Author: Jameson Lopp; Translation: Eric, Foresight News
Over the past decade, the scale and complexity of the cryptocurrency ecosystem have grown explosively. While most projects can be said to be scams or have terrible ideas, one percent of projects have indeed managed to innovate and find products that fit the market.
Bitcoin maximalism has also evolved as a result, but with the emergence of forks, it has become more complicated. Unfortunately, as I will explain throughout this article, certain aspects of the well-known “maximalist culture” are not conducive to the adoption of Bitcoin.
This article will cover:
- Why is the IMF strongly opposed to cryptocurrencies becoming official currencies or legal tender?
- A Quick Understanding of OpenAI Founder’s ‘World Coin
- One Article Explains | How to Enforce Virtual Currency in Winning a Lawsuit?
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Milestones in the history of Bitcoin maximalism
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Descriptions of variants and drawbacks of maximalism and bad behavior
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Providing warnings and suggestions for moving forward
History of Bitcoin Maximalism
Genesis
Long ago, before the “Bitcoin Twitter” community formed, the epicenter of Bitcoin discussions and culture was the BitcoinTalk forum. It was a simpler time, with hundreds of new networks being launched regularly and their creators promoting them through [ANN] posts on the altcoins board. Almost all projects were simple modifications of the Bitcoin codebase, with the main changes being marketing and no substantial content. The term “shitcoin” also originated in the context of creating worthless Bitcoin clones:
Most shitcoins were pump and dump schemes, and as a defense culture emerged due to numerous Bitcoin users being scammed and harmed by unfair economic models. We agreed that “pre-mining,” the distribution of tokens to insiders, was unethical. Many people believed that even if shitcoins managed to innovate and create value, this innovation would ultimately be absorbed by Bitcoin, so they could be viewed as Bitcoin testnets and discarded. Shitcoins included scams and some meaningless attempts, they were garbage coins that were not suitable as sound currencies or investments.
Extremism certainly existed in the early days, although the term had not yet been coined. Faced with worthless shitcoin projects, minimalists tended to firmly say “no, thanks.” Many of us found it distasteful that some people believed they could get rich quickly from Bitcoin clones.
In the early post-Satoshi era of protocol development, when Gavin Andresen was the project maintainer, there wasn’t actually a very organized development team. Everyone who contributed to the codebase was a volunteer – there was no money to fund development. Therefore, Bitcoin needed a developer culture. One way to attract and retain talented contributors was to discourage people from joining other projects by portraying shitcoins as useless scams (which they were).
In the early years, various aspects of the internet were weak, so it was very important to avoid the vampire effect of altcoins. If the above methods were not used, Bitcoin’s development may not have been self-guided in the following years, and we saw a significant improvement in the understanding of the advantages and disadvantages of the protocol by the talent pool.
By 2014, Bitcoin had a fairly active group of technical contributors. The future began to look bright after the release of the sidechain whitepaper: we finally found the answer to how people could innovate within the Bitcoin ecosystem without risking harm to Bitcoin itself. In 2015, the Lightning Network whitepaper showcased further innovation in low-latency, large-scale transactions. Bitcoin maximalists were pleased, as the hyperbitcoinization process was clearly underway.
Of course, just a few months later in 2015, we saw the launch of Ethereum, which introduced a completely new approach to cryptographic asset protocols. This marked a significant shift in the development of cryptographic asset protocols.
“Toxic” Bitcoin Maximalism
Mircea Popescu is a leading figure who developed Bitcoin maximalism even before it became a term. He is a prolific writer who has spread some ideas that have had a lasting impact. At least some of his followers from La Serenissima are still active today and have gained influential status on social networks…
Mircea’s followers, sometimes referred to as #bitcoin-assets residents (in their IRC space), have formed a unique culture. In their eyes, if you don’t have a GPG key on the WoT (Bitcoin-OTC trust network), you are not “one of them.” If you do successfully join the WoT, then you need to engage in meaningful interactions and transactions to earn recommendations from other WoT users.
Popescu is the administrator of this IRC room, and if you don’t adapt to their culture, understand their jargon, and have a high tolerance for prejudice, misogyny, and racism, you may find it difficult. Mircea does not place much importance on the effectiveness of his communication and tends to make exaggerated and hard-to-understand statements without caring about how others interpret them. Take his article opposing SegWit as an example, where he decided to “explain” his viewpoint by offering a bounty to assassinate a protocol developer. While he did this to present an interesting point about verifiability, most readers didn’t pay attention to this viewpoint due to his shocking values and lack of detailed explanation.
The #bitcoin-assets team strongly opposes any changes to Bitcoin, to the point that they forked Bitcoin Core 0.5 and created the “real” Bitcoin Foundation, maintaining their own full node implementation.
