Nostr notes by Quotable Satoshi

If SHA-256 became completely broken, I think we could come to ...

2026-04-03T00:21:02Z

If SHA-256 became completely broken, I think we could come to some agreement about what the honest block chain was before the trouble started, lock that in and continue from there with a new hash function.

At first, most users would run network nodes, but as the network ...

2026-04-02T12:21:02Z

At first, most users would run network nodes, but as the network grows beyond a certain point, it would be left more and more to specialists with server farms of specialized hardware. A server farm would only need to have one node on the network and the rest of the LAN connects with that one node.

Although it would be possible to handle coins individually, it ...

2026-04-01T12:21:02Z

Although it would be possible to handle coins individually, it would be unwieldy to make a separate transaction for every cent in a transfer. To allow value to be split and combined, transactions contain multiple inputs and outputs. Normally there will be either a single input from a larger previous transaction or multiple inputs combining smaller amounts, and at most two outputs: one for the payment, and one returning the change, if any, back to the sender.

Bitcoin isn't currently practical for very small ...

2026-04-01T00:21:02Z

Bitcoin isn't currently practical for very small micropayments. Not for things like pay per search or per page view without an aggregating mechanism, not things needing to pay less than 0.01. The dust spam limit is a first try at intentionally trying to prevent overly small micropayments like that.
Bitcoin is practical for smaller transactions than are practical with existing payment methods. Small enough to include what you might call the top of the micropayment range. But it doesn't claim to be practical for arbitrarily small micropayments.

For future reference, here's my public key. It's the same ...

2026-03-31T12:21:02Z

For future reference, here's my public key. It's the same one that's been there since the bitcoin.org site first went up in 2008. Grab it now in case you need it later. http://www.bitcoin.org/Satoshi_Nakamoto.asc

It should be noted that fan-out, where a transaction depends on ...

2026-03-31T00:21:02Z

It should be noted that fan-out, where a transaction depends on several transactions, and those transactions depend on many more, is not a problem here. There is never the need to extract a complete standalone copy of a transaction's history.

If you're having trouble with the inflation issue, it's ...

2026-03-30T00:21:02Z

If you're having trouble with the inflation issue, it's easy to tweak it for transaction fees instead. It's as simple as this: let the output value from any transaction be 1 cent less than the input value. Either the client software automatically writes transactions for 1 cent more than the intended payment value, or it could come out of the payee's side. The incentive value when a node finds a proof-of-work for a block could be the total of the fees in the block.

In this paper, we propose a solution to the double-spending ...

2026-03-29T12:21:03Z

In this paper, we propose a solution to the double-spending problem using a peer-to-peer distributed timestamp server to generate computational proof of the chronological order of transactions. The system is secure as long as honest nodes collectively control more CPU power than any cooperating group of attacker nodes.

SHA-256 is very strong. It's not like the incremental step ...

2026-03-29T00:21:02Z

SHA-256 is very strong. It's not like the incremental step from MD5 to SHA1. It can last several decades unless there's some massive breakthrough attack.

There would be many smaller zombie farms that are not big enough ...

2026-03-28T12:21:02Z

There would be many smaller zombie farms that are not big enough to overpower the network, and they could still make money by generating bitcoins. The smaller farms are then the "honest nodes". (I need a better term than "honest") The more smaller farms resort to generating bitcoins, the higher the bar gets to overpower the network, making larger farms also too small to overpower it so that they may as well generate bitcoins too. According to the "long tail" theory, the small, medium and merely large farms put together should add up to a lot more than the biggest zombie farm.

Nodes always consider the longest chain to be the correct one and ...

2026-03-28T00:21:01Z

Nodes always consider the longest chain to be the correct one and will keep working on extending it. If two nodes broadcast different versions of the next block simultaneously, some nodes may receive one or the other first. In that case, they work on the first one they received, but save the other branch in case it becomes longer. The tie will be broken when the next proof-of-work is found and one branch becomes longer; the nodes that were working on the other branch will then switch to the longer one.

The Bitcoin network might actually reduce spam by diverting ...

