Ethereum

What is Ethereum?

Just like Bitcoin, Ethereum is another cryptocurrency. Ethereum or Ether or ETH/ETC is not controlled by any one entity, it is also decentralized. Ethereum however, took the technology behind Bitcoin and improved it. It is its own network with their own coding language, browser and payment system. People can create their own decentralized application using the Ethereum Blockchain. For example, Tokenize’s very own token TKX uses the Ethereum Blockchain (Only available in Singapore currently). Cool right? You can create a new idea or decentralized reworks with existing concepts. There’s no need for a middleman or extra expenses of third parties.

In simple terms, Ethereum is an open software platform based on blockchain technology that enables developers to build and deploy decentralized applications.

History of Ethereum

Ethereum’s whitepaper was published in November 2013 by Vitalik Buterin, the co-founder of Ethereum and co-founder of Bitcoin Magazine.

In 2014, Buterin and the other co-founders of Ethereum launched a crowd-sourcing campaign where Ether (Ethereum) were sold to participants to kickstart and raised more than $18 million. The first live release of Ethereum known as Frontier was launched in 30th July 2015. The platform has grown swiftly since.

Similarities between Ethereum and Bitcoin

1. They are both a type of Digital Asset/Cryptocurrency
2. Both are decentralized
3. Both are a digital form of currency
4. Both uses blockchain
5. Both are market leaders in the Crypto world

Differences between Ethereum and Bitcoin

1. Bitcoin is limited in nature, only has 21 million in the world. The scarce nature is one of the factors why the pricing is as it is. Ethereum is unlimited but the creation of new coins are heavily controlled to ensure the value is not ruin by inflation.
2. Even though both are market leaders, Bitcoin is #1 in market cap at $182,746,465,208.75 (RM790,286,767,030) while Ethereum is #2 market cap at $23,685,537,831.56 (RM102,428,066,649).
3. Ethereum creates new coins faster than Bitcoin at 3 every 15 seconds while Bitcoin creates 12.5 new Bitcoins every 10 minutes. This rate will be cut into half (6.5 Bitcoin) during the 3rd Halving event on May 12th 2020.
4. While Bitcoin is mostly a means of payment, Ethereum is a programming platform on which you can write applications (dApps). With Ethereum, transactions have a different cost (called Gas) based on bandwidth use, computational complexity, and storage space. In Bitcoin, transaction costs are measured based on their block size only.
5. Bitcoin hard forks* include Bitcoin cash, Litecoin, Bitcoin Gold, Bitcoin Classic and many more. Ethereum hard forks created Ethereum Classic. A hard fork occurs when these consensus rules are expanded through different software
6. Bitcoin applications in real time include sectors such as banking, retail, entertainment and so on. Blockchain technology is growing exponentially to grab the top spot in the most innovative discovery of the decade. Even it is being used for voting and betting and many other industries. On the other hand, Ethereum applications are more prominent in domains such as self-driving cars- which Google announced some months back, then casinos or gambling, politics and so on.