What is Ethereum

Ethereum runs smart contracts without any possibility of downtime, censorship, fraud or third-party interference. $ETH is used to power these applications.

Ethereum is a decentralized platform that runs smart contracts: applications that run exactly as programmed without any possibility of downtime, censorship, fraud or third-party interference. These apps run on a custom built blockchain, an enormously powerful shared global infrastructure that can move value around and represent the ownership of property.  

This enables developers to create markets, store registries of debts or promises, move funds in accordance with instructions given long in the past (like a will or a futures contract) and many other things that have not been invented yet, all without a middleman or counterparty risk.  

The project was bootstrapped via an ether presale in August 2014 by fans all around the world. It is developed by the Ethereum Foundation, a Swiss non-profit, with contributions from great minds across the globe.  

Ethereum is a decentralized platform that runs smart contracts: applications that run exactly as programmed without any possibility of downtime, censorship, fraud or third party interference. Ethereum applications are powered by ether, the Ethereum network’s currency. Ether is like a vehicle for moving around on the Ethereum platform and is sought by developers looking to develop and run applications inside Ethereum.  

Ethereum is also used as a platform to launch other cryptocurrencies. Because of the Ethereum features and its potential to change the world forever, it has caught everybody’s attention including corporations like Microsoft and individuals like you and me.  

Ethereum was proposed in late 2013 by Vitalik Buterin, a cryptocurrency researcher and programmer. Development was funded by an online crowdsale that took place between July and August 2014. The Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) first went live on 30 July 2015.  

In 2016, as a result of the collapse of The DAO project, Ethereum was split into two separate blockchains – the new separate version became Ethereum (ETH), and the original continued as Ethereum Classic (ETC). The value of the Ethereum currency grew over 13,000 percent in 2017.  

Ethereum is a decentralized platform that uses blockchain technology to facilitate smart contracts and cryptocurrency trades. Ethereum is the second-largest cryptocurrency platform by market capitalization, behind Bitcoin. Ethereum was proposed in late 2013 by Vitalik Buterin, a cryptocurrency researcher and programmer.  

Ethereum's blockchain stores state transitions that occur in its internal state, which includes the current balances of all accounts and any smart contracts. This is accomplished through a process known as mining, where miners validate transactions and commit them to the blockchain. Ethereum’s native cryptocurrency, Ether (ETH), is used to pay miners for their work.  

Ethereum is an open source, public blockchain-based distributed computing platform, featuring smart contract functionality. It provides a decentralized Turing-complete virtual machine, the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), that can execute scripts using an international network of public nodes. Ethereum also provides a cryptocurrency token called "Ether", which can be transferred between accounts and used to compensate participant nodes for computations performed.  

Ethereum can be used to codify, decentralize, secure and trade just about anything: voting, domain names, financial exchanges, crowdfunding, company governance, contracts and agreements of most kind, intellectual property, and even smart property thanks to hardware integration.  

In short, Ethereum is a decentralized platform that runs smart contracts: applications that run exactly as programmed without any possibility of downtime, censorship, fraud or third-party interference. Ethereum applications are powered by ether, the Ethereum network’s currency. Ether is like a vehicle for moving around on the Ethereum platform and is sought by developers looking to develop and run applications inside Ethereum.