2026-03-27T12:21:02Z

The Bitcoin network might actually reduce spam by diverting zombie farms to generating bitcoins instead.

The receiver of a payment must wait an hour or so before ...

2026-03-27T00:21:01Z

The receiver of a payment must wait an hour or so before believing that it's valid. The network will resolve any possible double-spend races by then.

A transaction will quickly propagate throughout the network, so ...

2026-03-26T00:21:02Z

A transaction will quickly propagate throughout the network, so if two versions of the same transaction were reported at close to the same time, the one with the head start would have a big advantage in reaching many more nodes first. Nodes will only accept the first one they see, refusing the second one to arrive, so the earlier transaction would have many more nodes working on incorporating it into the next proof-of-work. In effect, each node votes for its viewpoint of which transaction it saw first by including it in its proof-of-work effort. If the transactions did come at exactly the same time and there was an even split, it's a toss up based on which gets into a proof-of-work first, and that decides which is valid.

As computers get faster and the total computing power applied to ...

2026-03-25T12:21:03Z

As computers get faster and the total computing power applied to creating bitcoins increases, the difficulty increases proportionally to keep the total new production constant. Thus, it is known in advance how many new bitcoins will be created every year in the future.

Think of it as a cooperative effort to make a chain. When you add ...

2026-03-25T00:21:02Z

Think of it as a cooperative effort to make a chain. When you add a link, you must first find the current end of the chain. If you were to locate the last link, then go off for an hour and forge your link, come back and link it to the link that was the end an hour ago, others may have added several links since then and they're not going to want to use your link that now branches off the middle.

A transaction will quickly propagate throughout the network, so ...

2026-03-24T00:21:02Z

We consider the scenario of an attacker trying to generate an ...

2026-03-23T12:21:02Z

We consider the scenario of an attacker trying to generate an alternate chain faster than the honest chain. Even if this is accomplished, it does not throw the system open to arbitrary changes, such as creating value out of thin air or taking money that never belonged to the attacker. Nodes are not going to accept an invalid transaction as payment, and honest nodes will never accept a block containing them. An attacker can only try to change one of his own transactions to take back money he recently spent.

The fact that new coins are produced means the money supply ...

2026-03-23T00:21:02Z

The fact that new coins are produced means the money supply increases by a planned amount, but this does not necessarily result in inflation. If the supply of money increases at the same rate that the number of people using it increases, prices remain stable. If it does not increase as fast as demand, there will be deflation and early holders of money will see its value increase. Coins have to get initially distributed somehow, and a constant rate seems like the best formula.

Only people trying to create new coins would need to run network ...

2026-03-22T00:21:02Z

Only people trying to create new coins would need to run network nodes.

At the moment, generation effort is rapidly increasing, ...

2026-03-21T12:21:02Z

At the moment, generation effort is rapidly increasing, suggesting people are estimating the present value to be higher than the current cost of production.

Forgot to add the good part about micropayments. While I ...

2026-03-21T00:21:02Z

Forgot to add the good part about micropayments. While I don't think Bitcoin is practical for smaller micropayments right now, it will eventually be as storage and bandwidth costs continue to fall. If Bitcoin catches on on a big scale, it may already be the case by that time. Another way they can become more practical is if I implement client-only mode and the number of network nodes consolidates into a smaller number of professional server farms. Whatever size micropayments you need will eventually be practical. I think in 5 or 10 years, the bandwidth and storage will seem trivial.

The problem of course is the payee can't verify that one of ...

2026-03-20T12:21:02Z

The problem of course is the payee can't verify that one of the owners did not double-spend the coin. A common solution is to introduce a trusted central authority, or mint, that checks every transaction for double spending. After each transaction, the coin must be returned to the mint to issue a new coin, and only coins issued directly from the mint are trusted not to be double-spent. The problem with this solution is that the fate of the entire money system depends on the company running the mint, with every transaction having to go through them, just like a bank.

Right, nodes keep transactions in their working set until they ...