Due to significant friction and ineffective external relations, this group remains quite niche. Although Mircea himself failed to expand his influence beyond the IRC room (he was banned from using Twitter for making death threats against Andreas Antonopoulos), some of his followers have imitated his actions on other platforms…
“Bitcoin Supremacy” is becoming popular
Vitalik Buterin popularized the term “Bitcoin Supremacy” in 2014:
“Recently, there has been a new idea in the Bitcoin community that has attracted some attention. It is described by myself and others as ‘Bitcoin Supremacy’ – essentially, this idea believes that it is undesirable to have an environment with multiple competitive cryptocurrencies, and launching ‘another token’ is wrong. It is legitimate and inevitable for Bitcoin to monopolize the cryptocurrency field.”
Although Buterin did not create this term (it was already in use before, as you can see from previous blog posts), he did play a role in positioning Ethereum and its views on digital assets as mainstream views, at a time when the mainstream thought was that “altcoins are immoral scams”. The term “supremacy” is obviously intended to remind the Bitcoin community of a certain closed-mindedness or lack of imagination, and can even be seen as anti-free market.
In the following years, as countless projects were launched, some Bitcoin supremacists updated their views and became more subtle in their positions, but still considered themselves Bitcoin supremacists because Bitcoin is obviously different from all other projects and has no real competition in the field of currency. The views of other extremists became more extreme, as they believed that everything outside of Bitcoin was actually a scam and focused on shaping the narrative to support this view.
Bitcoin Scaling Wars
By 2015, we saw a large-scale migration from BitcoinTalk to Reddit forums, which had accumulated over 150,000 subscribers (currently nearly 5 million). Although BitcoinTalk did have administrators, it was also a forum consisting of many sections targeting different topics, so you didn’t need to be too restrained as long as you posted in the appropriate section. Reddit, as a platform, is different. With moderators and rules for different sections in Reddit, combined with the ability to modify content visibility through voting, I see Reddit as a platform for incentivized group thinking and emotional feedback rather than rational speculation. The end result of this is that large sections inevitably become “echo chambers”, and if you try to discuss a contradictory idea, your post will be downvoted and forgotten without much discussion.
As the debate over how to scale Bitcoin intensified, the moderators of /r/bitcoin decided to ban discussions of hard fork proposals. And “technological maximalism” (everything will become a Bitcoin sidechain) became a turning point as its views were imposed on mainstream discussions. Why? Because the moderators of r/bitcoin were influenced by Theymos and immersed in technical discussions on development mailing lists. Therefore, they simply brought their norms to the attention of more followers on Reddit.
Naturally, the decision by the /r/bitcoin mods to ban discussions on certain topics has sparked strong opposition and prompted many people to migrate to /r/btc. Now, 7 years later, users of /r/btc are still “howling” over losing the scaling war due to the “censorship regime”. If you want to delve deeper into their dissatisfaction, you can check out “A History of Censorship in /r/Bitcoin”. Personally, considering that discussions on Bitcoin scaling take place on various platforms that are not run by Bitcoin supporters, such as Twitter, I think it is foolish to be obsessed with this. The key point is: anyone who cares about the scaling debate is well aware of both sides’ positions.
During the scaling war, a large community formed on Twitter, generating a lot of debates. Although this is undoubtedly a positive factor for the Bitcoin cultural gene, helping us reach millions of people and strengthening their understanding of Bitcoin, there is reason to believe that the quality of discourse on Twitter is a negative factor. Reddit’s mechanisms and algorithms tend to suppress controversy and create an “echo chamber”, while Twitter’s participation mechanisms have been optimized to enhance the impact and engagement of controversial posts. In addition, the limited length of tweets often leads to high dissemination but little substance. While this can be an interesting game, it is not particularly healthy for the quality of discussions.
Getting Rid of Pejoratives
The history of redefining pejorative terms in culture is long-standing. I think this also makes sense in Bitcoin maximalism because we are talking about ideological differences: what many people find repulsive about Bitcoin maximalism is actually highly regarded by an accepted group. I also think that while minimalism is one way to harness the cryptographic ecosystem, it is also an ideal. Please remember that Vitalik’s use of this term is for “maximizing dominance”, meaning that the cryptographic ecosystem will be dominated by Bitcoin. Although Bitcoin undoubtedly dominates 14 years later, it is not as the minimalists had hoped.
During the scaling war and the ICO frenzy in 2017, the use of the term “Bitcoin maximalism” regained its significance. It seems that in the middle of 2018, the use of “toxic” Bitcoin maximalism as a descriptor started to resurface. It is worth noting that Bitcoin maximalists were later vindicated when it was discovered that 80% of ICOs were scams.
In the scaling debate, we saw Samson Mow start producing hats as a new form of social signaling. The first hat was “Make Bitcoin Great Again” and “Make Ethereum Immutable” (satirizing The DAO fork incident).
The hat manufacturer Mow has sold more than 10 styles in the next few years. At the end of 2019, we saw Samson Mow wearing the “toxic extremism” hat because this term was being used more frequently. It is a social signal that indicates which camp you belong to, whether you only use Bitcoin or multiple tokens.
