Bitcoin is a digital or virtual cryptocurrency created in 2009 that uses peer-to-peer technology to facilitate instant payments.
An altcoin is any cryptocurrency or token created after the Bitcoin was developed.
Blockchain is most simply defined as a decentralized, distributed ledger technology that records the provenance of a digital asset.
Cold storage refers to storing cryptocurrency on a place where the private key cannot be accessed via the internet. This can be done on a hardware wallet, paper wallet or software wallet in an offline environment.
The block reward is the payment that is offered to the node that is securing the blockchain. In the case of Bitcoin, which is has a Proof-of-Work consensus algorithm, these would be the miners. The payment is in the form of the native cryptocurrency of that blockchain. The amount is a predetermined reward per block, but often that is supplemented with the fees that are paid for the transactions that block contains. For Bitcoin the current block rewards are cut in half every four years. This is called the ‘halvening’.
An airdrop is a way to distribute coins. End users can generally get coins for free or in exchange for a small task, such as subscribing to a newsletter, sending a tweet or inviting other people via a personal affiliate link.