2026-03-20T00:21:01Z

Right, nodes keep transactions in their working set until they get into a block. If a transaction reaches 90% of nodes, then each time a new block is found, it has a 90% chance of being in it.

We should have a gentleman's agreement to postpone the GPU ...

2026-03-19T12:21:02Z

We should have a gentleman's agreement to postpone the GPU arms race as long as we can for the good of the network. It's much easer to get new users up to speed if they don't have to worry about GPU drivers and compatibility. It's nice how anyone with just a CPU can compete fairly equally right now.

Instantant non-repudiability is not a feature, but it's still ...

2026-03-18T12:21:02Z

Instantant non-repudiability is not a feature, but it's still much faster than existing systems. Paper cheques can bounce up to a week or two later. Credit card transactions can be contested up to 60 to 180 days later. Bitcoin transactions can be sufficiently irreversible in an hour or two.

At equilibrium size, many nodes will be server farms with one or ...

2026-03-17T12:21:03Z

At equilibrium size, many nodes will be server farms with one or two network nodes that feed the rest of the farm over a LAN.

Announcing version 0.3 of Bitcoin, the P2P cryptocurrency! ...

2026-03-17T00:21:03Z

Announcing version 0.3 of Bitcoin, the P2P cryptocurrency! Bitcoin is a digital currency using cryptography and a distributed network to replace the need for a trusted central server. Escape the arbitrary inflation risk of centrally managed currencies! Bitcoin's total circulation is limited to 21 million coins. The coins are gradually released to the network's nodes based on the CPU power they contribute, so you can get a share of them by contributing your idle CPU time.

If SHA-256 became completely broken, I think we could come to ...

2026-03-16T12:21:02Z

The proof-of-work chain is a solution to the Byzantine ...

2026-03-15T12:21:02Z

The proof-of-work chain is a solution to the Byzantine Generals' Problem. I'll try to rephrase it in that context.
A number of Byzantine Generals each have a computer and want to attack the King's wi-fi by brute forcing the password, which they've learned is a certain number of characters in length. Once they stimulate the network to generate a packet, they must crack the password within a limited time to break in and erase the logs, otherwise they will be discovered and get in trouble. They only have enough CPU power to crack it fast enough if a majority of them attack at the same time.
They don't particularly care when the attack will be, just that they all agree. It has been decided that anyone who feels like it will announce a time, and whatever time is heard first will be the official attack time. The problem is that the network is not instantaneous, and if two generals announce different attack times at close to the same time, some may hear one first and others hear the other first. They use a proof-of-work chain to solve the problem. Once each general receives whatever attack time he hears first, he sets his computer to solve an extremely difficult proof-of-work problem that includes the attack time in its hash. The proof-of-work is so difficult, it's expected to take 10 minutes of them all working at once before one of them finds a solution. Once one of the generals finds a proof-of-work, he broadcasts it to the network, and everyone changes their current proof-of-work computation to include that proof-of-work in the hash they're working on. If anyone was working on a different attack time, they switch to this one, because its proof-of-work chain is now longer.
After two hours, one attack time should be hashed by a chain of 12 proofs-of-work. Every general, just by verifying the difficulty of the proof-of-work chain, can estimate how much parallel CPU power per hour was expended on it and see that it must have required the majority of the computers to produce that much proof-of-work in the allotted time. They had to all have seen it because the proof-of-work is proof that they worked on it. If the CPU power exhibited by the proof-of-work chain is sufficient to crack the password, they can safely attack at the agreed time.
The proof-of-work chain is how all the synchronisation, distributed database and global view problems you've asked about are solved.

You could say coins are issued by the majority. They are issued ...

2026-03-15T00:21:02Z

You could say coins are issued by the majority. They are issued in a limited, predetermined amount.

It is possible to verify payments without running a full network ...

