Bitcoin was created by Satoshi Nakamoto, a pseudonymous person or team, who detailed the technology in a 2008 white paper. The concept is straightforward: Bitcoin is digital money that facilitates secure peer-to-peer online transactions.
Bitcoin is an open-source, decentralized network of computer nodes that record and verify BTC transactions in blocks through a Proof-of-Work consensus mechanism. These nodes, known as “miners,” compete to solve a challenging mathematical puzzle related to the transactions in the block.
The miner who successfully solves the puzzle “mines” the block. When the block is added to the blockchain, the mining node receives newly minted BTC tokens as a reward.
The term “altcoin” is a combination of “alternative” and “coin.” Any crypto that is not Bitcoin is considered an altcoin. Examples of altcoins include Ethereum, Ripple, Polygon, Cardano, Shiba Inu, and Litecoin. Since Bitcoin‘s launch in 2008, tens of thousands of altcoins have been introduced.
