“If one transaction can be censored and controlled, can’t all transactions be censored and controlled? Can’t the powers-that-be deprive participants of the ability to exchange value globally and freely?” – Yassine Elmandjra

Starting into the

“Most Cypherpunk veterans on the Cryptography mailing list had by then seen one too many electronic cash experiments come and go, without any real successes to account for…”

“But Hal Finney, ever the optimist, wasn’t

“This explanation rests on illustrating a few interesting properties of how Proof-of-Work is used in the blockchain that are not immediately obvious and sometimes are rather counter-intuitive, for example how participants collectively solve a problem

“The project was initially understood as yet another doomed attempt to construct a digital currency by the disillusioned cypherpunk community. And without anyone’s permission, Bitcoin slowly emerged and diligently grew to become adopted by a

“Bitcoin’s supply schedule cannot change, because Bitcoin is the supply schedule. Any alteration produces something that is decidedly non-Bitcoin.” – Nic Carter

Nic does it again with a great piece on the potential future where

“As we conclude our “Discovering Bitcoin” series, we will build on the use of digital signatures and of the CoinJoin paradigm to explore concepts of unique chronology, mining fees and off-chain transactions.” – Giacomo Zucco

“The same is not true of the current monetary system. In the current structure, dollars can either be earned by delivering value to others within the economy, or conversely, if the Fed decides to hand

“By manipulating price levels, the Fed isn’t just preventing smaller intermittent fires from naturally running their course while creating larger fires down the road. Instead, think of the Fed’s actions as the arsonist that lights

Bringing back an old post for Hal’s Day. 6 years ago today we lost Hal Finney. This post was one of his last on the BitcoinTalkForums, knowing he would leave us soon, and how he

“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

“We need to be able to disassociate from our identities to protect ourselves. We need the freedom to selectively reveal ourselves. We need the possibility to rally behind names, symbols, masks, and the ideas they

“ignorance or delusion is one of the three causes of our suffering (the other two are attach­ment and aversion). So when we are deluded about reality, we perpet­uate suffering. When we are aware of reality

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

“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.”

“The Jevons paradox is a staple of environmental economics used to describe how the introduction of more efficient technologies tends to increase the consumption of resources rather than decrease it.” – Alex B.

Will Lightning

“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

“By buying Bitcoin, you are not making a mistake. But if you buy Bitcoin and stop there after your first purchase, you’re making a mistake.” – Sylvain Saurel

A great introduction into Bitcoin by Sylvain

“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

Continuing the series from Giacomo