Best Books to Learn About Bitcoin
Bitcoin is a digital or virtual currency created in 2009. It uses peer-to-peer technology to facilitate instant payments. However, the importance of Bitcoin books will only increase in the years to come.
This list of books will help all investors – new and old. These books provide valuable insights into the world of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency. They can help you navigate this complex and ever-changing landscape.
Here are 10 books that prove bitcoin isn’t a complex concept to understand.
|
# |
Book | Author | Published |
Rating |
| 1 | The Bitcoin Standard | Saifedean Ammous | 2018 | Amazon: 4.6
Goodreads: 4.16 |
| 2 | Mastering Bitcoin | Andreas M. Antonopoulos | 2017 | Amazon: 4.6
Goodreads: 4.31 |
| 3 | Digital Gold | Nathaniel Popper | 2016 | Amazon: 4.6
Goodreads: 4.15 |
| 4 | Inventing Bitcoin | Yan Pritzker and Nicholas Evans | 2019 | Amazon: 4.7
Goodreads: 4.45 |
| 5 | The Age of Cryptocurrency | Paul Vigna and Micheal J Casey | 2016 | Amazon: 4.5
Goodreads: 3.85 |
| 6 | CryptoAssets | Chris Burniske and Jack Tatar | 2017 | Amazon: 4.6
Goodreads: 3.95 |
| 7 | Bitcoin for Dummies | Prypto | 2016 | Amazon: 4.2
Goodreads: 3.38 |
| 8 | The Little Bitcoin Book | Timi Ajiboye | 2019 | Amazon: 4.6
Goodreads: 4.24 |
| 9 | Programming Bitcoin | Jimmy Song | 2019 | Amazon: 4.6
Goodreads: 4.60 |
| 10 | Bitcoin Money | Michael Caras | 2019 | Amazon: 4.7
Goodreads: 4.37 |
Now let us go through each book review in detail.
Book #1: The Bitcoin Standard: The Decentralized Alternative to Central Banking
Author: Saifedean Ammous
Buy this book here.
Review:
The Bitcoin Standard explores Bitcoin from its history. Comparing Bitcoin to other monetary systems expands into the digital good’s future orientation. The book includes all the technical details of the formation and operation of Bitcoin. This book analyzes Bitcoin from a monetary economic perspective with the best research.
Key Points:
- The book analyzes the value of Bitcoin compared to its physical monetary history.
- The market decides the medium of exchange.
- A good becomes money when it is: stable, scarce, and has a high stock-to-flow ratio.
- Bitcoin has a large possibility of becoming sound money because of its fixed supply.
- Bitcoin benefits society as sound money aids the accumulation of capital goods.
- Dividing Bitcoin by 8 decimal places would produce a new financial system.
Book #2: Mastering Bitcoin
Author: Andreas M. Antonopoulos
Buy this book here.
Review:
This book gives a critical analysis of how Bitcoin works. It covers all aspects of manufacturing, such as addresses, mining, and building blockchain. It also details transactions and interactions. This book explains how Bitcoin works at a technical computer science level concerning its economic perspective. Then it moves to provide more technical knowledge to the point of creating one’s blockchain. The book serves public-key cryptography to coders and non-coders equally. It discusses other cryptocurrencies and Bitcoin’s applications.
Key Points:
- Bitcoin is the perfect money as it is agile and secure.
- Bitcoin is an open peer-to-peer system with no central server.
- Every 10 minutes, miners produce a new Bitcoin block that has all previous transactions.
- A transaction becomes verified when it enters the global distributed ledger.
- The key innovation here is the decentralized mechanism.
Book #3: Digital Gold
Author: Nathaniel Popper
Buy this book here.
Review:
The book views Bitcoin as a form of revolutionary technology. This book captures the history of Bitcoin along with the mention of personalities involved in its growth. It encodes the journey of Bitcoin through its eminent contributors. The book follows a story structure of a novel with a storyline. It has a humanistic lens to the narration. The mixture of emotions and history makes the book enjoyable to read.
Key Points:
- Bitcoin’s invention started from a listserv in the nineties.
- The first Bitcoin transaction was buying a pizza for 10000 Bitcoin worth more than $85,000,000.
- The value of Bitcoin increased when millionaires invested in 2013.
- Initially, the founders didn’t have enough skills to protect it.
- Bitcoin is global money as it fits the needs of every country.
Book #4: Inventing Bitcoin: The Technology Behind the First Truly Scarce and Decentralized Money
Author: Yan Pritzker and Nicholas Evans (Illustrator)
Buy this book here.
Review:
Know the fundamental technological framework of Bitcoin without requiring hard math or coding skills. The book examines fundamental technology in simple language. It explains each stage of Bitcoin’s working. It doesn’t include redundant information on politics and investment options. As a farewell package, it has a list of supplementary resources.
Key Points:
- Many joined the Bitcoin network due to its value of exchange.
- Wei Dai’s b-money and Adam Back’s Hashcash were forefather attempts.
- The Bitcoin software is open source.
- Bitcoin develops trust by using cryptographic math.
- Satoshi Nakamoto used the Byzantine Generals’ Problem to invent Bitcoin.
Book #5: The Age of Cryptocurrency
Author: Paul Vigna and Michael J. Casey
Buy this book here.
Review:
The Age of Cryptocurrency is an engaging and convincing book on the potential of cryptocurrency to revolutionize our world. It provides a comprehensive overview of the technology, its history, and its potential to disrupt traditional financial models. Through in-depth interviews and research, Vigna and Casey explore cryptocurrency’s social, economic, and political implications. They provide an entertaining yet academic analysis of the subject matter, making this book a must-read for anyone interested in the potential of this technology. Corporates and businesses will find it particularly useful as it provides an expert’s view on how cryptocurrency can be used to their advantage.
