Let's Talk—My Tryst With Bitcoin in 2009 and What Happened Next!
Circa 2007, PayPal, Liberty Reserve, Solid Trust Pay and Moneybookers were some of the digital currency services available to the common man in some of the major economies. India wasn’t far behind, and there were a handful of shady exchangers for some of these services.
Using these services was the only way for most people trying to transfer money globally. You could sell INR for Liberty Reserve if you wanted to undertake forex trading on a MetaTrader based platform or for that matter participate in scammy HYIPs (High-Yield Investment Programs).
As an outlier, I was trying different things to become a self-employed individual. I also enjoyed the small profits I was making trading a few currency pairs. But, one fine morning in 2007 my email accounts, Liberty Reserve and a LiteForex trading account were hacked!
I had a dial-up internet connection at the time with an uptime of just 50% at best! Owing to the consistent downtime, I often relied on local cyber-cafes to check my emails, which led to the one-time account hacking incident. I lost ALL of money, and it was a LOT for it's time!
This incident made me very afraid of anything remotely close to the words, ‘digital currency’ and holding money on the Internet.
This was my first experience with digital currencies and Bitcoin hadn’t been invented yet!
Bitcoin: Magic Internet Money!
Circa 2009, a friend and I collaborated on a wordpress based technology blog. One fine day he suggested that I run this unique software which uses my computer’s processing power to solve mathematical puzzles.
He had stumbled into Bitcoin on a blackhat forum and was messing with it on his computer and asked me to try it out. I was curious, so we installed the software one day on my laptop. This software was supposed to utilize my laptop’s processing power, and add to the computing power of a larger network to achieve certain specific results. If it works, it might create Bitcoins I was told!
I had no idea how or what made it work. But it was the age of curiosity, and we tried out most softwares we could get our hands on! So, I allowed him to set it up and within minutes of running it, my laptop came to a halt! It started overheating resulting in a BSOD later in the day. Luckily I managed to fix it up and few weeks later, got myself a new desktop.
My friend at the time moved cities and was setting up a Bitcoin mining rig. Seeing as he was hyped over it, I decided to give it another shot. But the CPU based miner slowed down my computer. I was unsure about tweaking any of the settings and my friend was off the grid. Ergo, I refused to run it anymore and removed it completely.
It was the first quarter of 2010, and $1 value of bitcoin was an overestimation. No one at the time expected Bitcoin to become a global phenomena, let alone hold any real world value. It wasn’t a store of value as it has become today.
Look where we are today!
Priorities
My priorities at the time was simple: Travel!
Motorcycling was my way of life and I travelled a fair bit! At home, I was busy teaching myself to build websites using wordpress, search engine optimization, digital advertising and taking up freelance projects to fund my life! I had no time for embracing something so radical and couldn’t be bothered with it. I had no extra money to invest in any hardware so I let it be!
I hadn’t given it more than a couple of hours worth of attention on two different occasions at the time. I know what you are thinking at this point! What an Idiot!
We are now at $16000/BTC at press time! There was a small opportunity cost to get into Bitcoin at an early stage. But I paid for it through my fear, ignorance and differing priorities. This is how I missed the boat on Bitcoin!
Nearly missed it!
But luckily, it found me again and again. In 2011, I stumbled across a few threads on Bitcoin on, ‘BlackHatWorld.’ It seemed to generate some buzz within certain circles and I found a few posts about mining Bitcoin. But even at the time it seemed to be very radical and I couldn't comprehend its real world utility, so I passed up on it again as I didn't have the time nor funds for investing in a miner.
Sometimes you can't see things that's right in front of you!
Another few years passed and I finally jumped in on the bandwagon by starting to HODL it a little bit, and I haven't looked back since!
So, Let's Talk!
Did you stumble across Bitcoin in it's early days and miss the boat? If Yes, What happened?
If you like my work kindly resteem it to your friends. You may also continue reading my recent posts which might interest you:
- Steemit Mentioned In: How to File Tax Returns in India for Your Bitcoin Profits—My Latest Feature In TheQuint!
