In honor of the 13th anniversary of the #Bitcoin Genesis Block…

A quick thread on misconceptions about its launch 🧵

1/ THE BLOCK REWARD FOR THE GENESIS BLOCK IS UNSPENDABLE

Every time a #Bitcoin block is found, new bitcoins are issued to the winning miner. This was not the case with the Genesis Block. Satoshi made this reward (50 BTC) unspendable.

2/ THE GENESIS BLOCK DIDN’T HAVE A REWARD

Most block explorers say the Genesis block created 50 BTC, but these aren’t included in the blockchain.

It’s more accurate to say the Genesis Block created all the 21 million #bitcoin now being released in blocks.

3/ THE #BITCOIN SOFTWARE WASN’T LIVE AT THE GENESIS BLOCK

It would be a full six days from the Genesis Block to the point where Satoshi released the Bitcoin software to the public. From 1/3/09 to 1/8/09 you couldn’t run Bitcoin.

4/ THE TIMES ARTICLE IS A TIME STAMP

Satoshi famously included the quote: "The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks" in the genesis block.

This is how we know it was mined after this point in time (not before). It provides proof of transparency.

5/ SATOSHI DID NOT ‘PRE-MINE’ #BITCOIN

A pre-mine is when a cryptocurrency sets coins aside to reward its creators. Satoshi reserved no special #bitcoin for himself in code. He mined early on, but he spent money on computing power like everyone else.

6/ WHY DID SATOSHI MINE THE GENESIS BLOCK?

If Satoshi had just released the code, it would have been possible for anyone to launch their own #Bitcoin. You could have had multiple genesis blocks and multiple competing bitcoins.

Not very practical at launch.