New currency Primecoin searches for prime numbers as proof of work

New currency Primecoin searches for prime numbers as proof of work

A new digital currency has been announced, which uses prime numbers as its proof of work. Primecoin is still in beta, but its goal is to provide a proof of concept that a digital currency can produce something useful besides its subjective market value. One of the criticisms always put against bitcoin is that the cryptographic computation that provides proof of work has no intrinsic value. This is true - the bitcoin market places a subjective value on the currency, just as any other commodity. However, at least physical coins can be melted down and used to make something else. Long before....


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