Key Points:
- This book is an important guide to the world of money in the digital age.
- The book examines the idea of money being replaced by digital currencies, such as Bitcoin and its derivatives. It outlines how these technologies have the potential to revolutionize the global economy.
- It provides historical context on the evolution of money and its impact on societies, exploring the implications of digital money for governments and businesses.
- It also dives into different ways to invest in cryptocurrencies, such as mining, exchanges, and crowdfunding projects.
- Moreover, the book discusses how to avoid fraud, protect your investments, and use cryptocurrency for international payments.
Book #6: Cryptoassets
Authors: Chris Burniske and Jack Tatar
Buy this book here.
Review:
Cryptoassets, written by authors Chris Burniske and Jack Tatar, is an essential read for any corporate or business looking to get involved in the burgeoning world of cryptocurrency. From a convincing and engaging tone, this book provides an insightful overview of the industry’s current state and how it can be a viable option for investment. Burniske and Tatar are experts in the field. With its focus on the potential risks and rewards associated with crypto assets, the authors provide a balanced and well-rounded view of the industry. The book is an excellent resource for those looking to make informed decisions about their investments in crypto assets.
Key Points:
- Crypto assets are digital assets that use cryptography to secure transactions and control the creation of new units.
- Crypto assets offer an alternative method of raising capital through Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs).
- Crypto assets provide low-cost, efficient, and secure methods of transferring value across the internet.
- They are also seen as an alternative to traditional investments such as stocks and bonds.
- Chris Burniske and Jack Tatar explain that crypto assets are not just a new investment asset class but also a revolutionary technology with the potential to disrupt existing business models.
- Crypto assets have the potential to reduce transaction costs and increase liquidity in financial markets, as well as create new opportunities for investors.
- Crypto assets present a unique opportunity for businesses to take advantage of blockchain technology to improve services and open up new markets.
Book #7: Bitcoin for Dummies
Author: Prypto
Buy this book here.
Review:
This comprehensive guide provides a detailed overview of the Bitcoin landscape, from the basics of cryptocurrency to more advanced concepts such as blockchain technology, mining, and trading. The author Prypto does an excellent job of keeping the book easy to understand for all levels of readers, making it a must-have for corporates and business owners interested in entering the world of cryptocurrency. The book’s first part focuses on the fundamentals of Bitcoin and blockchain technology, covering its history, wallets, and transaction types. Prypto also dives into more complex concepts such as mining, trading, and investing, giving readers a comprehensive digital currency overview. He does an excellent job of breaking down these concepts in simple terms and providing helpful charts, diagrams, and examples to illustrate them.
Key Points:
- Learn about Bitcoin’s decentralized architecture, digital wallets, and unique features such as mining and trading.
- Discover how blockchain technology works, what it can do for businesses, and how to use it to create trustless systems.
- Easily acquire, store and use Bitcoin with the help of secure digital wallets.
- Understand the process of mining and how to get started with it.
- Learn the basics of trading and how to use online exchanges for buying and selling Bitcoin.
- Get an overview of other cryptocurrencies such as Litecoin, Ethereum, and Ripple.
- Discover Bitcoin’s potential risks and rewards and its effects on global finance.
Book #8: The Little Bitcoin Book: Why Bitcoin Matters for Your Freedom, Finances, and Future
Author: Timi Ajiboye
Buy this book here.
Review:
As cute as it sounds, the book endearingly answers the most frequently arising questions on Bitcoin. The highlight of the book is it is quick to read. It also has a simple language. It sheds light on the current monetary system and finding an alternative. It is written by 8 different experts answering fundamental questions on the system. It is a perfect fit for beginners with no prior knowledge.
Key Points:
- Bitcoin is not technology; it’s money.
- Bitcoin matters because it takes away the power of central banks’ mechanization.
- Bitcoin protects basic human rights that hard money fails to.
- Bitcoin interests people on the left side of the ideology politically.
Book #9: Programming Bitcoin: Learn How to Program Bitcoin from Scratch
Author: Jimmy Song
Buy this book here.
Review:
The book details the architecture of building Bitcoin, reminding the audience of its beauty. This book aims at teaching the software development aspects of Bitcoin. It has Python code examples and exercises to help programmers learn. The book seeks to turn eager software programmers into Bitcoin programmers. The book is no less than a university course in coding. It is hard to follow, but in the end, it is rewarding.
Key Points:
- We have the tools needed for public key cryptography operations.
- The elliptic curve used in Bitcoin is called scep256k1.
- Finite fields and elliptic curves build the primitive required to sign and verify the messages.
- Signing and verification occur in Bitcoin by inserting the target in the calculation and hitting that target.
- Satoshi used more little-endian than big in Python to build Bitcoin.
Book #10: Bitcoin Money: A Tale of Bitville Discovering Good Money
Author: Michael Caras
Buy this book here.
Review:
Who said Bitcoin is for elders only? With great plot twists and enticing comical displays, this book is for children and our inner child. The book is a narrative quest for a reliable form of money with high value. The book succeeds in its search for reliable and secure money in exchange for time and energy spent. It compares and contrasts with other competitors to Bitcoin. It is easy to read and aims to make a child understand the concept. It has many examples and comments on the ethical value of Bitcoin.
Key Points:
- Bitcoin is limited in supply like metal money but doesn’t need carrying around or keeping in a safe.
- Satoshi made Bitcoin work as an app so everyone could check the code themselves.
- Paper money loses value as more and more gets printed.
- Bitcoin helps one to verify their own money.
- Bitcoin copies are not good money.
Recommended Books
This article talks about the top 10 bitcoin books for your understanding. To know more, read the following books,
