What do you think is the most surprising thing in the History of Bitcoin?

[Jet Cash]

If we leave out the conception and creation of Bitcoin, then there have been numerous events and considerations in the path to today's market dominance. I think that the most surprising, and possibly the hardest thing was the attribution of the first few cents of value. Once it had managed to gain a perception of value, then the subsequent growth is less surprising in my opinion.

Do you agree with me, or do you think something else has been more remarkable?

[1715378920]

1715378920

[1715378920]

1715378920

[mk4]

That bitcoin was created by only one person. It was mind boggling to me how one person invented something so genius. But yea, I then realized like a week after that there's definitely a chance that it was a group rather than one singular person. But regardless even if it was created by a group, it's still surprising that a group created something that most people didn't even think the world needed.

As for bitcoin being priced a few cents in the past? It also definitely surprised me, especially the "bitcoin pizza day" event; but then immediately realized "well duh, it started as a sort of collectible that's only being used by a few people, of course it used to be worth a few cents". Both of these are equally sort of surprising in my opinion.

Just to add just for the sake of it because I recently rewatched the Voorhees-Schiff debate, some things that surprised me concerning bitcoin but not necessarily about it's history:

• That how I didn't realize and see the flaws of the current fiat system until I've learned about bitcoin. I'm definitely not an expert on this subject(money/economics), but I'm definitely more educated now than before.
• When I realized that bitcoin can potentially dethrone gold in the store-of-value category for the masses. One main reason of which is that gold can easily be faked through filling gold bar shells with tungsten(tungsten's weight is fairly close to the weight of gold). This itself is a huge hassle.
  Relevant article for this point: https://www.businessinsider.com/tungsten-filled-gold-bars-found-in-new-york-2012-9

[tranthidung]

You are likely wrong at this point.
So far, no one knows that bitcoin was created more than ten years ago by a person, a group, or an organization.
No one knows.
The only one thing we known and have to admit is bitcoin created by outstanding guy/ group/ organization.

That bitcoin was created by only one person.

I agree with Jet Cash that the biggest achievements and biggest surprise is when bitcoin set up its few cents for the first time.
Everything have to start from somewhere, for bitcoin, it started for a few cents.
Even the pizza's buyer, he probably deeply regreted with his decision years later, but all crypto enthusiasts should give him a round of applause.
Without his decision, we would not see bitcoin hit nearly $20000 last year.

[leowonderful]

The simple fact that Bitcoin went from being pretty much free to hitting near $20K at the ATH in 2017’s the most impressive thing about Bitcoin to me. I remember people talking about how there used to be faucets for whole bitcoins back when BTC was just launched and worth a few pennies- sure, BTC wasn’t worth a whole lot back then, but that still blows my mind to this day.

Something else related to price that was impressive to me was how BTC went from its lows of $200 in 2015 to reaching $20,000 in just two years.  I recall there were fears that BTC would simply bleed to zero around that time, and though we’re now in another bear market, I think very few people now believe BTC will bleed down to zero from here again.

[CryptopreneurBrainboss]

Most surprising thing in bitcoin history for me was the profitability of mining bitcoin.

Has anyone here watched "big bang theory" the bitcoin episode? Although it was just a movie their illustration made me consider the most surprising thing in bitcoin history as the profitability of mining bitcoin. The early miners just did it for fun because technically it had no value. Based on the movie, If I can recall correctly one of the actors told the others "so you mean we get to sit down all day solving mathematical problem and end up with worthless coins we can't spend? Then they replied "Sounds fun".

After watching that movie I came to a conclusion that the early miners that believe in bitcoin to the extent they even mined in losses are the true heros.

[Bitcoin_Arena]

Without his decision, we would not see bitcoin hit nearly $20000 last year.

The year was 2017, my friend. Not last year

My most surprising moment in the history of  BTC wasn't so many years ago and I am very sure many crypto believers will talk about it for years to come.
The day was 19^th Dec 2017
BTC price had shot to the record all-time high and it felt like a dream. I saw the price on my portfolio management app and couldn't believe my eyes.
I have check binance to confirm it.

"The Bitcoin mainstream media kept bashing?"
"Who can stop the bitcoin revolution now?" I kept wondering to myself.
Even a couple of pals with whom I had talked to about BTC before messaged me asking me what was happening and obviously with some regrets for not buying some when the price was low.
It isn't really my usual habit but that evening took some good amount of whiskey in celebration.  

[theyoungmillionaire]

I remember people talking about how there used to be faucets for whole bitcoins back when BTC was just launched...

It was 5 free bitcoins, which is surprising nowadays.

