So you understand what is a blockchain and the different types of blockchains. The first application of blockchain technology is currencies, known better today as cryptocurrency. The first cryptocurrency ever created is Bitcoin, by anonymous pseudonym, Satoshi Nakamoto, in January 2009.
Nakamoto mined the first block, called the Genesis Block or Block 0, and left a message in the code which says, "The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks".
The significance of this message is open to interpretation. Speculative at best, it is the headline of a London Times article published on January 3, 2009 containing details of the British government bailing out banks. Best guess is that this is what inspired Nakamoto to create the Bitcoin network, hoping to cut out banks and third parties whose self interest is corrupt and unreliable, and place the power back into the hands of citizens.
Cypherpunk Hal Finney received the first bitcoin transaction from Nakamoto for downloading the bitcoin software on the day it was released, which was six days after the genesis block was mined. 10 bitcoins in exchange for downloading a free software. Bitcoins wasn’t pegged to a fiat price then, so its hard to tell what was the monetary price for one.
October 5, 2009 – New Liberty Standard opened a service to buy/sell bitcoins, with an initial exchange rate of $0.008 USD for 1 bitcoin
October 12 2009 – New Liberty Standard purchases 5,052 bitcoins from a miner named Sirius for $5.02
2009 – Norwegian, Kristoffer Koch bought 5,000 bitcoins for $27
May 22, 2010 – BitcoinTalk user ‘laslow’ (Laszlo Hanyecz) paid fellow BitcoinTalk user ‘jercos’ 10,000 bitcoins for two pizzas. These two pizzas were valued at approximately $41
Bitcoin has been used as currencies since then in a number of transactions. Dark web users used bitcoin to buy drugs etc on Silk Road. Lamborghini is the first car company in the world to accept bitcoins as payment for their cars. Numerous other businesses have also started accepting bitcoin as payment, though they still accept fiat as well.
With Bitcoin being priced at $10,943.30 at the time of this writing, it is uncertain if Nakamoto intended for Bitcoin to have such a high valuation or being traded for profit. One thing is certain — his vision to cut out banks and third parties have been widely accepted.
It must be noted that Bitcoin isn’t the only cryptocurrency that can be used to make purchases. Other well known cryptocurrencies include but not limited to: Ethereum, Bitcoin Cash, Litecoin, Dash, Monero etc. Each of these cryptocurrencies have different features and are seen as alternatives to Bitcoin based on the cryptos intended use.
Do you own bitcoin? Have you used bitcoin to purchase anything? Do you think a peer to peer electronic cash system such as bitcoin is the future?
