Contrarian Analysis of Bitcoin from a fan of Bitcoin
Let's all have a nuanced view of our favorite cryptocurrency
I worked with this extraordinary individual while I was at BitPay. Let’s just call him Alan. Because he was my manager, we had one on one meetings. During these meetings, we would put great value on reaching “the appropriate level of nuance”. Because we lived and breathed Bitcoin on a day in and day out basis, this nuance was reserved for Bitcoin. You could see that he was very disappointed if I came in with the attitude that Bitcoin was fantastic and there was nothing it couldn’t do. There must be something we can improve. Even the improvement was to point out downsides.
This thinking reminded me of my engineering training. In engineering, there are always trade-offs. You make something more secure, but at the same time you might make it harder to use. We work everyday to maximize the good stuff and minimize the bad stuff, as we see it. If we are perennial Bitcoin maximalists looking to pwn anyone who speaks negatively about Bitcoin, is this really helping Bitcoin and our understanding of the technology?
BitPay was/is a fantastic collection of eccentrics. I wish I could name each person that I spent time with there, but I value their privacy and relative anonymity. So, I will refer to them from time to time by their first names and I will always speak constructively about them. I hold each and every one close to my heart. What that experience gave me was perspective. Not only because I was in the belly of the beast while that beast was raging, but more importantly after I left, I was able to look back and build a mental scrapbook of sorts.
These writings are my attempt at achieving the appropriate level of nuance and recreating my mental scrapbook.
I do not fear criticism for what I say. In fact, I welcome all opinions, but I especially welcome counter-arguments. For so long, people talk past one another. For example, I assert “the sky is blue”, but someone would retort, “you are wrong because physics is racist”. I don’t know if this is a conversation. Are you responding to my assertion at all? Are you just trolling me? Are you being earnest in the slightest? Are you having a stroke? Did you copy and paste the wrong sentence into the form? Is there anything I can learn from your reply?
Let us learn from one another via kind and thoughtful dialog.
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