Lab Notebook: the meaning of Bitcoin

Money has been around for thousands of years. Amazingly, people keep reinventing it over and over again. Money innovation (not invention!) is always a telltale sign of a deep, underlying change in large-scale commercial systems. It serves two vitally important tasks: value exchange and information diffusion. The growing acceptance of Bitcoin sends a loud and clear message:

Dear Government, we the People, no longer trust your ability to manage our money (The Fed). We also don't trust your shameless handling of our privacy (NSA). Therefore, we are going to create an alternative mechanism for commercial transactions and sharing information about them. The new computing and communication technologies give us the power to do so. 

In the 6th century BC, Lydians developed silver and gold coinage, which made them incredibly rich and powerful. In the 21st century AD, the first respectable government that will support a new trusted currency will have a once-in-a-thousand-years chance to create an economic miracle out of, practically, nothing. I hope it will be an American government.

tags: invention, innovation, deontic, payload, problem, money, solution, growth, economics, commerce