Progress Recap: The Early Years

Two weeks of Bitcoin history. Here’s what the early years actually looked like.

Bitcoin started at $0.0008. The first real-world transaction was pizza. The first real marketplace was the Silk Road — which proved the network worked even as it attracted the wrong kind of attention.

The first crash was 2011 — down 94%. The network kept running. The price recovered. The community was smaller, quieter, and more conviction-based after than before.

Mt. Gox held 70% of Bitcoin trading at its peak and collapsed in 2014, taking 850,000 Bitcoin with it. It produced the permanent lesson: not your keys, not your coins.

Cyprus showed the world why uncensorable money matters. The 2013 bull run took Bitcoin to $1,000 for the first time. The crash that followed took it back to $200.

China banned Bitcoin. Multiple times. The network survived every ban by relocating its mining power and adjusting its difficulty. No government has managed to stop it.

2017 took Bitcoin to $20,000 and brought millions of new participants — many of whom had no idea what they were buying. ICO mania burned billions. The 2018 crash separated conviction holders from price chasers.

Through all of it — the crashes, the hacks, the bans, the fraud, the ridicule — the network kept producing blocks every ten minutes. The supply kept growing at its scheduled rate. The rules didn’t change.

Next two weeks: Bitcoin grows up. Institutions arrive. The world starts paying serious attention.

Tomorrow: MicroStrategy — the company that bet its entire balance sheet on Bitcoin.

— The Daily Bit