Introduction to Satoshi: The New Blockchain Buzzword

The new buzzword in the Blockchain town is Satoshi – SAT.

The term although first coined in 2010 by Ribuck, a BitcoinTalk user, in a comment where he proposed that there should be a unit of bitcoin that can be displayed on the interface called Satoshi only became famous a while back after it became possible to pay for pizza with SAT on Lightning Network.

While the term that is now commonly heard in several podcasts is being confused by the name of the founder of Bitcoin Satoshi Nakamoto, there is no relation between the two.

SAT or Satoshi as they are generally called is the smallest unit which can be recorded on the Bitcoin Blockchain.

To explain it in a little more of a layman ballpark –

A Satoshi is 0.00000001 BTC and currently the smallest transaction unit.

If a Satoshi was equivalent to one penny, a microBTC would be equivalent to one dollar, and one BTC would be equivalent to 1,000,000 dollars.

The reason why Satoshi is out of the closet after its initial 2010-2011 mention

As users, we are more used to buying services and goods which have what you call a user-friendly price tag – numbers which are rounded off. But because Bitcoin comes with a high price tag compared to the currency that we work around on an everyday basis, the items, when priced in Bitcoin, looks very unattractive – example, $5 becomes 0.00057206 BTC. However, the SAT valuation of it is 57, 206 Satoshi – a number which is not very aesthetic but looks good to the eyes.  

Besides the obvious case of price bias, there is another reason that is contributing to the rise of SAT mentions.

Jesse Xiong, the JPMorgan Chase Quorum Ambassador believes that people are not very fond of decimals and factors so when prices are quoted solely in BTC, the number becomes very confusing for the consumers to enter at the checkout time.

Now while it did take 8 long years for Satoshi to become a popular name in the blockchain market, it is here to stay – be it because of price bias or ease of appearance. So, it’s time you get acquainted with the terminology to appear more sound if anything.

Need further explanations? Get in touch with our Blockchain experts.