Explaining Mining to Newbs \ stacker news ~bitcoin

I'm noticing a recent mainstream trend. No-coiners talking about Bitcoin seem to bring up the topic of mining a lot lately.

Two separate conversations this week, where the topic of Bitcoin came up with no-coiners, went like this:

"I just don't understand this mining thing. What the heck is it? It seems useless and unnecessary."

They seem to bring it up as a FUD topic, with a smirk, as if it's a blemish to Bitcoin.

So, I wanted to ask the community, how do you respond to normies who ask about mining?

I'll go first: I do my best to steer clear of any of the technical aspects behind it. Instead, I say something along the lines of:

"Mining is a way for Bitcoin to fairly distribute new money. It requires work. You put in the work, you get something in return. As opposed to the Central Banks on the dollar system who simply change numbers in a computer to create money; no work involved."

And I leave it at that. No actual description of how mining actually works, unless they actually want to go deeper and ask more questions.

So how do you all approach this subject to newbs without making their eyes glaze over?

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @030e0dca83 2 Dec 2023

I'm this year old when I have discovered how the mining really works.

Mining prevents cheating. You have to do hard work to add block while check your work can everyone and it's easy. Cheating in mining is economically inefficient

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @jakoyoh629 2 Dec 2023

I would say that mining is the central bank of Bitcoin. It is the "entity" responsible for validating and confirming transactions. This entity is made up of thousands of people. Like a central bank, it issues currency but in a decreasing amount over time. That is why Bitcoin is said to be deflationary money.