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What is Litecoin? (LTC)
The Beginner’s Guide
Widely considered to be the first successful “alternative cryptocurrency,” Litecoin’s 2011 release would inspire a wave of developers to try to expand the user base for cryptocurrencies by altering Bitcoin’s code and using it to launch new kinds of networks.
So, while Litecoin was not the first cryptocurrency to copy Bitcoin’s code and modify its features, it is one of the more historically significant, establishing a robust market over time even as it has sometimes faced criticisms that it lacks a clear value proposition.
For example, Litecoin would first differentiate its technology by reducing the amount of time it took for new blocks of transactions to be added to its blockchain. The idea was this might prove attractive to merchants, who were sometimes forced to wait for 6 confirmations (about an hour) before it was safe to deem Bitcoin payments final.
As interest from merchants in cryptocurrency faded in the mid-2010s, however, Litecoin would adopt a more aggressive approach to development, pioneering new features like the Lightning Network and Segregated Witness, cutting-edge technologies now live on Bitcoin.
Rather than stoking competition between the networks, the market has largely viewed these efforts as in line with Litecoin’s values. (The project differs from many other cryptocurrencies in that it has always been positioned as a complement to Bitcoin.)
Early marketing efforts for the project went so far as to portray Litecoin as the “silver to bitcoin’s gold,” a tagline that continues to entice potential buyers to this day.
What is Litecoin (LTC)?
Who created Litecoin?
Since 2011, Litecoin has been closely associated with its founder and creator, Charlie Lee, a computer scientist and graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Lee would go on to a career in technology before creating Litecoin, working at Internet giant Google. He later joined cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase as Director of Engineering in 2013.
Once joining the startup, Lee largely put the development of Litecoin aside, saying in 2017 that he thought his most important goal at the time was to help people “own bitcoin and hold bitcoin.”
In late 2017, Lee departed Coinbase to pursue Litecoin development full time. Lee now serves as the managing director of the Litecoin Foundation, a non-profit dedicated to the project.
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