What is Ethereum?
Founder of Ethereum
Most people will think of Vitalik buterin as the creator of the Ethereum network. Vitalik Buterin, the creator and co-founder of the Ethereum blockchain, published a white paper titled 'The Next Generation of Smart Contracts and Decentralized Application Platforms' in 2013 at the age of just 19 . In that white paper, Buterin described the idea of a blockchain that would allow decentralized computers to run any application with enough time and resources.
Afterwards , it was decided to sell the network's native token, ether, in the form of an ICO (Initial Coin Offering) to finance the development . Ethereum was launched in 2015, and the initial supply of Ether at that time was 72 million.
Bitcoin vs. Ethereum
Bitcoin is a blockchain that focuses on functions as money, such as payment and transaction-related systems. Because it is designed for transactions, security is set as the top priority, and information other than transactions is difficult to record and the code is limited. In addition, there is a disadvantage that the data processing speed is significantly slow for other functions to enter.
Many alternative coins have emerged to overcome the limitations of Bitcoin. These alternative coins are called alternatives, so they are called altcoins. Ethereum is the platform and first altcoin that has provided a foothold for these altcoins to appear .
Ethereum provides scalability to transparently operate various applications such as contracts and emails as well as transactions and payments . Developers have more freedom to experiment with their code on Ethereum and create decentralized applications. Most recently popular NFTs are also based on Ethereum (ERC-721, ERC-1155) .
Also, one of the biggest differences between Bitcoin and Ethereum is Turing complete. Turing completeness means that anything can be computed given enough computing power and time. Bitcoin has a Turing imperfection characteristic as a security issue. Ethereum, on the other hand, has this Turing-completeness, giving users virtually limitless possibilities. However, it has potential security problems due to its complexity, but it has been compensated to some extent by the introduction of a transaction fee (or gas fee).