Bitcoin Starter Pack

BitcoinStarter.md

#Bitcoin is the world's first successful, decentralized, sovereign money. It is the internet of money, the internet of VALUE. All Bitcoin transactions are documented on a virtual ledger called the blockchain, which is accessible for everyone to see.

Bitcoin gives you complete control over your money, unlike other assets you own which are regulated by banks and governments. As bitcoin gains more popularity, more and more places accept it as a payment method.

The BEST way to Learn Bitcoin

The best way to Learn about Bitcoin is to have one. Get yours, start ↪HERE.⏎ Skin in the game, baby!

Starter Reading List / Watch List

1 - Bitcoin Quickie: https://www.bitcoin.com/get-started/a-quick-introduction-to-bitcoin/

2 - Official website: https://bitcoin.org/en/how-it-works

3 - How does Bitcoin work? https://www.investopedia.com/terms/b/bitcoin.asp

4 - Forbes on BTC: https://www.forbes.com/advisor/investing/what-is-bitcoin/

5 - Video of Panel in Miami: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41JCpzvnn_0&list=PLRIDwBAVNVhZaHRg-YQAQONwT0rEslu2B

6 - Moral Case for Bitcoin: https://medium.com/the-bitcoin-times/the-moral-case-for-bitcoin-561ed592a464#:~:text=The%20moral%20case%20for%20Bitcoin%20is%20that%20Bitcoin%20aligns%20with,becoming%20more%20and%20more%20tyrannical.

7 - Bitcoin 2021 Panelists Make ‘Moral Case’ for Bitcoin https://decrypt.co/72907/bitcoin-2021-panelists-make-moral-case-for-bitcoin

8 - What is Bitcoin Mining? (in Plain English): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BODyqM-V71E&list=PLRIDwBAVNVhZaHRg-YQAQONwT0rEslu2B&index=3

Bitcoin mining or Bitcoin hashing is the process of updating the ledger of Bitcoin transactions known as the blockchain. Mining is done by running extremely powerful computers (known as ASICs) that race against other miners in an attempt to guess a specific number.

The first miner to guess the number gets to update the ledger of transactions and also receives a reward of newly minted Bitcoin (currently the reward is 12.5 Bitcoin 6.25 Bitcoin). The next "halving" of Bitcoin rewards from 6.25 to 3.125 Bitcoin will be approximately on 28 February 2024. What is Bitcoin Halving Schedule? see here: https://coinmarketcap.com/halving/bitcoin/

Today, in order to be profitable with Bitcoin mining you need to invest heavily in equipment, cooling and storage. It’s not possible to mine profitably with a PC or a GPU at home, like people used to do.

9 - How Bitcoin Mining Solves Byzantine Generals' Problem https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZXXDp0_R-w&list=PLRIDwBAVNVhZaHRg-YQAQONwT0rEslu2B&index=4

Further Reading / Listening / Watching

• A Cypherpunk's Manifesto. Hughes, Eric (9 March 1993). https://www.activism.net/cypherpunk/manifesto.html "Privacy is necessary for an open society in the electronic age. Privacy is not secrecy. A private matter is something one doesn’t want the whole world to know, but a secret matter is something one doesn’t want anybody to know. Privacy is the power to selectively reveal oneself to the world."
• The Golden Path from Cypherpunks to Bitcoin is clear. The deep technical roots of Bitcoin can be traced back to Cypherpunk ideas of the likes of cryptographer David Chaum on topics such as anonymous digital cash and pseudonymous reputation systems, described in his paper "Security without Identification: Transaction Systems to Make Big Brother Obsolete" (1985). Read the History of the Cypherpunk Movement, the band of innovators whose works inspired the creation of Bitcoin. https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2016/04/09/bitcoin-and-the-rise-of-the-cypherpunks/
• Introduction to Cryptography: the backbone of Bitcoin is secure storage of information and its certain, verifiable transmission via peer-to-peer network. Bitcoin thus safely stores value throughout time and space. Cryptography makes Bitcoin the best form of money in human history.
• The Bitcoin Whitepaper: published on 31 October 2008 under the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto (in the tradition of The Federalist Papers under the pseudonym ‘Publius’) on the cryptography mailing list at metzdowd.com describing "Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System". There is also an annotated version HERE.
• 45:00 minutes of Anita's Podcast with Jameson Lopp: Bitcoin Will Never Die, It’s a Pure Form of Economic Interaction https://bitcoinundco.com/en/jameson-lopp (Bitcoin is ‘sui generis’, it's in a class of its own. Network effects, Lindy effect, and first mover advantage puts Bitcoin in a unique position of self-sovereignty and integrity.)
• This video shows how Bitcoin is the embodiment of Friedrich Hayek's "The Denationalisation of Money". In 1974 Friedrich Hayek won the Nobel Prize for Economics. Hayek was awarded the Nobel Prize for his pioneering work in the theory of money and economic fluctuations. https://youtu.be/9-uo-KfnkhI (“I don’t believe we shall ever have a good money again before we take the thing out of the hands of government, that is, we can’t take them violently out of the hands of government, all we can do is by some sly roundabout way introduce something they can’t stop.” So spoke Friedrich Hayek in 1984. Reevaluating those words 35 years hence and it is hard not to interpret them in the context of Bitcoin. SOURCE: https://www.libertarianism.org/media/video-collection/interview-f-hayek; Hayek's 1984: Rediscovered Footage Shows Austrian Economist Predicting Bitcoin)
• Jameson Lopp's Resources: What is Bitcoin? Bitcoin is a new form of money that is controlled by no one and is developed as an open collaborative project. Below you'll find enough curated educational resources and information about it that you could spend months sifting through them all. https://bitcoin.page (Advanced reading or for later reference.)
• Nature of Money: What is MONEY? How is MONEY different from CURRENCY? What is BITCOIN? How is #Bitcoin different from ‘cryptocurrencies’??? An extensive list of videos on the history and theories of money. Bitcoin is the latest evolution of money. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X2uAZLjyGpM&list=PL2bUWhueS2g2Cs9Du_xuH39u3NsRfPxu2 (Hours and Hours of Fun.)