2026-03-14T00:21:02Z

It is possible to verify payments without running a full network node. A user only needs to keep a copy of the block headers of the longest proof-of-work chain, which he can get by querying network nodes until he's convinced he has the longest chain, and obtain the Merkle branch linking the transaction to the block it's timestamped in. He can't check the transaction for himself, but by linking it to a place in the chain, he can see that a network node has accepted it, and blocks added after it further confirm the network has accepted it.
As such, the verification is reliable as long as honest nodes control the network, but is more vulnerable if the network is overpowered by an attacker. While network nodes can verify transactions for themselves, the simplified method can be fooled by an attacker's fabricated transactions for as long as the attacker can continue to overpower the network. One strategy to protect against this would be to accept alerts from network nodes when they detect an invalid block, prompting the user's software to download the full block and alerted transactions to confirm the inconsistency. Businesses that receive frequent payments will probably still want to run their own nodes for more independent security and quicker verification.

I wish rather than deleting the article, they put a length ...

2026-03-13T12:21:02Z

I wish rather than deleting the article, they put a length restriction. If something is not famous enough, there could at least be a stub article identifying what it is. I often come across annoying red links of things that Wiki ought to at least have heard of.
The article could be as simple as something like: "Bitcoin is a peer-to-peer decentralised /link/electronic currency/link/."
The more standard Wiki thing to do is that we should have a paragraph in one of the more general categories that we are an instance of, like Electronic Currency or Electronic Cash. We can probably establish a paragraph there. Again, keep it short. Just identifying what it is.

SHA-256 is very strong. It's not like the incremental step ...

2026-03-13T00:21:02Z

SHA-256 is very strong. It's not like the incremental step from MD5 to SHA1. It can last several decades unless there's some massive breakthrough attack.

Some places where generation will gravitate to: 1) places where ...

2026-03-12T12:21:02Z

Some places where generation will gravitate to:
1) places where it's cheapest or free
2) people who want to help for idealogical reasons
3) people who want to get some coins without the inconvenience of doing a transaction to buy them

There are legitimate places where it's free. Generation is basically free anywhere that has electric heat, since your computer's heat is offsetting your baseboard electric heating. Many small flats have electric heat out of convenience.

Eventually at most only 21 million coins for 6.8 billion people ...

2026-03-12T00:21:02Z

Eventually at most only 21 million coins for 6.8 billion people in the world if it really gets huge.

But don't worry, there are another 6 decimal places that aren't shown, for a total of 8 decimal places internally. It shows 1.00 but internally it's 1.00000000. If there's massive deflation in the future, the software could show more decimal places.

It is a global distributed database, with additions to the ...

2026-03-11T12:21:01Z

It is a global distributed database, with additions to the database by consent of the majority, based on a set of rules they follow:

- Whenever someone finds proof-of-work to generate a block, they get some new coins
- The proof-of-work difficulty is adjusted every two weeks to target an average of 6 blocks per hour (for the whole network)
- The coins given per block is cut in half every 4 years

The design outlines a lightweight client that does not need the ...

2026-03-10T12:21:02Z

The design outlines a lightweight client that does not need the full block chain. In the design PDF it's called Simplified Payment Verification. The lightweight client can send and receive transactions, it just can't generate blocks. It does not need to trust a node to verify payments, it can still verify them itself.
The lightweight client is not implemented yet, but the plan is to implement it when it's needed. For now, everyone just runs a full network node.

It is strictly necessary that the longest chain is always ...

2026-03-10T00:21:02Z

It is strictly necessary that the longest chain is always considered the valid one. Nodes that were present may remember that one branch was there first and got replaced by another, but there would be no way for them to convince those who were not present of this. We can't have subfactions of nodes that cling to one branch that they think was first, others that saw another branch first, and others that joined later and never saw what happened. The CPU power proof-of-work vote must have the final say. The only way for everyone to stay on the same page is to believe that the longest chain is always the valid one, no matter what.

With the transaction fee based incentive system I recently ...

2026-03-09T12:21:02Z

With the transaction fee based incentive system I recently posted, nodes would have an incentive to include all the paying transactions they receive.

The solution we propose begins with a timestamp server. A ...

