What is Genesis Block?
WHAT IS GENESIS BLOCK?
Genesis Block is the name of the first
Bitcoin
block ever mined. Hence it is called “Genesis”. The Genesis Block forms the basis of the entire Bitcoin trading system and is the prototype of all other blocks on the blockchain. In 2009, Bitcoin’s developer,
Satoshi Nakomoto
, created the Genesis Block, which started the process of Bitcoin trading that exists today. The Genesis block is the starting block of the blockchain. The Genesis block may also be referred to as block 0.
In the cryptocurrency
world, blocks are files in which data about the Bitcoin network and its transactions are permanently recorded. Every time a block is completed, that is, filled with Bitcoin transactions, it leads to the next block in the blockchain. The only way to get the new cryptocurrency into circulation is through mining. So, to mine bitcoin is to make money in currency. Like gold, Bitcoin cannot be created arbitrarily. Gold must be mined somewhere and BTC must be mined through digital means. Moreover, Bitcoin’s founder stipulated that the supply of bitcoin, like gold, should be limited, and only 21 million BTC could be mined in total.
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First 50 BTC
The first example of the Genesis block is Bitcoin’s startup block. The prize of this genesis blog, which was created in a very interesting way with the feature of being the first, was equivalent to 50 BTC. However, Satoshi Nakamoto, the architect of Bitcoin, closed this reward to use or spend. This unspent reward is said to be sitting in Nakamoto’s account. Another curious issue is the message that Satoshi Nakamoto hid in the first block of Bitcoin. On January 3, 2009, Nakamoto added The Times’ newspaper headline of the day to the genesis block. Another surprising point was that the title was about banks. Although Satoshi does not seem to have given a message, the fact that the title he added is about banks makes people think that Satoshi is making a reference.
Features of Genesis Block
- Number of transactions –It is important to note that blocks contain transactions that take place on the Bitcoin network, there is only one transaction in the starting block. That is the 50 BTC reward given by Coinbase in exchange for Satoshi creating a block. Except for the Coinbase transaction, Satoshi did not make any other transactions in the initial block. The other mysterious message on the block is the headline of The Times newspaper that day, recorded by Satoshi, “The Times 03/Jan/2009, the UK Finance Minister could implement a bailout plan for Banks at any time.”
- Block height – As mentioned earlier, the genesis block has a zero block height and provides the foundation on which additional blocks are added.
- Timestamp: This is when the miner starts to create the block header. Therefore, we can see that the genesis blog was formed on January 3, 2019.
- Nonce: Nonce is an arbitrary variable that a miner constantly changes in sequence in order to gain the right to add a block to the blockchain. The internal variable that Satoshi used was 208393.
- Block difficulty: Difficulty is a measure of how difficult it is for a miner to find the nonce value that allows him to successfully add a block to the blockchain. When Satoshi created the genesis block, the difficulty of the Bitcoin network was “1”. The difficulty of the Bitcoin network is now 10,183,488,432,889.