Bitcointalk is a message board where Bitcoin and cryptocurrency enthusiasts can share their thoughts. It’s probably the most well-known forum in the cryptocurrency space.
The website went online in 2009 when the Bitcoin price was just one tenth of a cent. Since then, its price has increased around 3.7 mln fold to reach roughly $3.7k per coin at the time of writing.
Courtesy of Sir Nakamoto
Bitcointalk was originally created by Satoshi Nakamoto. The true identity of this individual is unknown and it could very well not be a single person, but a group of people posting under that pseudonym.
Before creating Bitcointalk, Satoshi used a SourceForge forum for Bitcoin related discussions. Unfortunately, this forum cannot be found anymore.
Satoshi’s Bitcointalk profile can be found here. The last time he logged into his account was on December 13th in 2010.
The following post, was one of Satoshi’s final contributions before he ultimately disappeared:
“It would have been nice to get this attention in any other context. WikiLeaks has kicked the hornet’s nest, and the swarm is headed towards us.”
Some statistics
Bitcointalk not only has an interesting origin story, it also has a very significant user base.
According to the forum’s official statistics center, the site has over 1.1 mln registered users that have written around 21.7 mln posts in total so far. Since Bitcointalk’s inception, the content on the site has received over 4.3 bln page views.
There is an average of 403 new registrations every day and the current male to female ratio is 4:1.
A traditional design
Bitcointalk.org was built using an open source software package called SMF, short for Simple Machines Forum.
As can be observed on several snapshots made by Archive.org in 2011, the forum’s design and functionality has barely changed since the day it was first published.
There are rumors that the admin of the forum could be working on several design and security improvements for the site.
Most popular boards
With over 4.5 mln posts, “Altcoin Announcements” is by far the most popular board on Bitcointalk, followed by “Bitcoin Discussion” with 1.1 mln posts and “Altcoin Discussion” with 0.98 mln posts.
The “Altcoin Announcement” thread has seen a huge spike in popularity in 2017 due to the ever increasing number of ICOs and Token Sales that are held every week.
The origin of ‘HODL’
In the cryptocurrency space, a ‘Hodler’ is an individual that doesn’t day trade with his/her coins.
This internet meme originated in a post on Bitcointalk back in 2013 when a user called GameKyuubi, who admitted to being drunk, confused the word hold with hodl.
The expression was quickly adopted by other users. It is nowadays accepted as an approach to cryptocurrency investing that is focused on long-term returns and patience.