Mastering Bitcoin

[Furball808]

I found a book called Mastering Bitcoin by Andreas M. Antonopolous released in 2014. It seems to have all the complete information a beginner one must need in order to really understand bitcoin.

I’m planning on making this thread kind of a reaction thread to the 240 something page of this book. If anyone has more recommendations or better suggestions for books one can read regarding bitcoin, I am open to it. I invite some beginners to also join me in this journey.  

edit: removed the file as to not violate the licensing of the book

[BlackBoss_]

I found a book called Mastering Bitcoin by Andreas M. Antonopolous released in 2014. It seems to have all the complete information a beginner one must need in order to really understand bitcoin.

You can read the book free on Github and with a newest version of it, the third version.
Mastering Bitcoin book, 3^rdversion on Github.

Andreas Antonopoulos has another book about Bitcoin and it is freely readable on Github too.
Mastering the Bitcoin Lightning Network.

Books are good for reading and learning but if you want something that is interactive for better learing and practice, you can learn with this website.
https://learnmeabitcoin.com/

[348Judah]

There are lots of books to read about bitcoin, starting from the one you mentioned and then the likes of learn me Bitcoin, all are important series we can use to develop our insight about bitcoin, there are some of other articles as well that talks blmkre of bitcoin online, which going through them could also help in many ways, take a look at a few I have to recommend.

bitcoin history
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5438353.0

Mastering Bitcoin
https://github.com/bitcoinbook/bitcoinbook

bitcoin education
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5467597.0

Learn me a Bitcoin
https://learnmeabitcoin.com/

[ABCbits]

FYI, PDF link you shared is for first edition which is very outdated. In addition, PDF link you share violate license of the book publisher and considered as pirated PDF.

The 2nd edition of "Mastering Bitcoin" is available under a CC-BY-NC-ND license, not a CC-BY-SA license.

It is deliberately not available as a PDF. Why? Because a PDF is a "derivative" product, which is what the ND prohibits. That's because the publisher (O'Reilly Media) is a for-profit publisher and puts considerable resources behind distributing the book.

When you make a PDF, you are violating the license. Worse, many will simply distribute the PDF on torrents and publishing sites. Since this issue was posted, I've seen a significant increase in pirate sites offering the PDF to the second edition for free or undercutting the publisher's price. This reduces the incentives of publishers like O'Reilly to consider open licenses.

The book will eventually (within a year of publication) be released under a CC-BY-SA license, at which point PDF and translations will be allowed. Until then, making PDF copies violates the license and hurts the publisher (and the author) ability to make a living on the considerable amount of work that went into this book. Furthermore, if you make it so the publisher can't recoup their investment, they will delay the release into CC-BY-SA.

tl;dr: The book is licensed so you can read it for free. It is not licensed so you can make a PDF of it to read it conveniently. Convenience costs money. Violating the license is a shitty thing to do, especially when this is one of the very few books that is licensed so openly.

--- LEAVE THIS ISSUE OPEN ---

[Mia Chloe]

~snip

You actually have to understand something, bitcoin is not about reading and reading it's about actually practicing chat you've been able to gather as information making practical knowledge. Personally if I'd ever have to recommend somewhere to learn about bitcoin I'll suggest mostly this forum bitcoin wiki and Wikipedia.

Of course there are a couple other courses out there but you'll definitely find links to those resources across threads on the forum.

[Asiska02]

~

Learn me a Bitcoin
https://learnmeabitcoin.com/

I have learnt the most of part of bitcoin through this website and it is very beginner friendly and takes you across as one from an elementary class to an higher institution. I got my first hand information about bitcoin there while also surfing more of it in this forum in order to get better.

If I would recommend where to learn from as a beginner, I’ll recommend this particular website because it came in handy for me through my journey of getting to know bitcoin better. It is very large and has different sections to learn from, you don’t need to get too complex about it, but learn about the basics and then if you find your area of specification to learn more about bitcoin, you can then focus more on that.

Other books and websites are out there with good resource also, but I haven’t tried most of them out, which puts me not in the best position to recommend them fully but I’m sure there are better ones out there to learn from also.

[WhoYouCantKill]

The act of mastering Bitcoin is one of the best starter-friendly books in the market, there beginning a reaction thread to is a valid idea. Even if it was released in 2014, it covers some fundamentals that are yet accurate and valuable. It is a good step for beginners to learn the technical and practical aspect of Bitcoin. When you want, The Bitcoin Standard and Layered Money are equally good additions to consider if you want to understand the bigger picture.

[AVE5]

If anyone has more recommendations or better suggestions for books one can read regarding bitcoin, I am open to it. I invite some beginners to also join me in this journey.

One thing you need to understand is that beginners there're also those who had studied bitcoin deeply but are ignorant to trust and adopt it simply because, they don't believe in it basic or decentlization.
And to an extent, you don't need to know everything about bitcoin before you can adoption investing on it rather, you just have to be that little skeptical and just trust it by investing what you can afford which risk adherence should be applicable in every sectors of resources so that we don't regret or panic over uncertainties.
I also doubt if there'd be a more convenient place that beginners can learn  about bitcoin other than an interactive platform where questione, opinions and suggestions can be shared amongst beginners and professionals.
So it you ask me, I'll always recommend bitcointalk forum for such bitcoin beginners.

