Bitcoin’s first adopter tweet turned 13
There have been many iconic tweets on crypto Twitter, but not a single one will come close to Hal Finney’s one.
The prominent cryptographer tweeted about the execution of Bitcoin on January 11, 2009, which is the first known tweet about the largest cryptocurrency. At the time, hardly anyone could predict that this experiment would spawn a multi-billion dollar industry. The tweet arrived just a week after the genesis block was extracted.
Finney received the very first Bitcoin transaction from none other but Satoshi Nakamoto. This, of course, led to a lot of speculation about him being the Bitcoin creator, something that the late cypherpunk denied.
A little over a week after Finney posted his legendary ‘running Bitcoin’ tweet, he also posted several other premonitory tweets about improving cryptocurrency anonymity and handling. its carbon footprint. While the Bitcoin network required a trace amount of power when Finney first started using it, it had enough foresight to predict the widespread adoption of cryptocurrency mining. Now that Bitcoin requires more electricity than many countries, its environmental implications are in the foreground.
After watching Bitcoin make its baby steps toward mainstream acceptance and becoming a prominent member of the Bitcoin community, Finney passed away at the age of 58 after losing his battle with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).
Finney’s body was freeze-frozen in 2014 so that it could possibly be resuscitated in the future.
Finney famously predicted that the Bitcoin price could one day reach $10 million.
