That could work

tbh I'd be happy with anything that's not "mining", but if we're going to change, we better do it right.

No.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reconciliation_(accounting)
This is exactly what miners are doing when checking against double spending!

If we use auditors instead of miners then reconciling is the perfect addition.

Excellent thread. I would like to see a few sentences at the end that also explain the initial creation of the supply.  Whenever I try to explain Bitcoin along the lines of what is attempted here, I get asked about the origin of Bitcoins in circulation. Any suggestions?

"Etching"

"Accounting period", as used in the finance industry and in business, means a month, a quarter, a fiscal year.  Using "accounting period" to mean a period that approximates 10 minutes - and whose actual length is totally random - will do little to help them understand what's happening.  Also, there is no requirement that a "block" include any or all of the transactions that happened during the "period" they purport to account for.  This becomes even less correlated in the event of what we presently call a chain reorganization.  May as well just continue to call it mining a block.

If miners' GPUs were busy adding the inputs and the outputs of the transactions together and comparing the sums to ensure they balance, then I would certainly agree that they are reconciling.  If you are familiar with the algorithm that miners run though, you'll know that's not the case.

Here is my attempt. I tried incorporating the new terminology, as well as a number of things about the security and workings of bitcoin in general.

"The recorders record the transactions to the public ledger, setting them in stone so to speak. This recording costs a lot of processing power, to prevent someone with malicious intent from adding fake pages to the ledger with their home computer. Or, for that matter, to prevent a government that wants to hurt bitcoin from adding fake pages to the ledger: the recorders' combined is larger than the 500 top supercomputers combined, which means it is impossible for anyone to create fake pages.
As a compensation for the processing power, the recorders of the network currently get new coins. These coins didn't exist before, and slowly increase the supply of bitcoins available. The speed at which these new bitcoins are generated decreases over time. Currently there are about 7 million coins, but there will never be more than 21 million coins.
This reward for the recording serves both to distribute the new coins, and also to motivate people to be a recorder. Over time, the generation reward will go down. It is expected that at that point the transactions themselves will provide enough reward: Some of the transactions will cost a small fee, in the order of half a dollarcent. This fee is a reward to the recorders.

Having this small fee also prevents people from trying to harm bitcoin by sending lots and lots of small transactions, trying to clog the network. If they want to do that, it would actually cost them money, so the recorders would not care since they're compensated by small fees on the spam-transactions."

Note that I have taken some liberty in the explanation. The bit about "fake pages" is slightly different in reality, but I think it is more important to create an explanation that regular people from all backgrounds can understand. The difference between my explanation and the real explanation is small enough that they won't ever notice it, but it's much easier to explain. This still gives them a confidence in the security which is roughly equal to the real explanation.

Public ledger is scores better than block chain.  It's a term that actually makes sense to people in the business and financial world.

Ideally, we want terms with similar meaning in the real world, the objective being to use language to describe concepts people already understand.  Kind of how Apple decided that a "subdirectory" would better be understood by the world as a "folder".  If most accountants and financial sector workers are familiar with accounting periods of random length approximately ten minutes long, that may or may not contain transactions that took place during the period, then sure, it is an excellent choice, and I will leave it at that.


As it should be, and so should yours (not the mining part).  If the idea of changing core Bitcoin terminology gets a consensus around it, the pros and cons of every credible choice should be well enumerated.  If you already understand the mining algorithm, then accept my apologies for assuming otherwise (most people do not understand the mining algorithm nor do they need to).

I am looking to come up with better terminology to describe what bitcoin is, not so much what it's like, so I am favoring words that mean what is literally happening.  I am considering formally proposing to the developers and the community at large that we avoid terms like "block" and "block chain" (except when talking about source code etc.) in favor of accurate non-computer-scientific terms that will be better understood by the non-technical public, while still remaining literally correct.

People have referred bitcoin as a distributed digital notary service.  I like this description.  With such a notary service it is possible to implement a triple entry accounting system.  I wouldn't say that bitcoin *is* "triple entry crowd accounting," but it certainly enables it.  I like the use of "crowd" to distinguish it from your typical triple entry system which requires an independent third party to a transaction.  In the case of bitcoin, the crowd is that third party.  I'm not especially crazy about the term "crowd" however…maybe "Distributed Triple Entry Accounting" or "Two Party Triple Entry Accounting" (since it doesn't require any trusted third party …aside from the network itself).

Bold part needs rephrasing or simply scratch it. Its not like all bitcoin users are honest.


Dont like that phrase much either. Let the reader decide if its magic or not. IMO, it isnt magic, its math. Magic is something without rational explanation. Its brilliant perhaps, but no hocus pocus.  A thread holding the whole thing together also makes it sound as if its very fragile, when in reality its ridiculously robust.


As many others, I dont like the word crowd. I think words like "public" and "Open" are more appropriate.