[Stepstowealth]

I found a book called Mastering Bitcoin by Andreas M. Antonopolous released in 2014. It seems to have all the complete information a beginner one must need in order to really understand bitcoin.

After reading such books that teach about bitcoin, you have to also try to keep yourself updated by reading recent developments online about bitcoin. If you make the mistake of thinking that after you have read a book called "mastering bitcoins" that you no longer need to read any more thing. Knowledge is evolving, and to not have outdated information and knowledge, you need to stay reading.

[Joy_learns_crypto]

I found a book called Mastering Bitcoin by Andreas M. Antonopolous released in 2014. It seems to have all the complete information a beginner one must need in order to really understand bitcoin.

The file: https://cointhinktank.com/upload/mastering%20bitcoin.pdf

I’m planning on making this thread kind of a reaction thread to the 240 something page of this book. If anyone has more recommendations or better suggestions for books one can read regarding bitcoin, I am open to it. I invite some beginners to also join me in this journey. 

Thank you for making the thread kind of a reaction and my reaction is that before I recommend any book, you can tell the beginner the complete information you found inside the book mastering bitcoin.
Beginners will want to know is they need to read the book mastering bitcoin and with you telling them the complete information you read in the mastering bitcoin book they will have to courage and motivation to read it.

[Webetcoins]

I found a book called Mastering Bitcoin by Andreas M. Antonopolous released in 2014. It seems to have all the complete information a beginner one must need in order to really understand bitcoin.

After reading such books that teach about bitcoin, you have to also try to keep yourself updated by reading recent developments online about bitcoin. If you make the mistake of thinking that after you have read a book called "mastering bitcoins" that you no longer need to read any more thing. Knowledge is evolving, and to not have outdated information and knowledge, you need to stay reading.

Well, as he said, the book is good for beginners. By there, it can be understood that the book is still incomplete despite having a title like that. The book was released on 2014 but I know some articles can be updated. We can tell by seeing an edit sign, plus date when it happened. If I'm the author of the book, I will update it regularly, only to stand the title of my book. As much as possible, I want to cover all the topics not only for the beginners but also to the pro ones. I want to add a section too about the latest move of the scammers. But for the developments of software related to Bitcoin, I think this is only optional. We can still see them if we follow their official pages.

[SquirrelJulietGarden]

Well, as he said, the book is good for beginners. By there, it can be understood that the book is still incomplete despite having a title like that. The book was released on 2014 but I know some articles can be updated. We can tell by seeing an edit sign, plus date when it happened. If I'm the author of the book, I will update it regularly, only to stand the title of my book. As much as possible, I want to cover all the topics not only for the beginners but also to the pro ones. I want to add a section too about the latest move of the scammers. But for the developments of software related to Bitcoin, I think this is only optional. We can still see them if we follow their official pages.

You can call the book as completed or incompleted, it depends on your view on whether Bitcoin is completed/ completed, perfect/ imperfect technically. Because the book must be updated with Bitcoin technical changes with time and so far there are three versions already.

Understand about Bitcoin fundamentally to technically can help Bitcoin users having better knowledge, safer practice and can avoid bitcoin lost by personal mistakes from storage to transfer broadcast or hacks. This book can be one of a very first things to read and learn about Bitcoin. There are many other education resources for learning.

Bitcoin information and resources.
Bitcoin Lightning Network resources.

[joniboini]

You can call the book as completed or incompleted, it depends on your view on whether Bitcoin is completed/ completed, perfect/ imperfect technically. Because the book must be updated with Bitcoin technical changes with time and so far there are three versions already.

I don't think a revision implies that Bitcoin is complete or not, tbh. It can be for a lot of reasons, including typos, outdated sources, wrong data, etc. Heck, I see so many other books with bombastic titles on the market, and no one thinks the author is claiming that their title is true and not just clickbait.

Anyway, it's still a good source. People should read the latest updates to keep up with Bitcoin or crypto anyway.

[Furball808]

I found a book called Mastering Bitcoin by Andreas M. Antonopolous released in 2014. It seems to have all the complete information a beginner one must need in order to really understand bitcoin.

You can read the book free on Github and with a newest version of it, the third version.
Mastering Bitcoin book, 3^rdversion on Github.

Andreas Antonopoulos has another book about Bitcoin and it is freely readable on Github too.
Mastering the Bitcoin Lightning Network.

Books are good for reading and learning but if you want something that is interactive for better learing and practice, you can learn with this website.
https://learnmeabitcoin.com/

Thank you for sharing the newest version of it. I am liking how the author writes about bitcoin so I am certainly entertained and educated.

~snip

You actually have to understand something, bitcoin is not about reading and reading it's about actually practicing chat you've been able to gather as information making practical knowledge. Personally if I'd ever have to recommend somewhere to learn about bitcoin I'll suggest mostly this forum bitcoin wiki and Wikipedia.