For my first Bitcoin coding project, I decided to do something that sounds really dumb:  I created a web site that gives away Bitcoins.   It is at: https://freebitcoins.appspot.com/

Five ฿ per customer, first come first served, I've stocked it with ฿1,100 to start.  I'll add more once I'm sure it is working properly.

Why?  Because I want the Bitcoin project to succeed, and I think it is more likely to be a success if people can get a handful of coins to try it out.  It can be frustrating to wait until your node generates some coins (and that will get more frustrating in the future), and buying Bitcoins is still a little bit clunky.

Please try it out and get some free coins, even if you already have more Bitcoins than you know what to do with.  You can get some and then donate them right back; the address is: 15VjRaDX9zpbA8LVnbrCAFzrVzN7ixHNsC

That's a classic.

Has anyone here watched "big bang theory" the bitcoin episode?

Seen that, The Big Bang Theory - The Bitcoin Entanglement S11 E09.

[bitmover]

I think Mt. God hack was very surprising.
I once saw antonopoulos talking about it. It was an exchange with like 90% volume that crashed  Bitcoin so spectacularly that it looked like the end.

It was amazing to see bitcoin going from 32 to 2 and then recover. How in a so small amount of time BTC price recovered and even increased.

It is also interesting how the community was able to embrace a campaign about the importance of holding your own private keys to prevent losses like that again.

[mk4]

*snip*

Oh definitely. MtGox was the first major hack that occurred in the bitcoin/cryptocurrency space, hence most people probably weren't expecting that "exchange hacks" were going to be a thing; and how big the consequences would be. Everyone probably thought their exchange funds were going to be fine.

Imagine how much of a big hit the markets would take if a major exchange such as Binance gets wiped. Yikes.

[Heisenberg_Hunter]

Histories tend to be more fascinating and interesting than speculating what the future holds for us. We have seen many people speculating on the future prices of btc during the next decade, but the decade long history of bitcoin should be considered note-worthy on why they matter the most than the future. The minor concepts which evolved yesteryear are probably dominating today's crypto world.

Since I had a major interest on revisiting the history of cryptocurrencies, I made a thread dedicated to some of the most interesting facts of this 10 years. The thread can be found here : Story of the Firsts - The events which triggered everything. Not many would have known about this, but I have collected some of the most interesting events of the decade to look through.

I have recently completed reading the book "Digital Gold", which was more like a novel rather than a book dedicated to the history of bitcoin. It was quite interesting to see how Hal and satoshi were discussing on the early versions and the future of btc. At one point of time, Hal mentions that if Btc was to be adopted globally and considering the trillions of dollars currently in circulation, each btc would reach a mammoth height of more than $1 million.

I think that the most surprising, and possibly the hardest thing was the attribution of the first few cents of value.

How many of them are really aware that the btc prices were first set in this forum? I have scrapped and scanned through some very old threads in this forum where people like dwdollar (The First Exchange owner) and NewLibertyStandard (The creator of BTC acronym) we're talking about how can they fix the value of BTC? It's quite very much interesting to note that, NLS states that Btc prices should never be based on the production or the mining value but should be based on what people are willing to pay! This forum acts as a central entity for most of the key events in the bitcoin history.

The only one thing we known and have to admit is bitcoin created by outstanding guy/ group/ organization.

I would neither contradict nor support your point in this. If you had read through some of the early cypherpunks mails, it is clear that satoshi summed up all those already existing ideas to create the digital money. It was not solely his creation, he has build quite few blocks on the existing issues and ideas.

[pooya87]

your title should have said "remarkable" instead of "surprising", i am surprised about a couple of annoying things these days but it doesn't seem to be what you are actually looking for here.

what i have always found remarkable in bitcoin is the technology, specifically the cryptography part of it. what it was and the fact that it still is improving by time is phenomenal. and it is all math! and it doesn't stop there either. bitcoin has opened up a lot of possibilities with all the alternative ways of using the technology that it introduced to us.

[tranthidung]

I think Mt. God hack was very surprising.

Of course, Mt. God hack is a big surprise.
I have never heard or seen Mt. God hack, before seeing your post.
You obviously made a typo, fella. It should be Mt. Gox, not Mt. God. 

[RapTarX]

One of the remarkable history of bitcoin is being accepted by Silk Road and later get seized by FBI. It was one of the greatest promotion for bitcoin.
This had a bad affect too. People had heard about it for the first time had an impression that bitcoin is a currency for buying/selling illegal goods.

[rnchavez19]

That bitcoin was created by only one person. It was mind boggling to me how one person invented something so genius. But yea, I then realized like a week after that there's definitely a chance that it was a group rather than one singular person. But regardless even if it was created by a group, it's still surprising that a group created something that most people didn't even think the world needed.

