3 ms·
Bitcoin wastes an obscene amount of energy for a theoretical maximum of seven transactions per second globally. How is that even remotely scalable?
by earthtolazlo 6y ago
Bitcoin wastes an obscene amount of energy for a theoretical maximum of seven transactions per second globally. How is that even remotely scalable?
- joeblau 6y agoI'm not a Bitcoin advocate, I just recognize the value the invention provided and I recognize that this whole cryptocurrency space relies on it being successful for long enough for anything else usurp it. If Bitcoin got hacked right now, everything crashes with it. Compared to Bitcoin, there are consensus mechanisms that are a lot faster (3 orders of magnitude), cheaper (almost free transaction cost), near instant finality (seconds, not 1 hour) and leave almost zero carbon footprint. They just haven't been proven out at scale yet.
- DennisP 6y agoYes, and the production launch of that new consensus mechanism is what happened today on Ethereum. It runs on a minimum of 16K nodes, and last I checked had about 60% more than that.
- brandonmenc 6y ago> there are consensus mechanisms that are a lot faster (3 orders of magnitude) Correct me if I'm wrong, but this still falls far short of like, VISA.
- DennisP 6y agoToday's big Ethereum news is the launch of new tech that eliminates that energy wastage, without sacrificing security or decentralization. It also lays the groundwork for scaling tech that will vastly increase the transactions per second.