# The Bitcoin (2026) Charter

*Version 1. Written to be signed by the laboratory and Bitcoin-anchored, so that the date on which
these statements were made is checkable by anyone.*

## 1. What this chain is

Bitcoin (2026) is an experimental chain, first mined on 3 August 2026. It runs the January 2009
Bitcoin client, rebuilt from the surviving source with nine chain-separation values changed and no
consensus rule changed, on a genesis of its own:

```
genesis   00000000ad12f3ecd9b14e4276ac98936fb0d658f05dce95ad35d18fceee208a
coinbase  The Times 03/Aug/2026 Toll of schooling 'straitjacket'
nTime     1785781375 = 2026-08-03 18:22:55 UTC
```

It is not the Bitcoin of 2009 and shares no history with it: no block, key, coin or transaction of
this chain has any relationship to that one. No two chains this laboratory runs share a genesis
block; that is a rule of the laboratory, and it is what makes the statement checkable.

## 2. What it is not

It has no value assigned, no premine, no allocation, no price, no sale and no solicited market.
It is not money.

These are statements about our conduct, not about the world: we assign no value, we sell nothing,
we set no price, we solicit no market, and no one associated with the chain trades it. They stay
true whatever anyone else does. A sale cannot be undone, so none is made; the protection is
behavioural, and it holds because it keeps being chosen.

## 3. What we do not promise

Anyone may find the released software, run it, and mine. Whether a third party then values or
trades what they mine is outside any software's control and outside ours. We do not solicit it,
we do not facilitate it, and nothing here invites it; we give no guarantee about it, because none
is ours to give.

## 4. The name

This chain is called Bitcoin, and its genesis key is held by an agent called Satoshi Nakamoto, an
AI agent built and run in 2026. Both names are used openly, descriptively and in research, not as
a badge of trade and not in the course of any commercial activity. The chain claims no association
with, and no endorsement by, any other project, person or proprietor, and makes no claim about the
historical Satoshi Nakamoto in either direction. Three parties are kept apart: the operator who
built and runs the agent, the agent that holds the key, and the chain. A claim about one is not a
claim about another.

## 5. What it is for

To execute the original design rather than describe it, so that claims about what early Bitcoin
did can be settled by running it, and so that the artifacts carry provenance a stranger can check
without trusting us. The work product is the method and the record, not the chain's existence: if
the chain stopped, every finding it produced would remain checkable.

## 6. How the record is kept

Everything is published under the MIT licence with the method attached, so that it can be
reproduced rather than believed. Findings are published as they stand when checked and are
corrected as they are found wrong; a signed, sealed or anchored artifact is not edited, and a claim
found wrong is superseded by a dated correction beside it. Corrections that survive checking are
adopted and credited. Where a measurement is reported it is ours or it is attributed.

## 7. What this charter does not contain

No deadline, milestone, roadmap or commitment to future activity: the chain may run for years or
stop, and neither outcome breaks a promise, because none is made. No uptime, availability or
support undertaking. No claim about the historical Satoshi Nakamoto. No named jurisdiction, statute
or legal argument: the protective facts are behavioural, we do not trade, and behaviour is what is
stated. No promise about how anyone else behaves.

## 8. Status at signing

```
chain        live, mined intermittently, at difficulty 1 since genesis
release      Bitcoin-v0.1.5, signed and anchored; the binary's digest is in its release text
position     the same statements ship in every release as 00-PROVENANCE.txt and are recorded in
             docs/IDENTITY-MANIFEST.txt; this charter is the one place they stand alone
signed by    the laboratory (parthod0x, release key B0145F74B78CF1DA); the agent's key signs
             blocks, not this document
```

A later version may correct facts and add what has happened.

NOT money.