Bitcoin Forum

Should I feel bad that I did not get into bitcoin mining early? I knew about it since 2004.

Come to think of it, Bitcoins weren't really worth anything until about last year when it jumped to $35 USD per coin

You must be talking about an alternative virtual currency.

Bitcoin has been around since 2009.

http://cdn.memegenerator.net/instances/400x/23123771.jpg

Yes, feel bad.

lol

Go read up on the history of bitcoins lumberjack moronic freaks.

Proof of Work was invented in 2004. Also look up hash cash.

People at cypherpunks have been talking about e-currencies since before then.

And stop putting a picture of your no good father on my thread nerdo

Welcome to bitcointalk, where everyone knows it best.

"Computer scientist Hal Finney built on the proof-of-work idea, yielding a system that exploited reusable proof of work ("RPOW").[17] The idea of making proofs-of-work reusable for some practical purpose had already been established in 1999.[11] Finney's purpose for RPOW was as token money. Just as a gold coin's value is thought to be underpinned by the value of the raw gold needed to make it, the value of an RPOW token is guaranteed by the value of the real-world resources required to 'mint' a POW token. In Finney's version of RPOW, the POW token is a piece of hashcash.

A website can demand a POW token in exchange for service. Requiring a POW token from users would inhibit frivolous or excessive use of the service, sparing the service's underlying resources, such as bandwidth to the Internet, computation, disk space, electricity and administrative overhead.

Finney's RPOW system differed from a POW system in permitting random exchange of tokens without repeating the work required to generate them. After someone had "spent" a POW token at a website, the website's operator could exchange that "spent" POW token for a new, unspent RPOW token, which could then be spent at some third party web site similarly equipped to accept RPOW tokens. This would save the resources otherwise needed to 'mint' a POW token. The anti-counterfeit property of the RPOW token was guaranteed by remote attestation. The RPOW server that exchanges a used POW or RPOW token for a new one of equal value uses remote attestation to allow any interested party to verify what software is running on the RPOW server. Since the source code for Finney's RPOW software was published (under a BSD-like license), any sufficiently knowledgeable programmer could, by inspecting the code, satisfy himself that the software (and, by extension, the RPOW server) never issued a new token except in exchange for a spent token of equal value.

Until 2009, Finney's system was the only RPOW system to have been implemented; it never saw economically significant use. In 2009, the Bitcoin network went online. Bitcoin is a proof-of-work crypto currency that, like Finney's RPOW, is also based on the hashcash POW. But in bitcoin, double-spend protection is provided by a decentralized P2P protocol for tracking transfers of coins rather, than the hardware trusted computing function used by RPOW. Bitcoin has better trustworthiness because it is protected by computation, RPOW is protected by the private keys stored in the TPM hardware, and manufacturers holding TPM private keys (or hackers who stole a TPM manufacturer key) could subvert that assurance. Bitcoins are "mined" using the hashcash proof-of-work function by individual nodes and verified by the decentralized P2P bitcoin network. The other novel aspect of bitcoin is that it dynamically varies the hashcash size required to create a coin to avoid inflation due to computers getting faster, and due to more users mining."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof-of-work_system

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hashcash

http://i1.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/original/000/007/508/watch-out-we-got-a-badass-over-here-meme.png

So then feel REALLY bad for having a 5 year head start on all of us and not doing shit but sitting on your lazy ass.

YOU FUCKING MORON.

L

O

L

Proof of work and hashcash are not Bitcoin.  Bitcoin uses a proof of work but it also uses hashing algorithms like SHA-256 which was released in 2001.  Saying you knew about Bitcoin is 2004 because proof of work existed would be like saying you knew about Bitcoin in 2001 because you had heard of the SHA algorithm.

Bitcoin "began" at the end of 2008 or begining of 2009 depending on what date you want to consider the "start".  Satoshi' paper was published in October 2008 and the open source project started on source forge about a month after that.  The genesis block (block #0) was produced on 01/03/2009 @ 18:15:05 GMT.  The 0.1 version of the reference client released roughly a week later (01/11/2009).  

You didn't know about Bitcoin in 2004.  You couldn't mine Bitcoins in 2004.  

I really regret not getting involved in Bitcoin back in the 80s.

+21000000

Perfect response :)

+1mn

Necromancing thread to prevent anyone misunderstanding the quote below, and neglecting one of the 2 most basic technologies in Bitcoin so the thread had to be resurrected.

I agree, but the basic technology of checksums has been around for much before hashcash was implemented. Proof of work is simply calculating new checksums in brute-force until a desirable one is found, like when we have a goal that we want to reach when a block is deemed successfully calculated, and thus accepted by the rest of the Bitcoin network.
Though secure cryptographic checksums are for the moment SHA-256. I don't know if SHA-1 is considered a secure cryptographic checksum.

Though I find of course the original poster's(OP) message dubious since the Bitcoin blockchain started early 2009 if I remember correctly.

Numbers were invented around 35,000 BC, therefore, I'm an idiot for not investing in Bitcoin in 34,999 BC.

Roman empire was so strong thanks to bitcoin. Then barbarians did a 51% attack.....  ;D ;D

I got my first computer in 1986 (C64C), and after reading this thread I regret not using it to mine bitcoins. OP - no offense, but the way you worded it was sure to cause some misunderstandings and consequential name-calling. I hope D&T response cleared things up.

This thread evolved like a thread on "www.halfbakery.com" ;D

I recall, around 44BC, seeing the wife of a wealthy senator buying one of the first laptops with an ATI GPU, in order to mine some BTCs to purchase a pair of then-fashionable alpaca socks.

http://cdn.geolocation.ws/geolocation_media/panoramio/04857/p-048574758.jpg

Ha ha, define early! I had in mind some months now to be involved with bitcoin, always said later, at the weekend, at my vacations when I have time... At least I could do it one week ago! Only!
From $15 to $25 in two weeks only, almost! :o

But it's never too late! ;D

I still remember the first mining client. That thing was fast.

10 PRINT "FOUND A BITCOIN!"
20 GOTO 10

This thread needs to be trashed* and honestly I don't understand the motives of the OP.  Lets ignore the fact that you've got your basic information wrong and your post boils down to "I could have made some money if I invested early in Bitcoin like other people did, but I didn't, should I feel bad?".  If you asked this question on some place more anonymous like 4chan, you would have received the answer, "Yes, feel bad, feel so bad that you kill yourself.", however you received the polite version by the BCT userbase.

Yes I knew about Bitcoin mining fairly early in it's existence as well, however I did not understand how far it could/would go and ignored it (I remember downloading an early version of the Bitcoin client, watching it for a few minutes and then deleting it).  Do I regret this?  Not really, as I'm fully aware now and know that we are still at the start of an evolving new form of currency (also I don't live my life with regrets, but that's more a personal thing).

Congrads though, I thought I had seen every single possible internet insult out there but "lumberjack moronic freaks" is new to me (also makes no sense and is really stupid, but still new!).

*Edit: Okay maybe it shouldn't be trashed as it can be used as reference material if need be, plus there are a lot of amusing comments.  greyhawk just took me back to my days with a 286 and Microsoft Basic; I was busy making animations (that moved at about 0.5 FPS) when I should have been mining!