It was much easier than today, but I can't agree that it was quite easy because even then it took a long time to earn 1 BTC. I was active on faucets at the time and there were days when I could earn over 500k satoshi, which would mean that it would take me about half a year for 1 BTC - which means that you really had to be persistent to reach that goal.
In the period of 2016-2017 I was quite persistent to get more Bitcoin because it is easy to get Bitcoin from various ways that can be done.
I participated in dozens of bounties and airdrops, and I was really focused on that time, until I finally got an airdrop that gave me a profit of 3BTC because of the incredible price increase and some bounties that gave me a pretty big reward, and then I bought Bitcoin.
This is not a question that should be asked in a forum where we should value privacy - because this forum is read by very bad and evil people who would certainly like to know such information.
Yes, I'm aware of that, I don't expect an honest answer about how much bitcoin a person has.
It's just a question that would make someone say about how they were in the past and how they tried to get more Bitcoin.
The portfolio is privacy that no one else should know.
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Bitcoin is already becoming more popular than before. The only people who might not have heard about Bitcoin are those who are living in the poorest part of the world, where there is no quality internet connection.
That will change now, internet access can be easily obtained and even wherever you are as long as there is still a sky because Starlink is available for unlimited internet.
But some education needs to be done to make anyone understand Bitcoin and crypto.
They will soon know how the world actually works and they will be part of this mass adoption.