Steemit Crypto Academy Season 4 Beginners' course - Task 3: The Genesis Block

Hello everyone, Thanks to Professor @awensono for the lecture and I’m here with my understanding on the lecture given.

1a) What is the Genesis block?

Genesis Block

Genesis is also another word for Origin, root, source etc. which implies the beginning or commencement of one thing. a bit like we've the book of Genesis that talks concerning the start of the globe, it conjointly applies during this case too. As the name suggest Genesis block-refers to the primary or initial block to be mined on a blockchain, it is Usually portrayed as Block 0 or Block considering the blockchain and it has no precedent.
The Genesis block is the inspiration of the blockchain, being the stepping stones of subsequent blocks to form up the complete chain.
All blocks except the Genesis block are coupled together by their hash. because the Genesis block is the first ever block it has no preceding Hash but the consequent blocks reference it’s hash.

A TYPICAL BLOCKCHAIN

b) What are the significances of the Genesis Block?

• The Genesis Block sealed means for Blockchain Technology since it absolutely was the primary block to ever be created.

• The Genesis Block set the inspiration for the introduction of different cryptocurrencies.in 2009 the Genesis block was implemented and the concept of mining was adapted and there are currently several thousands of crypto currencies in the world.

• The Genesis block is a composed way of storing Knowledge in a blockchain following a well constructed pattern. This serves as a blueprint of how the subsequent blocks will operate. This makes it simple for information retrieval in the blockchain.

c) Explore the Bitcoin Genesis block and indicate how many transactions so far and the number of bitcoins.

The Bitcoin blockchain is the most dominant blockchain and also the primitive of all other blockchains. The Bitcoin Genesis block is therefore the Adam of blockchains.

The Bitcoin Genesis block was the first ever block to be mined, On the 3rd of January 2009 by a pseudonymous Japanese Cryptographer Sakashi Nakamoto. Sakashi was involved in a transaction that brought about the existence of the Bitcoin Genesis block and it was described as “Block 0”.six days later, the 2nd block was created and depicted as “Block 1”.The concept of mining was adapted and there are currently several thousands of crypto currencies in the world.

The Bitcoin Genesis block (Block 0 ) has a hash of:

000000000019d6689c085ae165831e934ff763ae46a2a6c172b3f1b60a8ce26f

To Find the details of the Bitcoin Genesis block:

• Visit Block Explorer

• Paste the hash of the Genesis block in the search box marked above.

The Details of “Block 0”

The miners of the Genesis block got a reward of 50.000 BTC($2,250,356.00).

Wallet

The Block reward was deposited into the wallet address:

1A1zP1eP5QGefi2DMPTfTL5SLmv7DivfNa

Details

The address had transacted 3,033 times and received an amount 68.52179167 BTC at the time i visited the blockchain explorer.

Block 1

After the Genesis block (block 0) was mined it took up to six days before the next block was mined ( block 1). Meanwhile the average block mining time for Bitcoin is 10 minutes but block 1 took up to six days.

Block 0

You can see the timestamp shows 3rd January 2009 in block 0 above but it shows 9th January in block 1 below a difference of 6 days.

block 1

Sources has it that the whole idea of six days was to imitate the creation of the world. Some believe that it was related to network testing. The reason for this is still puzzled .

Conclusion

The Genesis block is the Adam of all blockchains as it’s the first block to be mined and the consequent blocks adapted the concept of mining from the Genesis block.
Thanks @awesononso for the exclusive lecture and I hope I’ve covered all parts of the questions asked.