Proof-of-stake and casper
Before we get into what the casper consensus protocol is, we need to understand how the proof-of-stake consensus protocol works.
Proof-of-stake is the most common alternative to proof-of-work. Proof-of-work wastes too many computational resources. The difference between POW and POS is that in POS, a miner doesn't need to solve the puzzle; instead the miner needs to prove ownership of the stake to mine the block. In the POS system, ether in accounts is treated as a stake, and the probability of a miner mining the block is directly proportional to the stake the miner holds. So if the miner holds 10% of the stake in the network, it will mine 10% of the blocks.
But the question is how will we know who will mine the next ...
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