On October 31, 2008, Satoshi Nakamoto released “Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System,” the technical vision for a “purely peer-to-peer version of electronic cash” that would become the preeminent cryptocurrency and blockchain.
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As the growth of Bitcoin has proven, the need for a P2P, electronic version of cash was much needed then and has become even more important today. What better time than this anniversary to revisit this seminal document?
In the paper, Nakamoto outlines many of the qualities that have made Bitcoin so successful — including transaction signature verification, timestamping and proof of work — with notable prescience. For instance, Bitcoin’s critical difficulty adjustment (cont. below):
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“To compensate for increasing hardware speed and varying interest in running nodes over time, the proof-of-work difficulty is determined by a moving average targeting an average number of blocks per hour. If they're generated too fast, the difficulty increases.”
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Following the release of the white paper, the pseudonymous Nakamoto continued to work on the development of Bitcoin remotely and collaborate with others. But Nakamoto’s last message to the Bitcoin Talk forum was sent on December 12, 2010.
Some fun facts: Today is Halloween in the U.S., but it’s also remembered as the official start of the Reformation, as the anniversary of the day that Martin Luther posted his “95 Theses” on the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany.
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Did Satoshi time the beginning of his own digital revolution to coincide with the historic anniversary? We wouldn’t put it past Bitcoin’s founding figure...
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If you like the image at the top of this thread and you’re looking for something special this White Paper Day, head over to our store and cop this commemorative shirt:
The U.S. Presidential Election is looming and we want you to join our watch party! We'll be hosting Marbles and election commentary over on our Twitch channel (twitch.tv/bitcoin) on November 3 starting at 7:00 pm ET. Mark your calendars and stay tuned for updates!
Throughout the stream, we're trying to give away 10,000,000 sats! We've teamed up with @earncarrot to reward our audience for their election hot takes, predictions and content.
First up, we're calling for your dankest election memes! Learn more here:
Macro Update! Bitcoin Winning Against Governments - Fed Watch 26
This week @ck_SNARKs and @AnselLindner recap prior guests, discuss recent Federal Reserve quiet, the ECB digital Euro study and trademarking of the term, and dive in deeply into the @Bitmex, Bitcoin, & @Tether.
Today commemorates an important day in the #Bitcoin community where on August 1st, 2017, users decided to claim control over the network. We've compiled a thread of @AaronvanW's coverage on the event dating back to May 2017👇#UASF#No2X
May 24th, 2017 — Spearheaded by @barrysilbert's DCG, over 50 companies signed and published a “Bitcoin Scaling Agreement” on Medium. [It] intends to put an end to Bitcoin’s long-lasting scaling debate.
June 16, 2017 — Bitcoin’s long-lasting scaling debate appeared to be heading toward a climax lately, with two proposals gaining significant traction. At one end... BIP148, a user activated soft fork.. On the other, there’s SegWit2x. bitcoinmagazine.com/articles/bip91…