2026-03-09T00:21:01Z

The solution we propose begins with a timestamp server. A timestamp server works by taking a hash of a block of items to be timestamped and widely publishing the hash, such as in a newspaper or Usenet post. The timestamp proves that the data must have existed at the time, obviously, in order to get into the hash. Each timestamp includes the previous timestamp in its hash, forming a chain, with each additional timestamp reinforcing the ones before it.

It might make sense just to get some in case it catches on. If ...

2026-03-08T12:21:02Z

It might make sense just to get some in case it catches on. If enough people think the same way, that becomes a self fulfilling prophecy. Once it gets bootstrapped, there are so many applications if you could effortlessly pay a few cents to a website as easily as dropping coins in a vending machine.

The project needs to grow gradually so the software can be ...

2026-03-08T00:21:02Z

The project needs to grow gradually so the software can be strengthened along the way. I make this appeal to WikiLeaks not to try to use Bitcoin. Bitcoin is a small beta community in its infancy.

It's not a problem if transactions have to wait one or a few ...

2026-03-07T12:21:02Z

It's not a problem if transactions have to wait one or a few extra cycles to get into a block.

I'll try and hurry up and release the sourcecode as soon as ...

2026-03-07T00:21:02Z

I'll try and hurry up and release the sourcecode as soon as possible to serve as a reference to help clear up all these implementation questions.

For greater privacy, it's best to use bitcoin addresses only ...

2026-03-06T12:21:02Z

For greater privacy, it's best to use bitcoin addresses only once.

In this paper, we propose a solution to the double-spending ...

2026-03-05T12:21:02Z

The current system where every user is a network node is not the ...

2026-03-05T00:21:02Z

The current system where every user is a network node is not the intended configuration for large scale. That would be like every Usenet user runs their own NNTP server. The design supports letting users just be users. The more burden it is to run a node, the fewer nodes there will be. Those few nodes will be big server farms. The rest will be client nodes that only do transactions and don't generate.

As computers get faster and the total computing power applied to ...

2026-03-04T12:21:02Z

Difficulty just increased by 4 times, so now your cost is ...

2026-03-04T00:21:03Z

Difficulty just increased by 4 times, so now your cost is US$0.02/BTC.

We're not "on the lookout" for double spends to sound ...

2026-03-03T12:21:02Z

We're not "on the lookout" for double spends to sound the alarm and catch the cheater. We merely adjudicate which one of the spends is valid. Receivers of transactions must wait a few blocks to make sure that resolution has had time to complete. Would be cheaters can try and simultaneously double-spend all they want, and all they accomplish is that within a few blocks, one of the spends becomes valid and the others become invalid. Any later double-spends are immediately rejected once there's already a spend in the main chain.

The problem of course is the payee can't verify that one of ...

2026-03-03T00:21:02Z

At equilibrium size, many nodes will be server farms with one or ...

2026-03-02T12:21:02Z

At equilibrium size, many nodes will be server farms with one or two network nodes that feed the rest of the farm over a LAN.

Bitcoin isn't currently practical for very small ...

2026-03-02T00:21:01Z

Proof-of-work has the nice property that it can be relayed ...

2026-03-01T12:21:02Z

Proof-of-work has the nice property that it can be relayed through untrusted middlemen. We don't have to worry about a chain of custody of communication. It doesn't matter who tells you a longest chain, the proof-of-work speaks for itself.

The nature of Bitcoin is such that once version 0.1 was released, ...

2026-03-01T00:21:02Z

The nature of Bitcoin is such that once version 0.1 was released, the core design was set in stone for the rest of its lifetime. Because of that, I wanted to design it to support every possible transaction type I could think of. The problem was, each thing required special support code and data fields whether it was used or not, and only covered one special case at a time. It would have been an explosion of special cases. The solution was script, which generalizes the problem so transacting parties can describe their transaction as a predicate that the node network evaluates. The nodes only need to understand the transaction to the extent of evaluating whether the sender's conditions are met.

Long before the network gets anywhere near as large as that, it ...

2026-02-28T12:21:02Z

Long before the network gets anywhere near as large as that, it would be safe for users to use Simplified Payment Verification (section 8) to check for double spending, which only requires having the chain of block headers, or about 12KB per day.

