Many people believe that cryptocurrency is a relatively new phenomenon, but its history is actually quite old. In fact, the first electronic payment system dates back to 1871, when the Western Union Telegraph Company started facilitating wire transfers on my editech house. Whether you believe it or not, cryptocurrency gives a new generation of people hope by resolving problems that have plagued the world for centuries.
Blockchain
Blockchain and the history of cryptocurrency are closely related. The basic idea behind blockchain dates back to the early 1980s, when an American cryptographer named David Chaum developed a system for secure information exchange called the “blinding algorithm.” This algorithm laid the foundation for future electronic currency transfers. In the early 1990s, Wei Dai published a white paper that described b-money, a type of cryptocurrency that was decentralised and provided complex anonymity protections. However, b-money was never deployed as a method of exchange. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Bitcoin and other conventional digital finance intermediaries began to emerge.
Bitcoin
Bitcoin is a digital currency which allows users to transact with each other without any middlemen. The system is composed of millions of computers all over the world, which means that users cannot rely on a single government or bank. It was proposed by Satoshi Nakamoto, a computer scientist and cryptographer. His goal was to develop a system which would offer individuals the freedom to send and receive money without any third party’s approval.
Ethereum
Ethereum is a new decentralised platform that was first introduced in 2014 by Canadian developer Vitalik Buterin. It combines the Bitcoin blockchain technology with smart contracts to add programmability and conditional logic to money. This makes it suitable for a variety of decentralised financial applications.
Cypherpunks
Cryptocurrency and the history of Cypherpunks go hand in hand. Cypherpunks were interested in building anonymous markets and communication networks. They saw cryptographic tools as infrastructural building blocks that could help create alternatives to nation-state structures. They also wanted to create systems that could self-organise.
Bitcoin bubble
Cryptocurrency, particularly Bitcoin, has undergone many periods of “bubbles,” in which its prices surged dramatically and fell back sharply. While “bubble” usually carries a negative connotation, it is not uncommon for markets to enter periods of overconfidence in new technologies or innovations. Some notable examples of such bubbles include the 1840s British Railway Mania and the 2000-2002 Dot-com bubble.
Bitcoin’s dark side
Bitcoin is a popular digital currency, but there’s a dark side. It’s also a target of hackers. A hacker can alter the blockchain and create a single copy of it that doesn’t align with the rest. Once the whole network sees this, the transaction will be rejected as illegitimate.
Bitcoin’s adoption by major corporations
The history of cryptocurrency and Bitcoin’s adoption by major companies has many facets. First of all, a major corporation like Google will likely be hesitant to invest in Bitcoin or any other cryptocurrency if it is not widely available to the general public like on Animixplays. However, if a company sees a business opportunity in cryptocurrency, they may be interested in getting involved.
