On Halloween of 2008, a paper was released that changed the world. The paper, titled “Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System” is a high level blueprint of Bitcoin. High level because there is no 1 document or 1 source for all of Bitcoin’s rules. It is a decentralized network, so even having 1 source for the rules will add centralization - I plan to write more on this in another blog. But the paper is very accessible to non-technical audience and a must read for everybody!
Keep in mind that Bitcoin has evolved over the years and some of the terminology used in the whitepaper may no longer be accurate. I have uploaded the original pdf on my site. LINK