How Bitcoin Saved Wikileaks

A thread 🧵👇 In 2010, WikiLeaks released its most impactful leak - the Afghanistan and Iraq War Logs.

Their contents shocked the world.

They also marked the beginning of a technical, political, financial, and legal assault against WikiLeaks and its founder Julian Assange.

Is Michael Dell buying bitcoin?

Let's see if history can give us any clues.

A thread 🧵👇 In the early 2010s, Dell's business was struggling as consumers were shunning laptops in favour of smartphones and tablets.

But Michael Dell is not one to give up easily. He wanted to turn the company around away from Wall Street's prying eyes.

If you weren't around in the early days—this is the unbelievable story of how a sheep farmer’s son became an internet pioneer, discovered bitcoin at $3, and infected dozens of billionaires with bitcoin fever.

Meet Wences Casares aka Bitcoin’s Patient Zero 🧵👇 Born in 1974, Wences was raised on a sheep ranch in the beautiful but remote region of Patagonia, Argentina.

The closest town, which consisted of just a shop and post office, was 100km (60 miles) away down a dirt track.

It was an isolated upbringing.

14 years ago, Laszlo Hanyecz purchased two Papa Johns pizzas for 10,000 BTC ($41).

Today, 10,000 BTC are worth $700 million and could buy a 40% stake in Papa Johns 🤯

Here's the story of the world's most expensive pizzas (like you've never heard before):

🧵 Bitcoin was just 1.5 years old back in 2010.

Users were a colourful mix of cryptographers, computer nerds, and the odd anarcho-capitalist libertarian. The digital currency was hard to get and even harder to giveaway.

It had almost no monetary value (1 BTC was less than a penny)

This is Dr. Adam Back, one of only a handful of cryptographers and cypherpunks cited in the Bitcoin White Paper.

In 2013, he spent 4 months trying to improve bitcoin. Despite having a PhD in Distributed Systems, he failed.

So, why is it so difficult to improve Bitcoin? 🧵 To answer this question, we must go back to the beginning and first answer, "What is bitcoin?"

According to the white paper, bitcoin is a peer-to-peer electronic cash system.

In other words...

Why This Halving Is Different

A thread 🧵 The number of new bitcoin issued per block just halved.

This is nothing new. It's happened every 210,000 blocks (approximately every 4 years) since bitcoin was launched. Satoshi programmed bitcoin to do this.

So what makes this halving different?

What actual utility do you, personally, get from running a bitcoin full node?

🧵 We all know the popular saying "bitcoin is rules without rulers."

I have a slightly different take on this.

Bitcoin is rules enforced by a decentralized set of rulers aka node operators.

So... everyone is cheering on the bitcoin spot ETFs - but I think they're the end of bitcoin as we know it.

Here's how I think it all goes down... *disclaimer - I don't *want* bitcoin to fail. The world will be a better place if it wins...

but wanting something doesn't mean it's going to happen. If it did, we would all be in our citadels, living on a bitcoin standard.

I would short bitcoin if there was an easy way to do it.

That's what Bill Gates said in 6 years ago when bitcoin was at $9,600.

Bitcoin is up 600% since then.

Here are 21 (😉) other historically bad takes on bitcoin.

🧵 1. Nouriel Roubini

The famed...wait, why is this guy even famous?

He's a treasure trove of terrible bitcoin takes.

Roubini went particularly hard at El Salvador in late 2022 as the FTX fraud caused bitcoin's price to crash.

Bitcoin is up 350% since then.

One of the most revolutionary inventions ever: Bitcoin.

On January 3, 2009, bitcoin's mysterious creator Satoshi Nakamoto mined the first ever block.

Since then, bitcoin has outperformed all other assets.

Here are 9 reasons why bitcoin is so valuable: @BitboBTC 1. Limited Supply

Unlike fiat currencies, stocks, and many others assets of which more units can be created, bitcoin has a supply cap of 21 million.

