How did cryptocurrency start?

Cryptocurrency, a digital asset designed to work as a medium of exchange using cryptography to secure its transactions, has garnered significant attention in recent years. But how did this revolutionary technology actually begin? The journey of cryptocurrency can be traced back to the year 1998, when a pseudonymous individual or group called Wei Dai first introduced the concept of 'b-money', a precursor to Bitcoin. However, it was Satoshi Nakamoto's creation of Bitcoin in 2008, with its whitepaper published in October of that year, that truly marked the dawn of cryptocurrency. Nakamoto's vision of a decentralized, peer-to-peer electronic cash system sparked a revolution in the financial world. As the Bitcoin network went live in January 2009, it laid the foundation for a new era of digital currencies, setting the stage for the emergence of numerous other cryptocurrencies in the years that followed. So, how did cryptocurrency start? It began with a vision of a more secure, decentralized, and efficient financial system.