Whitepaper

A Whitepaper is a technical document or report that explains how a cryptocurrency works.

It provides a vision of the roadmap the developers will take, proving details about the purpose of the asset, what it does, what it solves, and how the team will go about accomplishing this.

Some whitepapers get very specific about the inner workings of the asset and possibly its network or the network it will use, while others take a more high-level approach.

Cryptocurrency teams use whitepapers not only as a technical resource for other developers but also as a marketing tool to would-be investors who are possibly interested in investing in the project.

You can read the original Ethereum whitepaper here.

You can read the original Bitcoin whitepaper here.

Related Terms

Ethereum (ETH)

Ethereum is a decentralized blockchain platform that makes digital money, global payments, and applications possible using open-source software and smart contract functionality. The big difference between the two is that Ethereum is programmable, meaning you can build and use decentralized apps on the network. That means the Ethereum blockchain can be programmed to do virtually anything.

Bitcoin (BTC)

Bitcoin (BTC) is most well known as a digital decentralized cryptocurrency, without a central bank or single administrator, that can be sent from user to user on the peer-to-peer Bitcoin network without the need for intermediaries, such as payment gateways or banks or routing services. Think of bitcoin as Internet money, that you can send and receive directly, to and from anyone, and you can use it to pay for stuff.

Cardano (ADA)

Cardano is a decentralized open-source blockchain platform built with proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus, offering smart contract capabilities, and using the native cryptocurrency ADA.

Shill

Crypto slang for promoting bitcoin or an altcoin for your own benefit. A person who does the shilling can be called a shill (and other things, too!).

Charles Hoskinson

Charles Hoskinson is a technology entrepreneur and mathematician famous for co-founding Cardano, Ethereum, and Input Output Global, Inc. (formerly IOHK). Cardano was developed by IOHK and Hoskinson.