Ethics of Bitcoin Maximalism with Pete Rizzo
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Location: New York
Date: Wednesday 27th October
Company: Kraken & Bitcoin Magazine
Role: Editor
The role of Bitcoin maximalism is a hugely divisive topic. As a decentralised network, Bitcoin has no leaders or spokespeople to counter false information or fend off an attack.
In the absence of leaders, bitcoiners from all over have become an important immune system for the network. They protect the protocol from bad actors, false narratives and prevent anyone from gaining too much influence over the network.
This has proved highly effective and has been key throughout the history of Bitcoin. Most notably during the scaling wars that culminated in 2017.
However, for all the good toxic maximalism has done, it can, at times, go too far. But in a world headed to hyperbitcoinisation, is Bitcoin maximalism an important ethical stand to take?
In this interview, I talk to Pete Rizzo, the Editor at Kraken & Bitcoin Magazine. We discuss the ethics of bitcoin maximalism, its role in protecting bitcoin, and the path to hyperbitcoinisation.
00:03:21: Introductions
00:11:54: Dealing with hyperbitcoinisation
00:14:58: Understanding Bitcoin
00:15:59: Everything's good for Bitcoin
00:19:49: Defining the best cryptocurrency and metrics to use
00:24:42: Becoming a Bitcoin maximalist
00:29:42: Bitcoin adoption is not correlated to the price
00:34:36: Bitcoin vs other cryptocurrencies and decentralisation
00:47:36: Toxic maximalism
01:06:26: Ethics in Bitcoin
01:10:49: The value in the cryptocurrency ecosystem
01:15:28: In a doomsday scenario, there is no minority
01:20:07: Evangelising Bitcoin
01:21:39: Worldcoin
01:26:35: Understanding hyperbitcoinisation, the good and the bad
01:33:38: Final comments
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Mentioned in the interview:
El Salvador's Bitcoin Adoption Met With Small Protests | Nasdaq
A model for Bitcoin's security and the declining block subsidy - Hasu, Prestwich, Curtis 2019
CREAM Finance Exploited for $130M in DeFi’s Third-Largest Hack
Inside the bluster and lies of Petro, Venezuela's cryptocurrency scam | Wired
Against Cryptocurrency: The Ethical Argument for Bitcoin Maximalism - Pete Rizzo
Takeaways: 5 years after The DAO crisis and Ethereum hard fork | Cointelegraph
Alex Gladstein and the Moral Case for Lightning | Bitcoin Magazine
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