What is Ether? What is the difference between Ether and Bitcoin?

What is Ether?

Ether is a digital currency developed on an open software platform based on blockchain technology that allows developers to build and deploy decentralized applications running smart contracts. Ether was first created in late 2013 by cryptocurrency researcher and programmer Vitalik Buterin.

What is the difference between Ether and Bitcoin?

Ether, like Bitcoin, is a distributed public blockchain network. While there are some significant technical differences between the two, the most important difference worth noting is that Bitcoin and Ether have very different purposes and capabilities. The Bitcoin blockchain is used to track ownership of digital currency (Bitcoin), while the Ether blockchain is concerned with running the programming code of any decentralized application.

What is a smart contract?

A smart contract is a computer code phrase used to describe something that can facilitate the exchange of money, content, property, stock, or any item of value. Smart contracts run on the blockchain, completely programmatically, without any possibility of auditing, downtime, fraud or third-party interference.