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October 31, 2008Reputable source · 2 sourcesWell documented

Satoshi Nakamoto Publishes the Bitcoin Whitepaper

Weeks after Lehman's collapse, a pseudonymous author proposes money that needs no bank at all

On the timeline · around October 31, 2008 · The Age of Fiat and Digital MoneyThe Age of Fiat and Digital MoneySatoshi Nakamoto Publishes the Bitcoin Whitepaper194019501960197019801990200020102020

Quick facts

Whitepaper published
October 31, 2008
Title
"Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System"
Genesis block mined
January 2009
Core technology
Blockchain (distributed, tamper-resistant ledger)

What happened

On October 31, 2008, roughly six weeks after Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy, a pseudonymous author or group using the name Satoshi Nakamoto released a nine-page paper titled 'Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System.' According to HISTORY, the paper's central breakthrough was persuading users to trust each other and the Bitcoin network directly, without a centralized bank or government acting as intermediary, through an electronic ledger, later known as a blockchain, that is signed and distributed to every participant in the network, making false spending or tampering with the ledger extremely difficult. MIT Sloan describes the resulting technology as one where a network of computers periodically agrees on the true state of a shared, distributed ledger that exists as copies across every participating computer rather than in one central location. Nakamoto mined Bitcoin's first block, the genesis block, in January 2009, embedding within it a headline referencing a British government bank bailout, widely read as a pointed commentary on the crisis the currency was designed to route around.

Why it matters

The Bitcoin whitepaper introduced, at the exact moment public trust in banks had cratered, a technical proposal for money that requires no bank, no central issuer, and no government backing at all, launching an entirely new category of asset and inspiring the broader blockchain and cryptocurrency industry that followed. Whether cryptocurrency will function as durable money, a speculative asset, or something else entirely remains an open and contested question.

How we know

The Bitcoin whitepaper is a public document whose original 2008 posting date and authorship attribution to the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto are documented in mailing-list archives and cryptography forums from the time, and the technology it describes, the blockchain, is directly observable and auditable in the Bitcoin network that has run continuously since January 2009.

Sources

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Satoshi Nakamoto Publishes the Bitcoin Whitepaper · History of Money · SourcedStory