I. I Am Satoshi Nakamoto

In August 2017, a mysterious Twitter account with the ID 'Bitcoin Pizza' quietly went online, reporting the real-time value of 10,000 Bitcoins daily, rain or shine. The account information indicated it was from Australia. Among 25 million Australians, there was a Bitcoin celebrity—Craig Steven Wright, who has frequently claimed since 2015 to be Satoshi Nakamoto, the founder of Bitcoin. However, he has never been able to provide the private key of the Bitcoin genesis block, and the cryptocurrency community humorously dubbed him 'Australia's Satoshi', with no one believing he is the real Satoshi. His high-profile claims instead triggered a series of 'I am Satoshi' antics, with people around the world trying to gain attention or mock him, but none could provide solid evidence.

Twelve years since the birth of Bitcoin, its price skyrocketed from zero to $60,000, yet the identity of Satoshi Nakamoto remains a mystery. As Bitcoin draws the attention of Wall Street, investors focus more on the people and events that influence the coin’s price, while Satoshi himself seems to be forgotten—perhaps that is his wish. However, in the Bitcoin world he created, those people and events are far more noteworthy than him, some evoke sighs, while others drive innovation, collectively writing the legend of the cryptocurrency world.

II. The Pizza Incident

On May 18, 2010, programmer Laszlo Hanyecz from Florida posted on the Bitcoin Forum, willing to exchange 10,000 Bitcoins for two pizzas. He specifically emphasized: 'I like onions, peppers, sausage, and mushrooms, no weird fish toppings.' At that time, Bitcoin was only popular in geek circles, and the post went unanswered for three days, making Laszlo even doubt whether 10,000 Bitcoins were too few. Some advised him to buy pizza with a credit card instead, but he insisted that paying with Bitcoin would be fun.

On May 22, Jercos Sturdivant helped him realize his wish by buying two pizzas for $25 from Papa John's. Laszlo excitedly shared a photo of the pizza, with his one-year-old daughter reaching out to grab a slice, a cute and warm scene. On this day, Bitcoin finally had a price: 10,000 Bitcoins were equivalent to $25, making one Bitcoin only $0.0025.

In April 2021, Bitcoin peaked at $64,000, with 10,000 Bitcoins valued at $64 million. Laszlo, however, stated that he had no regrets: 'It was great to be part of Bitcoin's early history.' He once owned 100,000 Bitcoins, all from mining, but mostly used them for online shopping, including pizzas and a computer. Today, he has not become wealthy from Bitcoin, but his story has become an eternal classic in the cryptocurrency world.

Jercos also did not keep these 10,000 Bitcoins, selling them the following year for $400 to fund his travels. $400 at that time couldn’t even buy a round-trip ticket from Florida to New York, which is quite regrettable.

III. The Legendary Path of V God

In 2011, 17-year-old Canadian teenager Vitalik Buterin first learned about Bitcoin from his father and became fascinated. While studying the Bitcoin white paper, he wrote blogs to earn Bitcoin payment—5 Bitcoins (about $3.5) for an article. He once bought a shirt for 8.5 Bitcoins, which can be considered 'the most expensive shirt'. By the end of the year, he was invited to co-found Bitcoin Magazine and served as the chief writer, gaining some fame.

Vitalik not only focused on Bitcoin but also conceived the idea of running programs on the Bitcoin network, giving birth to the prototype of smart contracts. In 2013, he was admitted to the University of Waterloo but dropped out after 8 months to focus on blockchain. In November, he published the Ethereum white paper, which was released in Bitcoin Magazine in 2014, proposing a 'next-generation cryptocurrency and decentralized application platform'. At 21, he came to China to raise funds, and Shen Bo from Distributed Capital invested $500,000, acquiring 416,000 ETH (about $1/ETH).

Ethereum became a pioneer of blockchain 2.0, breaking through $1,000 in 2017, and Shen Bo gained nearly 1,000 times return, becoming legendary in one battle. Today, Ethereum supports thousands of applications such as DeFi and NFTs, with a market value of $331.7 billion and $82 billion locked in funds. Vitalik has grown from an internet-addicted teenager to 'V God', astonishing the world with technology.

IV. The $820 Million Hard Drive

In 2013, Welsh IT engineer James Howells stopped GPU mining due to the rise of ASIC miners. He had been mining since 2009, and the hard drive containing 7,500 Bitcoins was kept in an old computer. One day, in response to a community recycling initiative, he dismantled the computer and donated the hard drive, but mistakenly threw it away as garbage while intoxicated. That year, Bitcoin broke through $1,000, and the 7,500 Bitcoins were worth $750,000, causing James great regret.

In 2017, Bitcoin rose to $20,000, and a hard drive was valued at $14 million. James raised $7.4 million to dig through a landfill for the hard drive, but was rejected by the government due to environmental issues. In early 2021, Bitcoin broke through $40,000, and he proposed again, promising to donate 25% of the Bitcoin found to his hometown, but still did not get approval. This year, Bitcoin surged to $110,000, with the highest value of 7,500 Bitcoins reaching $820 million.

James's story is as tragic as 'A Chinese Odyssey': 'Once, there was $480 million in front of me, and I didn't cherish it.' He continues to hold on, dreaming of finding that hard drive.

V. The Birth of Dogecoin

In 2013, the soaring price of Bitcoin triggered a speculative frenzy, and people in the cryptocurrency world used the Doge meme to mock it. Jackson Palmer, a marketing officer at Adobe, suddenly had a whimsical idea to launch a Dogecoin parody project, posting on the Bitcoin forum and buying the domain Dogecoin.com, uploading an image of a Shiba Inu coin. Billy Markus, an IBM programmer, saw the post, copied the Bitcoin code within three hours, and developed Dogecoin: with a total supply of 100 billion, 5 billion issued annually after mining, and very low mining difficulty, changing 'mining' to 'digging holes'.

Dogecoin quickly became popular, but Jackson and Billy sold all their holdings in 2015 and exited the community. In 2021, Dogecoin surged from $0.0046 to $0.7, increasing over 150 times in six months, with a market value of $50.7 billion. Billy revealed that after selling his coins, he bought a used Honda Civic, approximately 60 million Dogecoins, which at the peak price would be worth $42 million, enough to buy 32 Rolls-Royce Phantoms. He lamented that Dogecoin's original intention was to bring a positive impact, not hype.

VI. Musk and Dogecoin

On April Fool's Day in 2019, the Dogecoin community voted Musk as 'CEO', and he gladly accepted, calling Dogecoin his 'favorite cryptocurrency'. In 2020, Bitcoin broke through $20,000, and Tesla purchased $1.5 billion in Bitcoin, while Musk changed his Twitter bio to 'Bitcoin', driving up the price and becoming a Bitcoin KOL.

At the beginning of 2021, Dogecoin surged, and Musk tweeted repeatedly calling it 'the people's currency', pushing it to $0.7, increasing 150 times in six months. However, on May 13, he suddenly announced that Tesla would stop accepting Bitcoin payments, citing environmental reasons, and shifted his support to Dogecoin. On May 19, Bitcoin fell below $29,000, and the market was in chaos. Musk went from a Bitcoin supporter to a 'flip-flopper', and the cryptocurrency community no longer trusts him.

Laszlo bought pizza with Bitcoin, and James discarded a hard drive worth $480 million; their stories are poignant. Vitalik created Ethereum, and Dogecoin transformed from a joke to a surge, bringing surprises. Musk once ignited hope but also brought chaos. The legends of the cryptocurrency world are like fleeting smoke, only the technological innovators continue to amaze the world, pushing blockchain forward.