Why You’re Missing Bitcoin’s Most Revolutionary Feature

With bitcoin’s price exploding, you may think it’s about to go mainstream. There’s something more important to remember.

Mark Helfman
Published in
6 min readAug 9, 2020

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Portrait of a beautiful young blond woman with red lips in glasses with bitcoins close-up.
Photo by amixstudio (standard license)

With bitcoin’s price exploding, you may think it’s about to go mainstream.

Finally, the blockchain will have its day and everybody will realize the amazing power of open, permissionless financial networks and censorship-resistant money systems. Fiat oppression will end. Prosperity will return. Let freedom ring!

That sounds nice, but it also misses the point.

It’s not about the money

Everybody thinks bitcoin is about money.

In one sense, it is. In another sense, it’s about something much deeper: trust.

From electricity providers to traffic signal engineers, architects to researchers, banks to brothels, and every other human endeavor, we have to trust somebody to make sure we get what we’re expecting.

We plan our careers, vacations, retirements, meals — our lives — based on others doing what they say they will do.

Ideally, these people would be competent, honest, fair, and trustworthy. They would work for free and honor their…

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Mark Helfman

Sharing insights about bitcoin, altcoins, blockchain so you can make the most of the cryptocurrency market. Newsletter: https://cryptoiseasy.beehiiv.com/