Excellent choice of a first project, nice work. I had planned to ...

2026-02-28T00:21:02Z

Excellent choice of a first project, nice work. I had planned to do this exact thing if someone else didn't do it, so when it gets too hard for mortals to generate 50BTC, new users could get some coins to play with right away. Donations should be able to keep it filled. The display showing the balance in the dispenser encourages people to top it up.

You should put a donation bitcoin address on the page for those who want to add funds to it, which ideally should update to a new address whenever it receives something.

Completely non-reversible transactions are not really possible, ...

2026-02-27T12:21:02Z

Completely non-reversible transactions are not really possible, since financial institutions cannot avoid mediating disputes. The cost of mediation increases transaction costs, limiting the minimum practical transaction size and cutting off the possibility for small casual transactions, and there is a broader cost in the loss of ability to make non-reversible payments for non-reversible services. With the possibility of reversal, the need for trust spreads.

Bitcoin isn't currently practical for very small ...

2026-02-27T00:21:02Z

If you're sad about paying the fee, you could always turn the ...

2026-02-26T12:21:01Z

If you're sad about paying the fee, you could always turn the tables and run a node yourself and maybe someday rake in a 0.44 fee yourself.

When you generate a new bitcoin address, it only takes disk space ...

2026-02-26T00:21:02Z

When you generate a new bitcoin address, it only takes disk space on your own computer (like 500 bytes). It's like generating a new PGP private key, but less CPU intensive because it's ECC. The address space is effectively unlimited. It doesn't hurt anyone, so generate all you want.

The price of .com registrations is lower than it should be, ...

2026-02-25T12:21:02Z

The price of .com registrations is lower than it should be, therefore any good name you might think of is always already taken by some domain name speculator. Fortunately, it's standard for open source projects to be .org.

At first, most users would run network nodes, but as the network ...

2026-02-25T00:21:01Z

Completely non-reversible transactions are not really possible, ...

2026-02-24T12:21:02Z

By convention, the first transaction in a block is a special ...

2026-02-24T00:21:02Z

By convention, the first transaction in a block is a special transaction that starts a new coin owned by the creator of the block. This adds an incentive for nodes to support the network, and provides a way to initially distribute coins into circulation, since there is no central authority to issue them. The steady addition of a constant of amount of new coins is analogous to gold miners expending resources to add gold to circulation. In our case, it is CPU time and electricity that is expended.

Total circulation will be 21,000,000 coins. It'll be ...

2026-02-23T12:21:02Z

Total circulation will be 21,000,000 coins. It'll be distributed to network nodes when they make blocks, with the amount cut in half every 4 years.

first 4 years: 10,500,000 coins
next 4 years: 5,250,000 coins
next 4 years: 2,625,000 coins
next 4 years: 1,312,500 coins
etc...

When that runs out, the system can support transaction fees if needed. It's based on open market competition, and there will probably always be nodes willing to process transactions for free.

Currently, paying a fee is controlled manually with the -paytxfee ...

2026-02-23T00:21:02Z

Currently, paying a fee is controlled manually with the -paytxfee switch. It would be very easy to make the software automatically check the size of recent blocks to see if it should pay a fee. We're so far from reaching the threshold, we don't need that yet. It's a good idea to see how things go with controlling it manually first anyway.

The proof-of-work chain is a solution to the Byzantine ...

2026-02-22T12:21:02Z

When you generate a new bitcoin address, it only takes disk space ...

2026-02-22T00:21:02Z

You could say coins are issued by the majority. They are issued ...

2026-02-21T12:21:02Z

You could say coins are issued by the majority. They are issued in a limited, predetermined amount.

Any owner could try to re-spend an already spent coin by signing ...

2026-02-21T00:21:02Z

Any owner could try to re-spend an already spent coin by signing it again to another owner. The usual solution is for a trusted company with a central database to check for double-spending, but that just gets back to the trust model. In its central position, the company can override the users, and the fees needed to support the company make micropayments impractical.
Bitcoin's solution is to use a peer-to-peer network to check for double-spending. In a nutshell, the network works like a distributed timestamp server, stamping the first transaction to spend a coin. It takes advantage of the nature of information being easy to spread but hard to stifle.

