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Origins · DOC·001Bitcoin Whitepaper
Nine pages about sending digital money without a bank in between. A guide to the original proposal and what it does not contain.
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Bitcoin mainnetBlock ···Epoch 04
HISTSOURCE-LED TOPIC GUIDE
Bitcoin history: documents, people and milestones
Connect cypherpunk ideas and digital-cash experiments with the 2008 Bitcoin Whitepaper, the 2009 Genesis Block and later events.
14connected coordinates
116Source links
01What this field explains
Eric Hughes’s 1993 manifesto explains the relationship between privacy, cryptography and electronic money. Satoshi Nakamoto announced the Bitcoin Whitepaper on 31 October 2008; it cites Hashcash and b-money among other work. The Genesis Block bears a timestamp of 3 January 2009. Distinguish document dates, software release and later network use: chronological order alone does not establish direct influence or inevitable adoption.
Primary sources
This guide offers a selection, not a complete chronology. The sources below support the introduction; linked entries have their own sources and reviews. A historical mention of a law or service does not describe its present status.
02Start with these coordinates
A curated path from first principles to the details that matter.
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Origins · BLK·0Genesis Block
Bitcoin began with a block carrying a newspaper headline, before there was an exchange to trade on. The Genesis Block of January 3, 2009 gave the network a shared starting point. Its story separates verifiable data from interpretation and explains why the original 50 BTC cannot be spent.
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Origins · CYPHCypherpunks
Cypherpunks connected an interest in privacy with a practical question: how do you build an internet where people do not have to reveal their identity to everyone? Their debates, software and experiments with digital money are important parts of Bitcoin’s prehistory.
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Origins · HCHashcash
Hashcash aimed to make spam more expensive: a computer would do a little work before sending a message. Finding a suitable result takes more effort than checking it. That difference later became one of Bitcoin’s building blocks.
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Origins · 10KBitcoin Pizza Day
In May 2010, Laszlo Hanyecz wanted to find out whether someone would get him dinner for bitcoin. His offer of 10,000 BTC for two pizzas became a story remembered every 22 May.
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Institutions · SV21El Salvador Bitcoin Law
El Salvador gave Bitcoin a place in its law, then changed the rules for accepting it. What did that mean for a merchant, a customer and the state?
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03Explore the connected entries
Definitions, mechanisms, people and source data connected to this field.
DOC·001Bitcoin WhitepaperOrigins · 4 §BLK·0Genesis BlockOrigins · 9 §2017Blocksize WarOrigins · 19 §CYPHCypherpunksOrigins · 11 §HCHashcashOrigins · 15 §10KBitcoin Pizza DayOrigins · 8 §B¥b-moneyOrigins · 7 §BGOLDBit GoldOrigins · 9 §DCASHDigiCashOrigins · 8 §E-CASHChaumian eCashOrigins · 14 §RPOWReusable Proofs of WorkOrigins · 11 §CAMThe Crypto Anarchist ManifestoOrigins · 11 §CPMA Cypherpunk’s ManifestoOrigins · 11 §SV21El Salvador Bitcoin LawInstitutions · 5 §
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