- 4 Tips For Steemit Account Recovery & Wallet Security!
- Steemit.Chat Contest #11 + Contest #10 Winners Announcement!
My story is infused by karma and humor.
I first stumbled upon Bitcoin when it was just about $520 a coin, and back then I couldn't understand what Bitcoin is. All I know is that people are believing that it has the potential to increase in value.
My friend and I were supposed to jump into the boat, but then one of our office mates, suddenly butted in. Well, actually, he was promoting it. However, we had already history with this guy, and most of what he offers turn out to be "scam", unintentionally of course. He just attracts bad luck with these things. So, we took it as a joke, and my colleague and I decided to scrap the idea.
It was one heck of a bad decision. It was karma for making fun of the guy. Had we bought it as that price, we could have been millionaires already. Still, there was a lot of uncertainty. We didn't know it will hit this big.
We just always reminisce with both *regret and laughter.
Wow..this is so hilarious
It's actually still a running joke whenever the topic of bitcoin is raised in the office. That guy! :)
Looool really nice haha
Same thing happened to me! 2013 and 2014... passed up on it and regretted it. Jumped in last year and have felt at least some redemption with yhe meteoric rise in value... though not as much if I got in years ago.
I completely had no clue about bitcoin introduces January of 2017 through a whatsapp group talking about bitcoin donations...! It involved investing money and I didn't fully understand it..! So I missed then in June I stumbled on Steemit on Facebook through @grantcardone and the whole bitcoin world opened up to me....and I have never looked back.
This incident made me very afraid of anything remotely close to the words, ‘digital currency’ and holding money on the Internet
That feeling above is what most guys here in Uganda have when I tell them about Steemit.
I started to look into bitcoin in 2012 but never focused on it deeply. For about a week I did cpu mining and I do not remember where the coins are, but I do know it was not even close to 10k satoshi. The thought of it ever becoming as big as it is now never crossed my mind. I only really started investing last August when bitcoin was around $5k. The Sept. crash got me in the red and I traded out of btc to coins that are not rising as much. I am hoping with more of my own effort on steemit and other crypto investments can recoup my loses. It is fun and I have seen many people earning huge profits. I am not asking for much, just one home run in profits. Hoping that day will come soon. I love crypto. Thanks.
I came across bitcoin in 2013, around the Cyprus crisis. I joined bitcointalk, reddit, people were tipping coins everywhere - I think my first satoshis were from tips.
I remember there was a Forbes journalist who was trying to live on bitcoin for a week, and we were all excitedly following her story. She actually managed to live on bitcoin back in 2013 - not sure that would be possible now with all the merchants dropping BTC because of the fees.
Wow, man. you are are One of the lucky ones. Glad to hear you got such early exposure and was able to guided by enthusiastic friends. Did not know that part of your history, so glad to hear of your humble beginnings. I suppose Steemit is a bit like that now. We are the Pioneers. Wishing you all the best in this New Year and the best of luck with all this emerging world has to offer!! May you prosper beyond your wildest Dreams!
Very interesting and seems to be very true. you made me feel the whole story like it was me. Well written.
Pass hurdles and move on, i appreciate that after loosing so much money, you came to digital life again.
The best decision so far "HODL".
I am still learning about cryptocurrencies these day and mining was something I thought about years ago and should have... Years went by and I basically let it all pass me by until few months ago. Now I am learning about it and so overwelmed. Now I am soaking in all the info I can and still basically think of it as an online stock market. I haven't learned more than there is a ton of options and so want to learn more and start investing but really don't have a starting point of what the options are coming in at $0 other than trying to make it on here first.
That said this was a good read about the BitCoin options. Whats next?
yay its really a good post.. many people who started mining bitcoin lost their private key.. how about you..
here few bitcoin address with coinbase transaction lost its private key
https://www.google.co.in/amp/s/amp.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/2twrs7/all_42400_dormant_bitcoin_addresses_with_a/
Pls How doI mon bitcoin?
Very good reflection, and very useful for those of us who are new to this world. Thank you
firepower!! Thank you, your Post.