It has been a decade since Bitcoin was
introduced.
Now, it has become an internationally
renowned name in the finance and technology world, together with Satoshi
Nakamato, its creator. One of his lesser known and recognised creations is the
forum that he developed for being the epicentre of all aspects associated with
bitcoin.
Ever since his first message in 2009, BTT
or BitcoinTalk became the public communication platform and tool for cyberpunks
who are working on virtual currencies. It had gained the attention of investors
quickly because they had seen its potential. In these early days, Erik
Voorhees, Gregory Maxwell, and Hal Finney were among the most active and
influential users in these days that set the base for crypto projects taking
place today.
Similar to an effectively preserved time
capsule, all of the conversations of Satoshi can be seen. With over 2.4 million
users and near 1.5 million views on a daily basis, BTT is actually more than
just a simple forum. It is a universe of bounty hunters, hodlers, and builders.
The
Crypto Collective: You might think that it is an
ugly website at first glance. After all, it serves to remind of early and
primitive Yahoo days. New users are left by the barebones UI to fend for
themselves. Usually, when you venture in, you find out that it is really the
people and not the website that serve to make this site unique and useful.
Similar to Reddit and its unique Karma
system, levels are achieved by users through merit and activity. Merit are the
recognition points which are given as a reward for great contribution in terms
of content. You might find it interesting to know that ranking system might be
the only forum where your levels have monetary value. Users with higher ranks
are able to offer postings for a specific fee and they can also earn bounty
rewards.
For some, even signing in is a challenge
with anti-spam and anti-bot features developed in it. Some users might have to
pay and give a nominal BTC fee in order to atone for the evil units which have
been created by their addresses.
The members have seemingly developed a
tight-knit community which is focused on the promotion of cryptocurrency and
preservation of trust in the environment. It is not possible for bad actors to
hide for a long time. In fact, the trust system seems to act as a Scarlet
Letter for criminals. If you do not have a positive red trust, only a limited
number of people will be working with you. In an environment where the majority
of freelancers work together from online payments and messages, this is one of
the only reliable tools for tracking scammers.
From the beginning of the hodl slogan to
the commonly known pizza order, numerous milestones have occurred on
BitcoinTalk. The initial distribution of NEM to four thousand people took place
on the forum and at the moment, an announcement thread is issued by every ICO
as its first step towards raising awareness.
Actually, the forum is seemingly segmented
into a number of boards which concentrate on things such as real world
politics, services, bounties, ICO announcements, and mining.
Users, in the mining threads, can share
advice and suggestions on the new mining rigs along with the profitability of
mining coins. In the development forums, new ideas such as different consensus
mechanisms are discussed and debated. In the economy thread, discussions will
seemingly impress even the most intellectual economists with topics such as
Deflation of Price and Inflation.
With the passage of time, services are
expanding and growing. For instance, if you want assistance in building your
coin idea, it is easy for you to find numerous platforms and developers
available at every level of price and talent. Services are offered by gifted
designers for website creation and logo making, telegram management abilities
are pitched by community operators, and details are shared by accountable for
resolving some of the most complicated crypto tax issues.
When it comes to the generation of
awareness around a new idea or project, bounties are recognised as an important
tool. They also play an important role in distributing coins and tokens to a
wide audience without having to depend on an ICO or mining. For instance, a
quick look at the first page of bounties shows more than 16 million dollars up
for grabs.
Skimming
the Surface: It is important to note that a five
minute read on BTT is not enough. Each and every threat has enough material for
supporting a long story. In addition, the economy of bounties and services that
the forum has seemingly developed might resemble a small nation’s GDP. Actually,
it is been one of the best hidden secrets of crypto: as it is protected by its
ugly and user-unfriendly appearance.
Exploring
BitcoinTalk: Once you have registered, you will
have to explore a few threads and forums if you have not done it already. These
threads can be visited by non-users as well.
The first thing that you will notice is
that an official rule or guideline list is not available. The forum together
with its moderators have the right of posting deletions and dishing out bans as
they find suitable. On the main page, the search will enable you to find every
BTT forum and will also help you save time in finding information on a specific
service or project. It is recommended to use Google Search as much as you can
because the search field at BYY is rate-limited for saving resources while the
Google Search has been determined to be more accurate.
BBcode is used by the forum for posting which
enables you to do some incredible things such as stylising your text and adding
images. You need to learn this if you have the desire of marketing your
services and projects.
There is one important thing that you need
to note. As a newbie, you will not be able to post often until you get a higher
rank. This is mainly for the prevention of spam.