“In Part 6 of this “Discovering Bitcoin” series, we will build on the idea of using digital puzzles as a way to reproduce scarcity, and on the importance of a supply-control mechanism to grant some hardness to digital money, to explore concepts of proving ownership through signatures and scripts, and the technique known as CoinJoin.” – Giacomo Zucco

Continuing the excellent series of Discovering Bitcoin, moving into the digital age, we have lost the most fundamental element of our money, it’s “hardness.” By what means can we get it back? Can we make a scarce money in the digital world, that has no authority, no ruler? Can we restore the freedom of decentralized money? Find out about the brilliant use of difficult puzzles, to achieve digital hardness, in part #5 of Giacomo’s excellent series, “Digital Scarcity.”

“While it was pretty difficult for him to take over the very decentralized process of people exchanging gold nuggets, there are now a few big, public, trusted, vulnerable entities he can easily seize control of.” – Giacomo Zucco

“The goods that fare better in hardness, scaleness and darkness will compete, and the first one to reach a critical mass will start swallowing the others, as far as monetary uses are concerned.” – Giacomo Zucco

“it clearly involves moral, political and ethical aspects, like the importance of privacy as a human right. I will use the term “darkness” to address this attribute.” – Giacomo Zucco

“In order to be useful for this kind of process, a good must possess a good “hardness”: Any unit of said good should not significantly lose its ability to provide utility if stored over some period of time.” – Giacomo Zucco