The Bitcoin wiki: Bitcoin is an experimental new digital currency
that enables instant payments to anyone, anywhere in the world. Bitcoin
uses peer-to-peer technology to operate with no central authority:
managing transactions and issuing money are carried out collectively by
the network. Bitcoin is also the name of the open source software which
enables the use of this currency.
The software is a community-driven open source project, released under the MIT license and originally created by Satoshi Nakamoto.
Bitcoin is one of the first implementations of a concept called crypto-currency
which was first described in 1998 by Wei Dai on the cypherpunks mailing
list. Building upon the notion that money is any object, or any sort
of record, accepted as payment for goods and services and repayment of
debts in a given country or socio-economic context, Bitcoin is designed
around the idea of using cryptography to control the creation and
transfer of money, rather than relying on central authorities. Sourced from Bitcoin.org and Wikipedia.