First-Ever Bitcoin Hashrate Fundraiser Mines Full Block for Non-Profit

A group of Bitcoin mining enthusiasts has participated in a fundraiser for an industry non-profit—not by donating Bitcoin or fiat, but by sending hashrate to solo-mine a full Bitcoin block.

Network data shows that Bitcoin block 881,423 was mined with a coinbase tag reading “Apollo/mined by 256 Foundation/” by a miner identified as “FutureBit Apollo Solo.” This marks the first time a fundraiser has been conducted through Bitcoin hashrate, raising 3.146 BTC in rewards worth about $330,300.

The 256 Foundation, a 501(c)(3) public charity, was founded by two Bitcoin enthusiasts known as @Econoalchemist and @bitkite on X with a mission to “dismantle the proprietary mining empire to make Bitcoin and freedom tech accessible to anyone.”

“We develop and advocate for solutions that lower the entry barriers to mining, including free and open-source Bitcoin mining software, firmware, and hardware solutions,” the 256 Foundation states on its website.

Econoalchemist shared in a thread on X that the foundation held its first annual fundraiser to raise funds for open-source Bitcoin mining development on Wednesday.

“We opted to have supporters send their hashrate to our self-hosted pool running on a FutureBit Apollo miner,” Econoalchemist said, adding:

“The event ran for almost 10 hours, and at one point, there was over 1.12 Eh/s from approximately 350 different entities. When the block was found, about 881 Ph/s was pointed to our pool.” The winning nonce was ultimately submitted by a miner from the U.S.-based Bitcoin mining firm Megawatt HQ.