Mining is essentially lending your computing power to the blockchain to record and verify transactions keeping the whole thing secure and traceable. In simple terms the miners get to decide what to ratify and what to reject, so anything dodgy looking trying to cheat the system obviously gets told to **** off, this is what gives it security. It does also mean if someone/some group were to gain control of 51% of all mining activity they could manipulate the entire thing and do whatever they want with it, although the chances of that happening are slim to none.
It uses so much electricity because you have to put in so much computing power in order to stand half a chance of getting anything out of it. The rigs the people use for mining are quite literally insane and cost well into the thousands to set up. There are other coins which use other methods to validate the chain, some use a proof of stake model whereby you stake coins in order to vote on what to accept/reject, instead of 'mining'.
IMO I personally would stay away from bitcoin, of the crypto currencies available, if any were to become a widely accepted currency I doubt it would be bitcoin as it's very slow and expensive to move around. Others such as Litecoin and XRP for example are miles ahead in both regards. And as has already been stated it's been piggy backed by investors and chancers so probably inflated presently and unlikely to grow a significant amount again, although that's obviously impossible to tell and it could quite easily be worth £100k a coin by tomorrow.
I'm not a bitcoin nerd, I got a tip off from a bitcoin nerd well over a year ago to buy in and ignored it (more fool me) but sat up and took notice when it started rising rapidly last year so got into some of the other promising coins. Nothing big but if any of the coins I've dropped cash into ever manage to rise to the extent bitcoin already has I'll never have to work again.
It uses so much electricity because you have to put in so much computing power in order to stand half a chance of getting anything out of it. The rigs the people use for mining are quite literally insane and cost well into the thousands to set up. There are other coins which use other methods to validate the chain, some use a proof of stake model whereby you stake coins in order to vote on what to accept/reject, instead of 'mining'.
IMO I personally would stay away from bitcoin, of the crypto currencies available, if any were to become a widely accepted currency I doubt it would be bitcoin as it's very slow and expensive to move around. Others such as Litecoin and XRP for example are miles ahead in both regards. And as has already been stated it's been piggy backed by investors and chancers so probably inflated presently and unlikely to grow a significant amount again, although that's obviously impossible to tell and it could quite easily be worth £100k a coin by tomorrow.
I'm not a bitcoin nerd, I got a tip off from a bitcoin nerd well over a year ago to buy in and ignored it (more fool me) but sat up and took notice when it started rising rapidly last year so got into some of the other promising coins. Nothing big but if any of the coins I've dropped cash into ever manage to rise to the extent bitcoin already has I'll never have to work again.
Impossible to fathom out.