commit 5584e0df44af3f36a5ed7ec35a064a1968ca1102
parent 71d3e8175b0f094a9c8f19648c5c8ea3c7127409
Author: Ville-Matias Heikkila <viznut@low.fi>
Date: Fri, 17 Jun 2022 15:26:23 +0300
add page
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+**Cryptocurrency** is a form of [[decentralized|decentralization]] digital
+currency that uses strong cryptography for security and verification.
+
+**Proof-of-work** cryptocurrencies such as **Bitcoin** are extremely
+problematic from the permacomputing point of view. Their market value is
+closely connected to the amount of energy used for "mining", which is
+currently a huge amount of wasted energy (IEA estimates ~100 TWh global
+consumption for 2020; in comparison, all of the world's data centers
+consumed 200-250 TWh that year). The embodied energy from the production of
+the vast amounts computing hardware used exclusively for "mining" is not
+included in this figure, and the material life cycles of the hardware will
+of course need to be considered as well.
+
+What about only using renewable surplus energy and otherwise useless
+hardware for mining, or participating in the PoW-crypto market without
+participating in mining at all? It can argued that this is problematic as
+well, since mere participation in the market may help maintain the value
+system.
+
+**Proof-of-stake** is the main alternative to the proof-of-work model. It
+has not yet been assessed from the permacomputing point of view. (If you
+have studied this topic, please consider assessing it and expand the page
+accordingly)
+
+**Blockchain** is the type of data structure used by cryptocurrencies. They
+may be useful for some purposes of decentralization, but it is doubtful
+whether they are an optimal or even good solution for any problem. (If you
+have studied this topic, please consider expanding the page)
