what the network cannot undo is a confirmed payment to a VALID address, whoever controls it, or a confirmed payment of the wrong amount. Recovering either depends on the person who received the funds agreeing to send them back.

Timings and Fees

bitcoin.org states that transactions are broadcast to the network and usually receive their first confirmation within about ten to sixty minutes, and that new blocks are added roughly every ten minutes on average, though block discovery is probabilistic. It notes that many parties treat six confirmations as settled. On fees, bitcoin.org states that transactions are typically processed with a fee and that fees vary over time with demand for space in the blockchain, and that there is no fee to receive bitcoins. No fixed figure is given, because none is stated.

One thing to watch is the volatility of the currency. Bitcoin has experienced major fluctuations over its life, and it still fluctuates more than major world currencies.