Building Better Money

This week on Building Better Money we continue the conversation with Steve Patterson! After zooming in on the foundations of Bitcion in our first episodes we are zooming out to talk about some of the history of Bitcoin. Specifically around the debate about the block-size limit which culminated in the fork creating Bitcoin Cash in the summer of 2017. Steve is the author of "What's the Big Deal About Bitcoin?", which, in my opinion, is the best introductory book out there to learn about bitcoin and cryptocurrency. Make sure to check out the book: "What's The Big Deal About Bitcoin?" on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Whats-Big-Deal-About-Bitcoin-ebook/dp/B00RF3BQDU Learn more about the Bitcoin Cash Fork with Steve's interviews with Ryan X Charles: * Episode 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGYo1EUaeKI * Episode 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kvOd6lL2fio Note: This interview was recorded in March 2019. And find out more about Steve at steve-patterson.com In this episode: A quick background for the block-size limit and debate around increasing the block-size limit. What early assumptions were and how the conflict in visions for Bitcoin grew leading up to the creation of Bitcoin Cash Super-basic overview of a fork Basic overview of potential concerns with big blocks and with a small block-size limit How politics and social media impacted the outcome of the block-size debate Bitcoin as a cryptographic and economic experiment, but also as a governance and political experiment The importance of the political actors within the Bitcoin system, and how focusing on the technological or economic side of it led people to underestimate certain movements Learning as a society about how governance of open source projects work Overviewing the different groups of stakeholders involved in the block size debate A timeline of the different unfulfilled compromises How does BTC, BCH, and BSV all having the same mining algorithm using the same mining algorithm effect their security

This week I am excited to share an interview Steve Patterson! We are zooming in all the way on the foundations of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency. Steve is the author of "What's the Big Deal About Bitcoin?", which I think is the best introductory book out there to learn about bitcoin and cryptocurrency. We talk about what first sparked Steve's interest in cryptocurrency and then dive into the basics of bitcoin from advantages, objections, challenges, and more. Note: This interview was recorded in March 2019. Make sure to check out the book: "What's The Big Deal About Bitcoin?" on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Whats-Big-Deal-About-Bitcoin-ebook/dp/B00RF3BQDU And find out more about Steve at steve-patterson.com In this episode: How did Steve first hear about Bitcoin and what made him feel excited about it? What about the economics of Bitcoin made it seem unique and interesting to Steve? Why should people care about cryptocurrency? The importance and value of having a currency that is not controlled by the government What does it mean for something to be "programmable money" The value cryptocurrency brings to a future where more and more work is done across borders Laying out the foundation for what Bitcoin is Understanding the parts of Bitcoin (ledger, currency, software) The basics of securing a blockchain How can something digital be provably unique? And why does this matter for the value of cryptocurrency? Covering some common objections to cryptocurrency and bitcoin Why learning about the basics of economics will help you understand almost everything about the world, and be especially helpful with understanding cryptocurrency

Welcome to Building Better Money! This week, I'm sharing a bit of the backstory. Why Building Better Money? Why do I care about this technology? It's a short introduction to the show going forward!