Bitcoin and the developers behind it

Bitcoin has become a hot topic among Silicon Valley e-commerce elites and Wall Street tycoons recently. But a few years before Bitcoin became a global phenomenon and a tool for financial speculation, it was just an open source software that attracted a small number of users.

In the spring of 2009, a mysterious person named "Satoshi Nakamoto" released the Bitcoin software and ran it for a few months. The software offered free Bitcoins to players who downloaded and used it to attract more people to participate, but almost no one was interested. After all, what was the use of these free Bitcoins?

Satoshi Nakamoto actively sought people interested in Bitcoin on cryptography forums and message boards, but there were still few people. At this time, a person who could save the technology appeared in an unexpected place: a university dormitory in Helsinki.

When Martti Malmi discovered Bitcoin in the spring of 2009, he was a sophomore at the Helsinki University of Technology. Tall and thin, Martti was a recluse who didn't have much contact with society. He was happiest staying in his dorm with his computer, writing code, or playing online games while listening to heavy metal music with headphones.

Martti's computer-centric, isolated life made him interested in the ideas behind Bitcoin and Bitcoin itself. Martti began to explore political doctrines outside the Finnish social democratic consensus and began to follow the views of libertarian economists who encourage people to create their own destiny, which is consistent with Martti's lone wolf lifestyle. When you have talent and ideas, who needs a country?

During college, Martti was attracted to the Pirate Party that emerged in Scandinavia, a group dedicated to using technology rather than political contracts to promote social development. Napster (a software that can download MP3s on the Internet) and other music sharing services did not wait for the reform of copyright protection laws, but forced the world to change. Martti carefully weighed these views and began to wonder if currency would be the next thing to be disrupted by technology. After a period of random browsing on the Internet, Martti discovered the original Bitcoin website portal.

In his first email to Satoshi in May 2009, Martti wrote: “I would like to help develop Bitcoin if there is anything I can do.”

Before contacting Satoshi Nakamoto, Martti had written about Bitcoin under the account name Trickster in an anarchist forum. He gave a preliminary description of Bitcoin and further asked: "What do you think about it? I am interested in these practical ideas that can really bring freedom to our lives."

Martti attached the link in his email to Satoshi, who quickly read and responded to him.

“Your understanding of Bitcoin is absolutely correct,” Satoshi Nakamoto wrote.

Satoshi quickly gave Martti practical advice on how to help the project. The most important one was also the simplest: turn on your computer and keep the Bitcoin program running. Five months after Bitcoin was launched, it was hard to believe that someone, somewhere, was still running the Bitcoin program.

As for more complex programming, Satoshi told Martti that “it’s not that easy at this stage.” But Satoshi added that Bitcoin websites needed to provide introductory materials for new players, and Martti seemed to be the right person for the job.

“My writing is not that good, I am better at programming,” Satoshi wrote, encouraging Martti to take up the task.

Two days later, Martti proved that Satoshi was right by preparing a somewhat lengthy but understandable document containing seven basic questions to be posted on the Bitcoin website. Martti provided straightforward, if occasionally dull, responses to some of the questions, including: "Is Bitcoin secure?" and "Why use Bitcoin?"

Satoshi Nakamoto was pleased with the documents, and Martti soon obtained all the authentication information for the Bitcoin website to help him make further improvements to the website.

New users arrived late. In June of that year, a few dozen people downloaded the Bitcoin software, joining the initial hundreds of users who had access to it. Most tried it once and then turned it off.

Martti continued to persevere. After launching the new website, Martti turned to the actual underlying code operation of the software. He did not know the C++ language for writing programs, so he began to learn it by himself.

Martti had plenty of time to do this work, because he failed to find a summer programming job, which would give Bitcoin a huge boost in the coming months. Martti found a part-time job at an agency, but he still stayed in the school computer room all day and all night, finding inspiration at dawn. He and Satoshi were in frequent contact and had a relaxed and harmonious relationship.

Satoshi did not discuss any personal topics in the emails, but he would also joke with Martti about some small things. In one email, Satoshi mentioned that some users called Bitcoin cryptocurrency, which is a new word created based on its encryption function.

“Maybe we can use this word to describe Bitcoin. Do you like it?” asked Satoshi.

They also go back and forth on potential improvements to the software: Martti suggests automatically running the Bitcoin program when users turn on their computers to get more nodes on the network.

Satoshi agreed: “I think this might cause a change in the order of magnitude of nodes.”

Despite Martti's lack of programming experience, Satoshi Nakamoto gave him full access to the Bitcoin program server, some of which were originally operated by Satoshi Nakamoto himself. Starting in August, records show that Martti became the main operator. When the next version of Bitcoin 0.2 was released, Satoshi Nakamoto gave Martti the trust to improve most of the software.

At the same time, Martti set up a small forum that provided a platform for a small but growing group of Bitcoin users to communicate.

The Bitcoin forum went online in the fall of 2009 and attracted a number of users. Among them, a user who called himself "New Liberty Standard" proposed the need for a website where people could trade Bitcoin with real money. Martti had previously discussed this issue with Satoshi Nakamoto, and he wanted to help "New Liberty Standard". In the initial Bitcoin transaction settled in US dollars, Martti gave "New Liberty Standard" 5050 Bitcoins to bring in new transactions. In return, Martti received $5.02 through the online payment system PayPal.

It’s still almost a year before Bitcoin attracts serious users, but Martti has proven that Bitcoin is as valuable as real money, and more. The digital currency has spawned hundreds of startups that have quickly secured billions in venture funding, and has taken him from an outsider to the boardrooms of nearly every major bank and stock exchange in the world. Martti’s continued interest in disruptive finance now includes working at MONI, a secretive startup building a bridge between the old and new worlds of finance. Those $5.02 in Bitcoins Martti exchanged for? They’re now worth about $1,196,850.