What Is Bitcoin?

[brandelynmarie]

(Mining bitcoins is not a viable way to make money without a lot of computing power at your disposal. Far more than the average person has available to them. It makes me sad too. :sad2: )

  

Read, a lot of efficient computing power. It's about how many floating point operations you can do per watt-hour. If you can design a good ASIC for it, you're in business. Also, living in, say, Idaho, where electricity is less than a penny per kWh, helps a lot.

It sounds like it would be hard to do....

[Nihil Obstat]

so when ppl say you can't make money mining bitcoins, it's because you're paying for the electricity?

so if you're in some kind of university dormitory and don't pay for electricity... could you make at least some money with an average computer (like a laptop) seeing as you're not paying for the electricity? or would an ordinary computer not be enough to generate anything worthwhile?

With an average consumer computer dedicated to mining and nothing else, and a year to spare... Couple dollars, I think. Not much.