Of course there are a couple other courses out there but you'll definitely find links to those resources across threads on the forum.

I have made bitcoin transactions in the past but it’s easy now to use bitcoin without really knowing about its past or technical terms involved in the matter. Some would say it’s not really important to know about bitcoin’s technicalities and terminology but in order to contribute much efficiently to discussions here in the forum I wanna make sure I stack up with knowledge.

[Hashura]

You can read the book free on Github and with a newest version of it, the third version.
Mastering Bitcoin book, 3^rdversion on Github.

Andreas Antonopoulos has another book about Bitcoin and it is freely readable on Github too.
Mastering the Bitcoin Lightning Network.

Books are good for reading and learning but if you want something that is interactive for better learing and practice, you can learn with this website.
https://learnmeabitcoin.com/

I checked the book and I was a bit overwhelmed by the huge walls of text. Learn Me A Bitcoin seems to be tailored for beginners so I prefer to stick with it, it's very well explained and the illustrations are easy to understand.

[BlackHatCoiner]

Mastering Bitcoin is an excellent choice for a beginner who wants to dive into the technical parts of bitcoin. I remember back in 2020, the main resources that taught me bitcoin besides Bitcointalk, were Andreas' book and learnmeabitcoin.com. If you're going to read Mastering Bitcoin make sure it is the 3rd edition that includes the latest changes in bitcoin such as taproot. Mastering the Lightning Network is also useful to understand what atomicity is, and how LN ensures transaction finality, even though transactions happen off-chain.

Mastering Bitcoin teaches you the how. The Bitcoin Standard will then teach you the why. I read them in that order and did not regret it.  

[YOSHIE]

I found a book called Mastering Bitcoin by Andreas M. Antonopolous released in 2014. It seems to have all the complete information a beginner one must need in order to really understand bitcoin.

As far as I remember, here we have been introduced to various Bitcoin guidebooks including Antonopolous, we understand Bitcoin and guidebooks are part of the journey process for both beginners and legendary ones.

If you want to learn more about the Bitcoin book, of course you can see it below.

• Topic: 5 BOOKS TO READ FOR NEWBIES
• Topic: The Bitcoin History Book 2008-2024 [Paperback/Hardcover/eBook]
• Topic: The Bitcoin History Book 2008-2024 [Paperback/Hardcover/eBook]
• Topic: Books about Bitcoin for Beginers

I think beginners can find the most complete one there.

[Wind_FURY]

I found a book called Mastering Bitcoin by Andreas M. Antonopolous released in 2014. It seems to have all the complete information a beginner one must need in order to really understand bitcoin.

I’m planning on making this thread kind of a reaction thread to the 240 something page of this book. If anyone has more recommendations or better suggestions for books one can read regarding bitcoin, I am open to it. I invite some beginners to also join me in this journey.  

edit: removed the file as to not violate the licensing of the book

These are not books, but they're also good to prepare you, or any beginner/newbie, on your Bitcoin journey. I suggest reading the basic Bitcoin Developer Guides in, https://developer.bitcoin.org/devguide/index.html

Then for more advanced questions, go to Bitcoin Stack Exchange, https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/

Plus there will be recommendations of books about Bitcoin and its Economic and Political side. I suggest avoiding them, and you should focus on the technical basics/fundamentals.

[Razmirraz]

There are several book titles you can read to broaden your horizons on Bitcoin, including the one you mentioned at the beginning of the topic. It should be emphasized that reading alone is not enough without practicing directly. It might be more complicated if the knowledge you have comes from books or self-taught without anyone guiding you step by step in applying it directly.

Investing or trading Bitcoin is full of risks, and requires in-depth knowledge to avoid these risks. This forum is the most suitable place for you to increase your knowledge about Bitcoin, here you can ask about something you don't understand because every question will always be answered willingly to help fellow forum members to increase their knowledge about Bitcoin.

[puloweh555]

I found a book called Mastering Bitcoin by Andreas M. Antonopolous released in 2014. It seems to have all the complete information a beginner one must need in order to really understand bitcoin.

After reading such books that teach about bitcoin, you have to also try to keep yourself updated by reading recent developments online about bitcoin. If you make the mistake of thinking that after you have read a book called "mastering bitcoins" that you no longer need to read any more thing. Knowledge is evolving, and to not have outdated information and knowledge, you need to stay reading.

That's right. No matter how many books you read about Bitcoin, don't be satisfied with not keeping up with current developments. Reading books about Bitcoin is great for gaining a better understanding of Bitcoin, but don't be complacent and think you're already proficient. To understand Bitcoin you also need to follow developments as a whole and continue learning from everywhere.

However for those who haven't read books, don't be discouraged. Investing in Bitcoin doesn't require mastery of everything, including the technical aspects. Simply learn the basics and then determine where your wallet is, and you can invest in Bitcoin. Bitcoin carries a lower risk if you're aiming for a long-term investment. I say this because I'm afraid many beginners think that investing in Bitcoin requires a complete understanding.