If you're having trouble with the inflation issue, it's ...

2026-02-20T12:21:02Z

If it gets tiresome working with small numbers, we could change ...

2026-02-20T00:21:02Z

If it gets tiresome working with small numbers, we could change where the display shows the decimal point. Same amount of money, just different convention for where the ","'s and "."'s go. e.g. moving the decimal place 3 places would mean if you had 1.00000 before, now it shows it as 1,000.00.

It is possible to verify payments without running a full network ...

2026-02-19T12:21:02Z

The price of any commodity tends to gravitate toward the ...

2026-02-19T00:21:01Z

The price of any commodity tends to gravitate toward the production cost. If the price is below cost, then production slows down. If the price is above cost, profit can be made by generating and selling more. At the same time, the increased production would increase the difficulty, pushing the cost of generating towards the price.

Forgot to add the good part about micropayments. While I ...

2026-02-18T12:21:02Z

For our timestamp network, we implement the proof-of-work by ...

2026-02-18T00:21:02Z

For our timestamp network, we implement the proof-of-work by incrementing a nonce in the block until a value is found that gives the block's hash the required zero bits. Once the CPU effort has been expended to make it satisfy the proof-of-work, the block cannot be changed without redoing the work. As later blocks are chained after it, the work to change the block would include redoing all the blocks after it.

At equilibrium size, many nodes will be server farms with one or ...

2026-02-17T12:21:02Z

At equilibrium size, many nodes will be server farms with one or two network nodes that feed the rest of the farm over a LAN.

Excellent choice of a first project, nice work. I had planned to ...

2026-02-17T00:21:02Z

You could use TOR if you don't want anyone to know you're ...

2026-02-16T12:21:02Z

You could use TOR if you don't want anyone to know you're even using Bitcoin.

The incentive can also be funded with transaction fees. If the ...

2026-02-16T00:21:02Z

The incentive can also be funded with transaction fees. If the output value of a transaction is less than its input value, the difference is a transaction fee that is added to the incentive value of the block containing the transaction. Once a predetermined number of coins have entered circulation, the incentive can transition entirely to transaction fees and be completely inflation free.

The traditional banking model achieves a level of privacy by ...

2026-02-15T12:21:02Z

The traditional banking model achieves a level of privacy by limiting access to information to the parties involved and the trusted third party. The necessity to announce all transactions publicly precludes this method, but privacy can still be maintained by breaking the flow of information in another place: by keeping public keys anonymous. The public can see that someone is sending an amount to someone else, but without information linking the transaction to anyone. This is similar to the level of information released by stock exchanges, where the time and size of individual trades, the "tape", is made public, but without telling who the parties were.

When there are multiple double-spent versions of the same ...

2026-02-15T00:21:02Z

When there are multiple double-spent versions of the same transaction, one and only one will become valid.

Does anyone want to translate the Bitcoin client itself? It would ...

2026-02-14T12:21:02Z

Does anyone want to translate the Bitcoin client itself? It would be great to have at least one other language in the 0.3 release.

You can get coins by getting someone to send you some, or turn on ...

2026-02-14T00:21:01Z

You can get coins by getting someone to send you some, or turn on Options->Generate Coins to run a node and generate blocks. I made the proof-of-work difficulty ridiculously easy to start with, so for a little while in the beginning a typical PC will be able to generate coins in just a few hours. It'll get a lot harder when competition makes the automatic adjustment drive up the difficulty. Generated coins must wait 120 blocks to mature before they can be spent.

In this paper, we propose a solution to the double-spending ...

2026-02-13T12:21:01Z

Commerce on the Internet has come to rely almost exclusively on ...

2026-02-13T00:21:01Z

Commerce on the Internet has come to rely almost exclusively on financial institutions serving as trusted third parties to process electronic payments. While the system works well enough for most transactions, it still suffers from the inherent weaknesses of the trust based model.

