i thought i can buy and sell them when the value rise. i guess thats not the way you guys make real money.
i still dont get what the mining is. it involves some computer stuff right?
so what is it and how do you do it?
it's complicated but basically, the network is creating new blocks every 10 minutes.
Each new block contains the new transactions that people makes (and got validated by the miner).
Miners are people who keep validating transactions by using their power capacity.
It is not possible to mine a block alone now. Block reward is 25 block now, and will decrease over time.
So, people are mining in "pools": they share the power, and when the pool find a block, they will split the reward through everyone who contributed (might be thousands of people). So basically, you have a smaller reward, but a constant one. And of course it depends about the power you bring to the pool. The more power you have, the better reward you get.
But you need specific components (ASICS) if you want to have enough power now to get anything.
Most people don't understand money anyway. 
