ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5
Do you demand a simple and concise explanation of complicated and complex topics?
Fret not, dear voater, for ELI5 is here! Ask a complex question, and get a simple answer!
General guidelines:
Your explanation should be friendly and straightforward, but not condescending.
- 1.1. Above all, you're here to answer questions concisely. Don't get needlessly hostile or complicated in your response.
- 1.2. We aren't literally 5 year olds. Well, most of us aren't. We can handle big words and long sentences. There's no need to dumb down an explanation unless specifically asked to do so by the asker.
- 1.3. If specified by the asker, responses to particular levels of expertise are encouraged.
/v/ELI5 is a place to get simple explanations of complex topics.
- 2.1. Yes/no answer questions, and questions pursuing an answer without an explanation of that answer, are not allowed.
- 2.2: If it doesn't have an explanation, it isn't an explain like I'm five question.
- 2.3. Refrain from posing hypothetical or personal questions. Ideally, every question should have a factually based, reasonable explanation.
Feel free to send prohibited questions to /v/nostupidquestions, they'll help you out instead!
This isn't a debating subverse:
- 3.1. Don't ask for personal opinions (and don't ask potentially loaded questions)
- 3.2. Don't present a biased response
Top-level comments should be on-topic.
- 4.1. Self-explanatory, really.
- 4.2. Jokes are allowed and appreciated if they're on topic and not a whole top-level comment.
Someone came here for an answer, don't send them somewhere else.
- 5.1. Your response should not consist wholly of a redirection link within a sentence.
- 5.2. It is acceptable to link to outside sources for singular words or concepts. This can be done to save you explaining concepts that are non-central (yet still important) to your response.
- 5.3. Don't copy+paste from outside sources without paraphrasing. Outside sources don't always explain concepts in layman's terms.
Don't know? Don't teach.
- 6.1. If you don't know what you're talking about, don't try to teach someone else about it.
You are allowed to post a question that's been posted before, but to save your own time, search for it before posting anyway.
Tag your post as "Explained" once you're satisfied with an answer
All moderation decisions are made at the moderation team's discretion. You won't be protected by loopholes if you're using them to a detrimental effect.
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[–] marvinrabbit ago (edited ago)
Specifically regarding the mining process...
Very roughly, the mining is the mathematical processes required to validate and approve a batch of bitcoin transactions. Think of it like this... A batch of transactions form a lock by running all the transactions through a simple math formula. The mining is the effort to find a key that would open that lock. Only once a key is found for a batch of transactions are all the transactions finalized. So the process starts over with a new batch of transactions as soon as the previous one is done. Whoever finds the key is rewarded with some amount of bitcoins. (Many miners work together as a "pool" to spread out the risk and share in the gains.)
Here is a good basic explanation of the mining process. Play the video on the main page.
Pay attention to the part where it talks about different inventions that let more and more specialized computers do the mining faster and faster. The upshot is that several hundred dollars of modern specialized equipment can do the mining process millions of times faster than (even very powerful) desktop or server computers. It would be so slow on anything besides these specialized machines that you would not come close to covering the cost of electricity of running your computers. (And before you say, "Well, I have computers running anyway..." This would pin the processors at 100% constantly and draw even more power. And even then, you would have an infinitesimal fraction of the processing, and thus the earning, of one of these machines. Don't tempt yourself into thinking it is feasible with general computers.)
Edit: The last part of this is really aimed at /v/deadlyaura