Bitcoin 2.0 explained

So basically, we can't wait to see if the benefits outweigh the costs to start taking Bitcoin seriously. Bitcoin has to be taken seriously before we can weigh the benefits against the costs. There's just no way to evaluate whether decentralization is more beneficial than costly except to take the risk and try it.

In that sense, Bitcoin isn't really that different from any other new financial idea. Either you invest in a thesis or you don't, and if you invest, then either you make money or you lose money. You can make educated guesses on which theses are correct, but ultimately you can only prove or disprove a new financial idea by taking it seriously enough to try it.

People are already taking Bitcoiners seriously to the tune of billions of dollars, so I think we'll see results from this experiment. Whether the results of the experiment will be positive or negative, I don't know.

Basically, the benefit of the internet was that it was the first "open" telecommunications protocol (as opposed to telephone for example), which allows for permissionless innovation. Applications (i.e. Facebook) can be built on the internet without approval of any central party.

Bitcoin is an open protocol for "ownership." We're not even beginning to scratch the surface of what applications can be built upon it.

(chopped up for brevity:) "Internet applications, such as email and the World Wide Web, are defined in protocols implemented on devices at the edges of the network, like servers and home computers, not in the guts of the network: routers, switches, hubs, and exchange points. The lower layers of the Internet can be completely oblivious to the specific applications that are in use; they just focus on getting packets of data to the right place. ... If Sir Tim [Berners-Lee] had to explain to a telecom executive what hypertext was in 1990 before he could create the web, it may never have happened. If we had to rely on telecom companies to provide video calling, it would probably be more expensive and inferior to the video calling services we have today. ... The permissionless innovation and devolution of power fostered by the Internet may be obvious, or nearly so, in retrospect, but not in advance. From Krugman’s perspective, perhaps, the Internet was just another medium for communication, of which we already had plenty. Why should it have been such a big deal?"

For example one can argue that if Europe had been kept under a central authority since Charlemagne, Europeans would have suffered much less wars, and maybe would have had less need to bring war and colonization worldwide.

But for a currency, distribution of goods, communication, etc decentralization is probably better, i.e. have more value than its implementation cost.

http://www.pcworld.com/article/2039705/could-the-bitcoin-net...

A decade ago there was talk of decentralized web sites through p2p technologies. IBM was working on such a web server. There is of course FreeNet, but it needs a gateway to access pages from the internet.

For example, if you've ever been a poor college student, you know that banking fees can be very onerous. (Buy a $2 coffee with too little in your account; boom $40 overdraft.)

But you're forced to use a bank because it's really hard to get by in the world without one. (It's hard to receive money and impossible to spend it online or send it to a friend without the risk of carrying around cash.) Bitcoin could solve those problems for the poor.