The creation of Bitcoin is shrouded in mystery due to its anonymous creator named “Satoshi Nakamoto”. No one seems to know who Satoshi Nakamoto is. Perhaps their identity is that of an individual, a group, or an organization.
The bitcoin.org domain name was registered on 18 August 2008. On 31 October 2008, a link to the white paper titled, “Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System”, was posted to a cryptography mailing list. Satoshi Nakamoto went on to release the bitcoin open-source software in January 2009.
The first implementation of the bitcoin software, and creation of the bitcoin network, occurred on 03 January 2009 when Satoshi Nakamoto mined the first block of the bitcoin blockchain. The first bitcoin block is known as the “genesis block” (block number 0). The genesis block rewarded 50 bitcoins. Hal Finney, a software developer, received the first bitcoin transaction of 10 bitcoins shortly thereafter.
The first known bitcoin commercial transaction involved a transaction of 10,000 bitcoins by programmer, Laszio Hanyecz, to buy two Papa John’s pizzas. The momentous bitcoin transaction is now celebrated on 22 May as “Bitcoin Pizza Day”.
It is estimated Satoshi Nakamoto mined about one million bitcoins before mysteriously disappearing in 2010. Before vanishing into the Bitcoin Ethos, Satoshi Nakamoto gave control of the bitcoin code repository to software developer Gavin Andresen. Andresen would go on to become the lead developer at the Bitcoin Foundation, founded in September 2012. The Bitcoin Foundation continues to promote bitcoin today.