As for bitcoin being priced a few cents in the past? It also definitely surprised me, especially the "bitcoin pizza day" event; but then immediately realized "well duh, it started as a sort of collectible that's only being used by a few people, of course it used to be worth a few cents". Both of these are equally sort of surprising in my opinion.

Just to add just for the sake of it because I recently rewatched the Voorhees-Schiff debate, some things that surprised me concerning bitcoin but not necessarily about it's history:

• That how I didn't realize and see the flaws of the current fiat system until I've learned about bitcoin. I'm definitely not an expert on this subject(money/economics), but I'm definitely more educated now than before.
• When I realized that bitcoin can potentially dethrone gold in the store-of-value category for the masses. One main reason of which is that gold can easily be faked through filling gold bar shells with tungsten(tungsten's weight is fairly close to the weight of gold). This itself is a huge hassle.
  Relevant article for this point: https://www.businessinsider.com/tungsten-filled-gold-bars-found-in-new-york-2012-9

well, just to add...
i partly agree and disagree about this..

it may be that bitcoin came from the idea of a single person then supported by his peers or manages to get some influence..
the idea of putting bitcoin to work is that you need others to accept it even though it is not recognized by an authority.. be it just merely a collectible or sort of like group jargon thing..

my guess though is that.. they have probably worked on an ancient free port space unknown called the "GARAGE"

[TheBeardedBaby]

The most surprising thing is that the group/person that created bitcoin, made it not for personal/financial benefits but made a huge gift to the humanity in general.

They should be nominated for Nobel prize even they are anonymous.

[Juggy777]

If we leave out the conception and creation of Bitcoin, then there have been numerous events and considerations in the path to today's market dominance. I think that the most surprising, and possibly the hardest thing was the attribution of the first few cents of value. Once it had managed to gain a perception of value, then the subsequent growth is less surprising in my opinion.

Do you agree with me, or do you think something else has been more remarkable?

Hey i was going to write about the conception but since that’s ruled out, the most surprising thing is that people not only adopted it they fought their government to legalise it. The next most surprising thing was a currency that has no institution managed to rise from few cents to 20k, and became a global phenomenon. The last and most amusing thing is the identity of the owner aka Satoshi, is yet a mystery and one that will never be solved.

[markstivn98]

If we leave out the conception and creation of Bitcoin, then there have been numerous events and considerations in the path to today's market dominance. I think that the most surprising, and possibly the hardest thing was the attribution of the first few cents of value. Once it had managed to gain a perception of value, then the subsequent growth is less surprising in my opinion.

Do you agree with me, or do you think something else has been more remarkable?

I think the most amazing thing is the great evolution in the price of the bitcoin.
It started at less than a dollar and became worth a lot.

[Harlot]

I do agree with what Jet Cash has said, the first three years of BTC was like the hardest part for Bitcoin as it's value was basically nothing until it builds it price up which was three years after its creation which was around April of 2013. But for me the most surprising thing about BTC is how it build a new kind of market outside of stocks and foreign exchange, it created what we called now a cryptocurrency market. The cryptocurrencies that followed BTC was obviously influenced them on creating their own in order to fill the market. This alone made a lot of people rich as well as created a lot of millionaires in the process where we thought that there are no more investments or earning opportunities we haven't think will open up.

[Hivalley]

I think what surprises me the most about bitcoin is the way it gave rise to thousands of other cryptocurrencies, the bitcoin was number one and with time it's growth and development gave ruse and birth to over 3000 other alternative coins.
Without the bitcoin, u doubt if any of the alternative coins of today will exist, and the bitcoin still indirectly controls and decides their price or value

[Diamond Member]

Most surprising thing in bitcoin history for me was the profitability of mining bitcoin.

The mining the fictional characters did in the The Big Bang Theory episode, was done on a regular laptop computer (using a laptop to mine can actually be harmful to the internal components), and used a negligible amount of electricity, potentially the same amount as would otherwise have been consumed (some seti contributors temporarily stopped giving their resources to the SETI at home program and used their computer's resources to mine). The value of the mined coins, at the time they were mined were likely not even enough to to pay for the characters' time to setup the mining program.

In Bitcoin's early days, mining was profitable because technology to create more efficient ASIC chips quickly advanced, and the slow rate of filling orders for ASICs. In many cases, an ASIC manufacturer would have designed a new ASIC miner, offer it for sale at a price at which the buyer would earn the entire purchase price back within a week, but by the time it is delivered, difficulty went up by so much that profitability would take months after factoring in the purchase price.

The price of BTC was going up so quickly in its early days that it was often more profitable to purchase BTC than it was to purchase a miner because the miner would not generate as much BTC as you could have purchased when you paid for the miner.