Bitcoin is scarce.

Hey Hey Hey!

The BitConnect Ponzi: How An Unknown Man From Rural India Stole $2.4 Billion and Got Away With It

🧵 Satish Kumbhani was born in the small rural village of Hemal in Gujarat, India.

Hemal's population is just 4,340.

He probably came from humble beginnings.

I say probably because Satish is a mysterious character.

The Incredible Story of the Unlikely Man Who Stole 50,000 BTC ($3B) From the Silk Road

🧵 It's Wednesday, March 13, 2019, in Athens, Georgia.

James "Jimmy" Zhong has just returned home from a trip to find someone has broken into his house.

He calls 911 immediately.

The US GOVERNMENT ACCIDENTALLY LEAKED the emails of everyone bidding on the bitcoin seized from Silk Road.

Spoiler alert: it led to a bidder losing 100 BTC.

🧵 Ross Ulbricht, the founder of the darknet website Silk Road, was arrested in October 2013.

The US Government (USG) seized 144,000 BTC from the Silk Road and 29,656 of Ross's personal BTC.

THE DAY THAT 184.5 BILLION EXTRA BITCOIN WERE CREATED

The day is Sunday August 15, 2010.

Block 74,638 is mined with a strange transaction.

It contains 3 outputs which balloon the bitcoin total supply into the billions.

What the hell happened?

🧵 Satoshi sat down at his computer and opened the bitcoin talk forum, as he does almost daily.

His eyes were immediately drawn to two threads.

"Strange block 74638"

"overflow bug SERIOUS"

Bitcoin self-custody: 12 vs 24-word mnemonic seed phrases.

Which is better? 🧵 What is a bitcoin mnemonic seed phrase?

It's a way of representing a numerical bitcoin seed using words.

Mnemonic seed phrases were implemented in bitcoin as a result of the creation of BIP39 (more on that later)

Bitcoin is a bubble with no intrinsic value.

That's what I told myself back in 2017.

Turns out, mainstream media isn't a great place to get your information.

Thankfully, these 5 incredible pieces of content changed my mind.

And now, I'm all in.

Here they are:

🧵 1⃣ Michael Saylor on How Bitcoin Infiltrates Corporate America from the Real Vision YouTube Channel

In this interview with Raoul Pal, @saylor goes deep into his thesis on why bitcoin is a great asset.

It's a masterclass.

🔗:

Bitcoin for All? Or Do Spot ETFs Betray Satoshi's Vision?

a thread 🧵👇: In 2008, an individual (or group) under the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto introduced Bitcoin, a peer-to-peer electronic cash system.

Satoshi's email to the cypherpunk's mailing list on Halloween 2008 began, "I've been working on a new electronic cash system that's fully peer-to-peer, with no trusted third party."

Bitcoin was a system designed to be free from the control of any single entity. A revolutionary idea where financial access to all, without censorship, was foundational.

Let’s make sure millions of people see this.

Darkness cannot prevail in the light of truth.

Thanks to everyone who is helping cast a light on this.

Just listened to latest two episodes of @WhatBitcoinDid with @ericyakes and @thetrocro while lying in bed unable to sleep.

Highly recommend. Highly recommend listening to the episodes, not the lying in bed unable to sleep part : ).

Any companies that cut sick pay for unvaccinated employees will be losing me as a customer.

Don't take this as an indication of my stance on the vaccine.

Take it as an indication of my stance on individual freedom and rights. Will they cut sick pay benefits for other people who could be rationally argued to not be looking after their health in the best way possible (smokers, drinkers, overweight people etc)?

My guess is no, because this isn't about health, it's about a political ideology and LARPing.

The Chinese government has duped its entrepreneurs into building them big tech surveillance networks. Replies saying they weren't duped. I hear what you are saying.

Perhaps I should rephrase: I don't think Jack Ma etc would have chosen to build businesses in China if they knew that the government would 'disappear' them and take effective control of them.