experience lots of promising ideas especially in the field of cryptography never get anywhere in practice. But anyway, it's probably a combination of many things. Satoshi's knowledge and skill. His choice of an essentially fixed monetary base which ensures early adopters large windfalls if Bitcoin were to become popular, and which appeals to people who distrust flexible government monetary policies. Timing of the introduction to coincide with the economic crisis. Earlier discussions of related ideas which allowed his ideas to be more readily accepted. The availability of hardware and software infrastructure for him to build upon. Probably other factors that I'm neglecting."

Source: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/YdfpDyRpNyypivgdu/aalwa-ask-any-lesswronger-anything?commentId=ZvJDryrskf2Gy6nhG