Who is Vitalik Buterin?

Vitalik Buterin is a writer and programmer who was born in Russia and now lives in Canada. He has been active in the Bitcoin ecosystem since 2011, when he helped co-found Bitcoin magazine and began contributing articles to it. His primary claim to fame is as the creator of Ethereum, a blockchain platform that serves as a global computer for decentralized applications, also known as DApps.

During the first half of 2013, Buterin spent six months traveling the world to meet with different Bitcoin (BTC) developers. He was aware that by repeatedly iterating on the Bitcoin blockchain, he might create a new version that was potentially more advantageous. For the aim of illustrating this concept, he compared Bitcoin to a calculator and a future blockchain to a smartphone. He then used the same approach of increasing the system’s robustness by making it more versatile to blockchain networks. Bitcoin was the first cryptocurrency ever created, while Ether (ETH) is a digital currency based on the Ethereum blockchain network. However, Bitcoin was the first cryptocurrency ever created.

Buterin is credited with the co-creation of Ethereum, the blockchain that enables a variety of tasks, such as the creation of applications and programs using the power of cryptocurrencies such as Ether. The Ethereum platform does this by utilizing something known as smart contracts, which are effectively just software programs that can be stored and run on the Ethereum network.

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His Early life

Vitalik was born on January 31st, 1994 in the city of Kolomna, which is located in the Moscow Oblast of Russia. He was born in Russia and raised there until he was six years old, at which point his parents made the decision to relocate to Canada in the hope of finding better job possibilities.

When he was in the third grade at a primary school in Canada, he was put in a course that was designed for students who were bright. During his time in the school, Vitalik rapidly became aware that his special set of abilities and talents set him apart from his classmates and even the program’s instructors in certain ways. He was born with a natural aptitude for mathematics and programming, held an early and strong interest in economics, and had the ability to add three-digit figures in his mind at a rate that was twice as quick as the typical person of his age.

Buterin was not one to participate in social get-togethers or extracurricular activities. He recalls that quite a few others spoke of him as if he were some sort of mathematical genius. After that, he attended a Toronto private high school known as the Abelard School for a total of four years. The school shifted his perspective on education, which resulted in significant shifts in both his attitude and his academic performance. Abelard was the student where he first established his insatiable desire for information, which would later become his principal motivation in life.

In addition to his studies, he passed the time from 2007 to 2010 by enjoying himself while playing World of Warcraft (WoW). Nevertheless, he wept himself to sleep that night after Blizzard made the decision to remove the damage component from his favorite warlock’s Siphon Life talent. After coming to the conclusion that centralized services may be extremely problematic, Vitalik decided to stop playing World of Warcraft.

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Student life

In 2011, Vitalik was seeking for a change in the course of his life when he stumbled across Bitcoin. When he first heard about it, he was skeptical, and he couldn’t see how it could be of any use if it didn’t have any tangible support. However, as time went on, he gained further knowledge and became increasingly captivated.

He was interested in formally participating in this new and experimental economy by acquiring some tokens, but he did not have the processing capability to mine them and he did not have the funds to acquire Bitcoin. Therefore, he started looking for a job in Bitcoin on various online forums. Eventually, he started writing articles for a blog, and each piece earned him around five Bitcoin.

At the same time, he investigated cryptocurrency from a variety of perspectives, including its economic, technical, and political implications. His writings drew the attention of Mihai Alisie, a Bitcoin enthusiast living in Romania, which led to the establishment of Bitcoin Magazine along with him in late 2011. Because he spent over 30 hours a day writing, traveling, and working on cryptography projects, he made the decision to stop attending university.

He went all around the world to investigate different cryptocurrency initiatives, and in the end, he came to the conclusion that they were overly focused on certain applications and lacked sufficient breadth.

After examining the protocols that were being used by those projects, Vitalik came to the conclusion that it is feasible to enormously extend what the protocols were doing by substituting a Turing-complete programming language for all of the functionality that the protocols possessed. In the field of computer science, a Turing-complete programming language is one that allows a computer to solve any specific issue, provided that the proper method as well as the required quantities of time and memory are provided. After been turned down by the already existing initiatives. He made the decision to do it on his own, which led to the creation of Ethereum.

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Ethereum’s creation

Vitalik Buterin explained his proposal in a 2013 white paper, which he shared with friends. 30 individuals contacted Vitalik to discuss the idea. Ethereum began as a digital money. Over time, the team found it straightforward to construct decentralized file storage, and concepts like name registry can be implemented with a few lines of code.

Vitalik Buterin, Mihai Alise, Anthony Di Iorio, Charles Hoskinson, Joe Lubin, and Gavin Wood launched the initiative in January 2014. Buterin presented Ethereum in Miami. A few months later, the company held an ICO of Ether, Ethereum’s native asset, to support development. Vitalik also earned a $100,000 Thiel Fellowship award.

The team sold ETH for more than 31,000 BTC, or $18 million. The Ethereum team created a Swiss non-profit to supervise Ethereum’s open-source software development. Ethereum’s crowdfunding campaign succeeded despite turbulence.

Ethereum’s design prioritizes simplicity, universality, modularity, agility, non-discrimination, and non-censorship.

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