CODE

10 - Bitcoin (and other BTC-compatible Cryptocurrencies) Library for Python https://github.com/1200wd/bitcoinlib

11 - Bitcoin Wallet in Python: https://dev.to/nownodes/bitcoin-wallet-in-python-1idb

12 - Other Languages - Useful Programming Libraries to Create Your Own Wallet https://dzone.com/articles/useful-programming-libraries-to-create-your-own-cr

13 - A from-scratch tour of Bitcoin in Python https://karpathy.github.io/2021/06/21/blockchain/

14 - Blockonomics /shopping-cart-demo: https://github.com/blockonomics/shopping-cart-demo

15 - 33 best Python Bitcoin libraries in 2021: https://kandi.openweaver.com/collections/python/python-bitcoin

16 - 64 Repositories - Python Bitcoin Libraries: https://pythonrepo.com/tag/bitcoin

A copy/mirror of the Bitcoin Core Code Base is also available here: https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin

BitcoinTerms.md

Bitcoin Vocabulary

Address

A Bitcoin address is similar to a physical address or an email. It is the only information you need to provide for someone to pay you with Bitcoin. An important difference, however, is that each address should only be used for a single transaction.

Wallet

A Bitcoin wallet is loosely the equivalent of a physical wallet on the Bitcoin network. "Not your keys, Not your Bitcoin." The wallet actually contains your private key(s) which allow you to spend the bitcoins allocated to it in the block chain. Each Bitcoin wallet can show you the total balance of all bitcoins it controls and lets you pay a specific amount to a specific person, just like a physical wallet. This is different to credit cards where you are charged by the merchant.

Block Chain

The block chain or ‘blockchain’ is a public record of Bitcoin transactions in chronological order. The block chain is shared between all Bitcoin users. It is used to verify the permanence of Bitcoin transactions and to prevent double spending.

Block

A block is a record in the block chain that contains and confirms many waiting transactions. Roughly every 10 minutes, on average, a new block including transactions is appended to the block chain through mining.

BTC

BTC is a common unit used to designate one bitcoin.

Satoshi

Satoshi or ‘sats’ is a common unit used to designate a sub-unit of a bitcoin - 100,000,000 sats is equal to 1 bitcoin (BTC). 1 sat = 0.00 000 001 BTC. This unit is usually more convenient for pricing tips, goods and services.

Confirmation

Confirmation means that a transaction has been processed by the network and is highly unlikely to be reversed. Transactions receive a confirmation when they are included in a block and for each subsequent block chained on top of it. Even a single confirmation can be considered secure for low value transactions, although for larger amounts like $1,000 USD, it makes sense to wait for 6 confirmations or more. Each confirmation exponentially decreases the risk of a reversed transaction.

Double Spend

If a malicious user tries to spend their bitcoins to two different recipients at the same time, this is double spending. Bitcoin mining and the block chain are there to create a consensus on the network about which of the two transactions will confirm and be considered valid.

Hash Rate

The hash rate is the measuring unit of the processing power of the Bitcoin network. The Bitcoin network must make intensive mathematical operations for security purposes. When the network reached a hash rate of 10 Th/s, it meant it could make 10 trillion calculations per second.

Mining

Bitcoin mining is the process of making computer hardware do mathematical calculations for the Bitcoin network to confirm transactions and increase security. As a reward for their services, Bitcoin miners can collect transaction fees for the transactions they confirm, along with newly created bitcoins. Mining is a specialized and competitive market where the rewards are divided up according to how much calculation is done. Not all Bitcoin users do Bitcoin mining, and it is not an easy way to make money.

P2P

Peer-to-peer refers to systems that work like an organized collective by allowing each individual to interact directly with the others. Previous examples include bittorrent, gnutella, ed2k, and Kademlia networks that do not use a centralized information hub or server. In the case of Bitcoin, the network is built in such a way that each user is broadcasting the transactions of other users. And, crucially, no bank is required as a third party.

Cryptography

Cryptography is the branch of mathematics that lets us create mathematical proofs that provide high levels of security. Online commerce and banking already uses cryptography. In the case of Bitcoin, cryptography is used to make it impossible for anybody to spend funds from another user's wallet or to corrupt the block chain. It can also be used to encrypt a wallet, so that it cannot be used without a password. See Further Reading above to learn MORE.

Signature

A cryptographic signature is a mathematical mechanism that allows someone to prove ownership. In the case of Bitcoin, a Bitcoin wallet and its private key(s) are linked by some mathematical magic. When your Bitcoin software signs a transaction with the appropriate private key, the whole network can see that the signature matches the bitcoins being spent. However, there is no way for the world to guess your private key to steal your hard-earned bitcoins.

Private Key

"Not your keys, Not your Bitcoin." A private key is a secret piece of data that proves your right to spend Bitcoin from a specific wallet through a cryptographic signature. Your private key(s) are stored in your computer if you use a software wallet; they are stored on some remote servers if you use a web wallet. Private keys must never be revealed as they allow you to spend bitcoins for their respective Bitcoin wallet. See Further Reading above to learn MORE.

The BEST way to Learn about Bitcoin

The best way to Learn about Bitcoin is to have one. Get yours, start ↪HERE.⏎ Skin in the game, baby!