Laszlo Hanyecz is a Bitcoin legend.

[hd49728]

A thread about Laszlo Hanyecz on X which is interesting and I believe it's worth to share here.

This content is from the thread.

Mined 80,000 BTC when it was under $0.01
Spent $2.4 billion on pizza

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A Mac programmer from Florida, Laszlo Hanyecz discovered #Bitcoin in April 2010 when it was less than $0.01.

His goal was to help more people run the software.

Back then, $BTC only ran on Windows.

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Laszlo quickly translated Satoshi’s code for MacOS.

He wrote software users began running within a week.

Here’s the computer he wrote it on: an iBook G4 😲

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Laszlo quickly became one of Satoshi’s most trusted contributors

Here’s Satoshi and Laszlo discussing what gives #BTC value and the mechanics of how payments work 👏

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Laszlo and Satoshi also discussed #Bitcoin’s future design

Here’s Laszlo pushing back against those who already didn’t think the network could scale 👏

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Laszlo was one of the first 5 developers to work on #Bitcoin.

Here’s Satoshi crediting him for his work helping to test and review the 3rd version of the software in history 🏆

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Laszlo wasn't just a coder though.

He was the 1st user to mine with powerful GPUs

He took computer hardware specialized for video games and quickly boosted the network’s hashpower 🔥

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Laszlo’s mined 35,000 $BTC in just the first 2 months

He was making 700+ $BTC a day

His wallet balance grew to over 80,000 #Bitcoin 🤯

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Satoshi didn't like what he saw

In fact, he wrote an email to Laszlo asking him to reconsider how he was mining.

He wanted to keep it easy for "100% of people" to earn #Bitcoin 🤔

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Rather than quit mining, Laszlo decided to give back to #Bitcoin.

In fact, he dusted off one of Satoshi’s own ideas – taking an example from the official Bitcoin FAQ.

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So, on May 18, 2010, Lazlo went on to the #Bitcoin forum and offered to send 10,000 $BTC to anyone who would buy him dinner.

10,000 BTC was worth just ~$41 🤯

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3 days later, a 19-year-old student in California answered his call.

Jeremy “Jercos” Sturdivant got on his laptop and ordered a pizza from Laszlo’s local Papa John’s, swapping 10,000 $BTC.

Here’s what the payment looked like on the blockchain:

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Here’s a picture of Laszlo and his kids eating the two 10,000 $BTC pizzas.

At $70,000, each pie cost ~$350 million

Each slice cost over $40 million 🤯

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For Laszlo, though, this wasn’t enough.

He made clear it this an “open offer"

He spent 40,000 $BTC on pizza ~$3 billion today 🤯

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In 2010, Laszlo was one of #Bitcoin’s most active developers.

Then, life got in the way.

He spent everything he mined and left the community.

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Laslzo has no regrets, though.

In 2018, he bought two pizzas with #Bitcoin again.

In fact, he was one of the 1st to use the Lightning Network for a payment – another historic first ⚡️

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Today, Laszlo has the distinction of eating the most expensive pizza in history.

But – more importantly – he kickstarted the #Bitcoin economy, paving the way for a freer financial system.

I don't know what do you learn from his story but I myself learn from his experience as follows.

I will never sell all bitcoin I have and I always reserve a part of my bitcoin for very long term, like 10% to 30% of my bitcoin for very long term and I even don't care when I take profit with it. In next 20 or 30 years, the 10% to 30% of my reserved bitcoin possibly will have more value than what I sell earlier.

[hugeblack]

Woow nice thread, I thought Laszlo Hanyecz's story started with him mining Bitcoin and buying pizza, but it seems like he was a developer and contributed to the development of Bitcoin in the early days. It's good that he's still around and has no problem appearing in front of the cameras.

[Eclipse33]

Amazing thread. Thankyou.

[tabas]

A great read, although I know some of the histories that you've made about him but it's still giving me chills when reading something about a great piece of history that's related to Bitcoin.

I don't know what do you learn from his story but I myself learn from his experience as follows.

I will never sell all bitcoin I have and I always reserve a part of my bitcoin for very long term, like 10% to 30% of my bitcoin for very long term and I even don't care when I take profit with it. In next 20 or 30 years, the 10% to 30% of my reserved bitcoin possibly will have more value than what I sell earlier.

While looking at the current value of the BTCs spent by Laszlo for pizzas, we have to realize that it's essential that he has triggered the exchange of Bitcoin through that purchase. Without that historical purchase, it wouldn't create the curiosity of many to think that something can be traded or purchased with Bitcoin. I know we're looking at the thousands of Bitcoins spent and the tremendous value of it right now, but without his great contribution to that exchange, there could be someone else who has done that but we don't know, it's just going to remain another what if. And the valuable lesson we can learn from this history is about the power of holding. When 10k Bitcoins can purchase pizzas before, the lesser amount of Bitcoin now or so can purchase more than what we can expect in the future. Real estate, luxury cars, everything that truly are life-changing.

[PrivacyG]

Looking through the historic images is absolutely crazy.  At the time, I had that exact GPU.  Thinking I was using that piece of equipment for very basic Computer stuff while others were generating what today would be more than what I consider a fortune is blowing my mind away.  I often feel kind of stupid for not knowing better about what I could of done with my Computer components.

