Money is an instrument that facilitates the exchange of goods and services, as well as serving the functions of a unit of account and store of value. For millennia humans have used precious or rare materials as currency, moving in recent times to what was called convertible money. Convertible money made use of media that had no intrinsic value but more practical use (such as paper), and had convertibility
into precious metal guaranteed by the authority that issued such currency. Today's national currencies, called legal tender, have neither intrinsic value nor convertibility to precious metal or other materials, and consequently the only validity associated with them is that associated with their recognition by central authorities. Historically, the issuance of legal tender currencies by authorities was an extraordinary measure in times of economic and military crises or instability; however, since the final abandonment of the last vestiges of gold convertibility of the U.S. dollar in 1971, all the world's major monetary authorities have switched to perpetual issuance of legal tender currencies, leading to a gradual loss of purchasing power on the part of the users of such currencies.

Marco Amadori says: "...it is a distributed messaging system that realizes a scarce, openly verifiable, chronologically ordered digital token according to principles of thermodynamics that realizes the shelling point of at least two functions: of the open source development community and industry"
Bitcoin is digital money, open source, usable via the Internet, including with one's smartphone. Bitcoins are not issued by a central bank but by an open-source global computer network that impartially verifies transactions and ensures their security. Bitcoins can be used
by people, companies and automated systems without limits, at transparent costs, worldwide and online. This is because they do not represent value, but are themselves value, just like a precious metal: rare and useful, but digital. Unlike the Euro, bitcoins are not generated on a debit basis but on a job basis
(cybersecurity) and are the first example of a pure digital asset. Bitcoin was born as a payment system and as a digital currency that is international and freely usable by anyone, person to person, without the interference of banks or financial institutions, and unencumbered by debt.
The Bitcoin payment network has been operating since January 2009.

For millennia, humans have sought increasingly sophisticated and functional solutions to the problem of information storage, preferring those that guarantee the inalterability and integrity of data.
With the invention of writing came the concept of the ledger, which consists of a ledger in which transaction information is kept in an orderly manner and guaranteed by a central authority that is potentially corruptible and individually attackable. Blockchain technology revolutionizes the concept of the ledger by endowing it with the property of decentralization, which, in conjunction with the underlying IT dimension
underlying, transforms it into a truly programmable and incorruptible platform in which to store unalterable, eternal and publicly accessible data, and on which to build revolutionary applications. With blockchain technology, all users are active players in sharing information, creating a distributed and unassailable network. The first application of blockchain technology is bitcoin, a cryptographic digital currency that relies on the network to record transactions that occur between users, indelibly and transparently.
"It is a system used to agree on a history of events between an indefinite number of (pseudo) anonymous counterparts" Giacomo Zucco

Satoshi are the smallest fractions of a Bitcoin. They are named after its creator, Satoshi Nakamoto. One Bitcoin can be divided into 100 million Satoshi, which means that 1 Bitcoin is equal to 100 million Satoshi. This is useful because it allows for smaller transactions, even when the price of a Bitcoin is very high. For example, if a Bitcoin is worth €50,000, you can still trade a very small fraction, even a fraction of a cent, using Satoshi. Satoshi are essential to enable precise transactions and microtransactions within the Bitcoin system, making it more flexible and efficient for users. These fractions allow for greater adaptability to changes in the value of Bitcoin and the diversity of users' transaction needs, whether for large commercial transactions or small everyday purchases.

The Lightning network is a scalability solution designed primarily for Bitcoin. It is based on a network of bidirectional payment channels between users, enabling instant and low-cost transactions outside the blockchain. These channels allow users to make direct exchanges without having to record each transaction on Bitcoin's main blockchain, thus reducing the workload on the network. Using smart contract technology, the Lightning network enables fast and reliable transactions because they are executed and confirmed by the users themselves rather than by Bitcoin's main network. This solution offers greater privacy, scalability and efficiency to cryptocurrency transactions, paving the way for new applications and use cases for digital money. The Lightning network is still under development and improvement, but it promises to solve scalability challenges and make cryptocurrencies more practical for everyday use.

It is an entire community as a laboratory for the development of a new way of experiencing money and its use. It will be possible to create new products and services starting from real needs. Generate international visibility by bringing Trentino to be a window on the near future of payments, electronic money and society more generally. Living in the #bitcoinvalley means living in an area where bitcoin is a real alternative to traditional payment systems. A showroom of 6,000 km² where the first protagonists are the citizens of Trentino in the form of merchants, entrepreneurs and consumers. Bitcoin does not replace traditional currency but offers a real, secure and agile alternative to it. Just as bitcoin is open technology, so too the Trentino #bitcoinvalley initiative is everyone's and for everyone's benefit.