I very much wanted to find some way to include a short message, ...

2026-02-12T12:21:02Z

I very much wanted to find some way to include a short message, but the problem is, the whole world would be able to see the message. As much as you may keep reminding people that the message is completely non-private, it would be an accident waiting to happen.

The project needs to grow gradually so the software can be ...

2026-02-12T00:21:02Z

The project needs to grow gradually so the software can be strengthened along the way. I make this appeal to WikiLeaks not to try to use Bitcoin. Bitcoin is a small beta community in its infancy.

Difficulty just increased by 4 times, so now your cost is ...

2026-02-11T12:21:02Z

Difficulty just increased by 4 times, so now your cost is US$0.02/BTC.

Even if a bad guy does overpower the network, it's not like ...

2026-02-11T00:21:02Z

Even if a bad guy does overpower the network, it's not like he's instantly rich. All he can accomplish is to take back money he himself spent, like bouncing a check. To exploit it, he would have to buy something from a merchant, wait till it ships, then overpower the network and try to take his money back. I don't think he could make as much money trying to pull a carding scheme like that as he could by generating bitcoins. With a zombie farm that big, he could generate more bitcoins than everyone else combined.

We have proposed a system for electronic transactions without ...

2026-02-10T12:21:02Z

We have proposed a system for electronic transactions without relying on trust. We started with the usual framework of coins made from digital signatures, which provides strong control of ownership, but is incomplete without a way to prevent double-spending. To solve this, we proposed a peer-to-peer network using proof-of-work to record a public history of transactions that quickly becomes computationally impractical for an attacker to change if honest nodes control a majority of CPU power.

If a merchant actually has a problem with theft, they can make ...

2026-02-10T00:21:02Z

If a merchant actually has a problem with theft, they can make the customer wait 2 minutes, or wait for something in e-mail, which many already do. If they really want to optimize, and it's a large download, they could cancel the download in the middle if the transaction comes back double-spent. If it's website access, typically it wouldn't be a big deal to let the customer have access for 5 minutes and then cut off access if it's rejected. Many such sites have a free trial anyway.

In this sense, it's more typical of a precious metal. Instead ...

2026-02-09T12:21:02Z

In this sense, it's more typical of a precious metal. Instead of the supply changing to keep the value the same, the supply is predetermined and the value changes. As the number of users grows, the value per coin increases. It has the potential for a positive feedback loop; as users increase, the value goes up, which could attract more users to take advantage of the increasing value.

When someone tries to buy all the world's supply of a scarce ...

2026-02-09T00:21:02Z

When someone tries to buy all the world's supply of a scarce asset, the more they buy the higher the price goes. At some point, it gets too expensive for them to buy any more. It's great for the people who owned it beforehand because they get to sell it to the corner at crazy high prices. As the price keeps going up and up, some people keep holding out for yet higher prices and refuse to sell.

As an additional firewall, a new key pair should be used for each ...

2026-02-08T12:21:02Z

As an additional firewall, a new key pair should be used for each transaction to keep them from being linked to a common owner. Some linking is still unavoidable with multi-input transactions, which necessarily reveal that their inputs were owned by the same owner. The risk is that if the owner of a key is revealed, linking could reveal other transactions that belonged to the same owner.

Actually, it works well to just PM me. I'm the one who's ...

2026-02-08T00:21:02Z

Actually, it works well to just PM me. I'm the one who's going to be fixing it. If you find a security flaw, I would definitely like to hear from you privately to fix it before it goes public.

The design supports a tremendous variety of possible transaction ...

2026-02-07T12:21:02Z

The design supports a tremendous variety of possible transaction types that I designed years ago. Escrow transactions, bonded contracts, third party arbitration, multi-party signature, etc. If Bitcoin catches on in a big way, these are things we'll want to explore in the future, but they all had to be designed at the beginning to make sure they would be possible later.

Bitcoin is still very new and has not been independently ...

2026-02-07T00:21:03Z

Bitcoin is still very new and has not been independently analysed. If you're serious about privacy, TOR is an advisable precaution.