Fairly speaking, the redefinition of extremism around 2017 was a resurgence of the ideology. This was a response, partly because the promise of technological extremism that sidechains would trigger an innovative explosion related to Bitcoin did not materialize. But compared to the stagnation of sidechains, Ethereum and other protocols have seen increased adoption and iterations of new features. As the term technological extremism gradually became untenable, people needed a new narrative that could succeed without sidechains. This is the resonance provided by Mircea, who adopted his style as #bitcoin-assets users and imposed it on the discussions.
By redefining this derogatory term, Bitcoin holders use it as a social signal mechanism. We can also see extremists sending similar signals when expressing the view that “Bitcoin is not a cryptocurrency.” Although technically this statement is not accurate, it implies the significance of the deep differences between Bitcoin and all other cryptographic asset protocols.
A World of Unity
In 2018 and 2019, we saw the embryonic form of becoming the next cornerstone of typical Bitcoin supremacism. Bitcoin standards were released, countless new memes were created and entered people’s field of vision.
The Bitcoin scaling debate did not end dramatically, but rather abruptly in years of “moaning.” By 2020, it was clear that a large number of large-block Bitcoin forks did not have strong appeal. Many OGs who were once actively involved in the Bitcoin scaling debate became tired, but this left an opportunity for newcomers to fill the void. Not long after, the COVID-19 pandemic provided an opportunity, with many authoritarian figures being criticized and the printing press running at full speed.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, we saw the accelerated development of extreme lifestyles, which benefited from the strengthening of certain extreme cultures (such as “laser eyes” and political populism).
It should be noted that I myself have participated in some of the above activities, and this is not a judgment on any of the above topics.
The COVID-19 pandemic greatly accelerated the evolution of Bitcoin supremacism ideology, shifting from traditional face-to-face activities to new media forms such as virtual reality. The chaos caused by the pandemic made it crucial to explore other content distribution channels, and those who participated through social media were the primary beneficiaries. A large group of newcomers with limited knowledge of Bitcoin dominated the topics on these new stages, while other Bitcoin enthusiasts sought information and entertainment on these stages. Due to the borderless nature of Bitcoin interest groups, Bitcoin enthusiasts have taken the lead in this new era of network interaction. Early Bitcoin users were often smart and unconventional thinkers who were eager to discuss authoritarianism related to the pandemic and constantly innovate.
The travel restrictions during the pandemic have also played an important role in shifting people’s attention towards the United States. This helps improve the image of Americans who are less affected by the lockdown, making the narrative after 2020 largely inclined towards digital gold. This statement is not new for Bitcoin (it has always dominated), but logically, it is more attractive to first-world people who can use modern financial infrastructure and those who need to pay US taxes.
During this period, I also observed an accelerating trend of “thought leaders”. I saw educators and builders being overwhelmed by those who seem to be artists and performers. Those who are good at “growth hacking” have accumulated a large audience despite only providing shallow content. This situation was already happening before the pandemic, but now it is even more severe.
The problem is that (and still is), the lessons of the “scaling war” are very complex and not easily understood. If you want to increase your engagement and influence on social media networks, this content is not suitable for you.
What happened afterwards?
New platforms focus on storytelling. Some “veterans” started telling “great war stories” to naive newcomers. Then the newcomers started participating in oral storytelling, recounting the traditions of the previous generation, but they didn’t have firsthand information, so their views had no innovation, just like copies.
These platforms (Clubhouse, SLianGuaices) are designed for long monologues, so their participation mechanisms will only further stimulate this behavior.
Mainstream Bitcoin culture has degenerated from the expression of ideas (the debate of the times in 2017) to the reproduction of old stories. The old enemies have been replaced by new enemies that are more in line with the current trend, but we still retain the atmosphere of “Bitcoin players against the world” from the past, which leads to many newcomers excessively defending their beliefs. It is worth noting that this is a recurring cycle, as in 2017, people talked about how good the discussions in 2014 were, and in 2014, people reminisced about the discussions in 2011. This is a natural phenomenon that occurs when a community transitions from niche to mainstream.
Counterattack by Anti-Extremists
The toxic extremism of extremist extremists makes many moderate supremacists uncomfortable. Those extremists who dare to speak out have accumulated a large audience, and they must make a decision: whether to continue talking about what they find interesting and accept abuse, or to self-censor and confine themselves to the echo chamber of Bitcoin? From a cultural perspective, this is somewhat regrettable, and when some public figures succumb to the captives of their audience, it will definitely have a chilling effect.
Some moderate extremists have turned into provocateurs of extremist factions, and these individuals are known as “antima”. They enjoy pointing out the weaknesses/hypocrisy/disgusting behavior of more extreme extremists and provoke them by any means possible. Nowadays, this also includes “using” Bitcoin in ways that are detested by pure extremists, such as Bitcoin NFTs.
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