So my #GRCOriginStory starts many years ago, when I was young and virile, ok we can skip some of that ;)
Then I heard about another type of BOINCing that helps science. I started running some projects I forget now what they were, I think Rosetta may have been one, and I was on SIMAP for a long time.
I heard about Bitcoin around 2012, and I was tempted to try mining, but I couldn't divert my computer from BOINC work, for an experimental currency project. I forgot all about Bitcoin.
Then in early 2014 Id heard about the $1,000 Bitcoin price, and I started thinking about it from time to time, but PC mining was already gone by then. I was idly Googling in Summer of 2014 and must have put 'bitcoin boinc' in because Gridcoin came up.
WOW! So I was going to get in on some of this, thought I. I downloaded the client, but I couldnt get it to sync (if you think its complicated now, you should have tried it then!), and anyway 50% was still based on hashing, so I wasnt to bothered about cutting my BOINC contributions in half. I forgot all about it.
For some reason that little seed kept growing in my mind, if only we could reward BOINCers, we may be able to attract a lot of nerds who were getting into Bitcoin. So in January 2015 I tried again, Gridcoin was changing, it was transitioning to PoS, whatever that was, but it only used 1% CPU and the rest was directed at BOINC
WOW
Now Im super keen, so I buy some Gridcoin Classic, and burn it for Gridcoin Research (the GRC of today), and on the 25th Jan 2015 I had mined my newbie stake block, as we called them in those days.
And as they say dear reader, the rest is history!
That's really cool. Thanks for sharing
Thank you for telling your story @scalextrix! I'm glad you persevered with it :) I imagine things were difficult back in the early days - I remember how much trouble I had with Bitcoin mining back then.. like you said, not worth diverting your computer from BOINC work!
Very glad you persevered with it, staked your newbie block and became a large contributor to this community - thank you for taking the time to reply!
I never had any interest in online communities before Gridcoin, I didn't crunch in a BOINC Team, no Faceberk profile, no Twotter etc.
I hit gold on the first try, and to this day I've never regretted being part of Gridcoin. fabulous people, and even as we are growing to the 10,000 people, its still feels nice and freindly.
I think Gridcoin is underestimated not only because of its uncommon technology and goals, but because the community clearly demonstrated that crypto can be kind; people who like crypto arent all dark web nasties.
Very well said!