But then it is people like Laszlo who we have to thank for progressively building what Bitcoin is today.  Brick by brick, they built an unbeatable monster.

[BlackHatCoiner]

I believe people would very much appreciate hearing from him. It'd be completely respectable if he refuses to say a word, but I think it'd be an honor for the young Bitcoiners to take an interview with him, just like zasad@ did a couple of years ago, in here.

If I could ask him just one question, it'd be: "why did you leave Bitcoin?". He was so passionate at first, but then something seemed like it underwhelmed him about Bitcoin.

[Fiatless]

Woow nice thread, I thought Laszlo Hanyecz's story started with him mining Bitcoin and buying pizza, but it seems like he was a developer and contributed to the development of Bitcoin in the early days. It's good that he's still around and has no problem appearing in front of the cameras.

Laszlo Hanyecz was not just a programmer, I guess he was part of Satoshi's team. He was the first to mine Bitcoin with GPUs when he converted his gaming computer to a mining machine. He was also one of the first developers who ran Bitcoin on MacOS instead of the popular Windows. Becoming the first to use Bitcoin for commercial transactions adds more feathers to his cap. The Bitcoin legend said he didn't regret his action, that's remarkable. Good historical thread to celebrate a legend.

[hd49728]

If I could ask him just one question, it'd be: "why did you leave Bitcoin?". He was so passionate at first, but then something seemed like it underwhelmed him about Bitcoin.

I don't believe he left Bitcoin and he can simply mine bitcoin, invest in bitcoin, hold it, but he no longer has interest to be one of most famous noisy public figures in Bitcoin community.

Saying you leave something is easy and it's hard for community to verify that you actually leave it. You can do many things silently and privately, disappear from the community.
Pizzas for bitcoin?
Did Laszlo Hanyecz exchange 40000 BTC for 8 pizzas, not 10000 BTC for 2 pizzas?

It is a topic on Bitcoin pizza with some information that he did not trade only 10,000 BTC for pizzas but more than that.

The man behind Bitcoin pizza day is more than a meme: He's a mining pioneer.

[yhiaali3]

Thank you, what a great series I enjoyed reading this thread about the history of Bitcoin and Lazalo.

Many people think that Lazalo is just an ordinary person who spent 10,000 Bitcoins to buy a slice of pizza, which is considered the most expensive pizza in history, but they do not know that Lazalo was one of the first developers of Bitcoin and that he spent this amount of Bitcoin, which is considered a fortune today, to prove the idea he believed in by transforming Bitcoin from something virtual to something tangible on the ground.

[Darker45]

Thanks for sharing, and for making it clear to everybody how the man isn't just about pizza. He was an early believer, made significant contributions, earned a lot, and kickstarted the Bitcoin economy. But I doubt he spent everything he mined. I hope those "little bit of single digit change" that he declared was left on him would actually add up to more than 10BTC. And while he might have left mining, I doubt he left Bitcoin for good.

[hugeblack]

The Bitcoin legend said he didn't regret his action, that's remarkable. Good historical thread to celebrate a legend.

In short, a person who gave everything he could when Bitcoin was not an attractive idea or a project that you expected to make you a fortune. I thought his story was arranged by mining Bitcoin and buying pizza (note that the person who bought the pizza did not keep it, but rather received payments in dollars).

[Kruw]

Here's a fun fact about Laslzo - he may be Satoshi  

Martti Malmi was the first developer of Bitcoin and helped Satoshi, he released some email correspondence between them during a recent court case: https://mmalmi.github.io/satoshi/

Within these emails, there's this message from Martti to Satoshi:

Donations in Bitcoin are helpful and can be sent to 14EXchS9j3AAfim6mL4jtw6VWMosSUiG5U.

This address only ever received coins once, in 2018: https://mempool.space/tx/6243edcfd99a56bbe9f89afad63c0f839c342847c62166b3e3ece1a0e1f26b8e

Who was the sender? 157fRrqAKrDyGHr1Bx3yDxeMv8Rh45aUet, the address in Laszlo's signature. This either means Laszlo is Satoshi, or Martti gave this same address to Lazslo almost a decade after he gave it to Satoshi.

[BlackHatCoiner]

[...]

Or perhaps sirius reused his address in several places in the Internet, and Laszlo used it to purchase something from him. Satoshi donating a few cents to sirius after all those years makes no sense.

I don't believe he left Bitcoin and he can simply mine bitcoin, invest in bitcoin, hold it, but he no longer has interest to be one of most famous noisy public figures in Bitcoin community.

I can absolutely understand this, but he left Bitcoin in 2010. It wasn't up until mid 10's that Bitcoin gained this popularity. I feel like he left because he was bullied for the pizzas as time passed. 

[adaseb]

Man this is one of the best threads ive read on bitcointalk in a while, I assumed it would be short but its very long and detailed. I learnt lots about the Bitcoin Pizza guy that I didn't know previously.

Sure he spent alot of bitcoins for those pizza's. But keep in mind it was the first transaction which proved bitcoin can be used for goods and services and it caught on perhaps because of this purchase. Who knows if bitcoin would be the same if it never had this transaction, hard to tell.

He sure is a bitcoin legend. Never knew he ported the bitcoin software to a macOS, pretty crazy in the short time frame.