 Andrew asks, in the Bitcoin ecosystem, how were the initial Bitcoins created in the Genesis Block, dispersed in transactions, and the proof of work accomplished? Well, the first version of the software was launched by Satoshi Nakamoto in January 3rd, 2009. Presumably, Satoshi Nakamoto fired up the Bitcoin software and ran it on their own computer. It started calculating a candidate block. That block was empty. In fact, I believe the first transaction didn't happen until block 75 or so. The first 70 or so blocks only had a coin-based transaction in them. Of course, it only had a coin-based transaction. There was no Bitcoin to spend. Every transaction refers to the previous output, and at that point there were no previous outputs. The first block could necessarily only have a coin-based transaction. Soon after, in the first year or so, I believe a limitation was placed so that you couldn't spend the coin-based transaction until at least several blocks had elapsed. The current standard is 100 blocks. I'm not quite sure when that rule was added, but even the coin-based from the first block was not immediately spendable. The second block was also empty, and it only had a coin-based transaction. The third block was also empty. It only had a coin-based transaction, etc. All of these coin-based transactions paid the Bitcoin address, presumably Satoshi Nakamoto. By the way, none of those have ever been spent. In fact, it would be quite a historic event and a big news item if any of those coins were spent. That would indicate that Satoshi Nakamoto was spending their initial coins. Of course, we don't know that Satoshi Nakamoto mined the first blocks. Maybe they gave the software to a friend, and a friend was running it. Maybe Satoshi Nakamoto was more than one person. Maybe lots of different people were collaborating in running that early network. None of that is known. We do know that others were invited to participate, and several other individuals did participate in both mining and transactions in the first 100 blocks or so. Michael asks, how does the miner integrate the coin-based transaction within the block? That's a great question. This is often confusing. After all, the coin-based transaction includes a payment to the miner themselves. Essentially, they write a check to themselves in the block that they produce. How do they get that coin-based transaction in there? The trick here is to realize that every miner constructs a candidate block. Every miner's candidate block has a coin-based transaction. They put it in there, and that coin-based transaction pays their Bitcoin address. If it's being produced by a mining pool, then the mining pool has put a coin-based transaction inside the candidate block. That coin-based transaction pays the mining pool address. Then they distribute that candidate block out to all of the miners participating in the mining pool. Who creates the candidate block? The miners create the candidate block. Who puts the coin-based transaction in there? Every miner puts a coin-based transaction in their own candidate block. That coin-based transaction pays them. If everybody puts a coin-based transaction in their own candidate block, how do we choose between them? That's where mining comes in. All of these candidate blocks are useless, worthless, not valid. The reason they are not valid is because they do not contain valid proof of work. They do not have a nonce such that the block header hash produces a fingerprint that is within the difficulty target of the network. They are not valid. In order to become valid blocks, they need to have that nonce. In order to find that nonce, you have to do septillions of calculations and hashes. Once you find that nonce, you publish that block because it is valid. The rest of the network accepts it because it is valid. As a result, the coin-based transaction that you wrote as a miner and put into that candidate block becomes reality. A hundred blocks later becomes expendable, so you can pay for your electricity bill and make some profit. Miners write a check. They put it in a candidate block. That candidate block is not valid until they find the proof of work that makes it valid.