Bitcoin’s core idea is finiteness. No other blockchain really gets this.
Ethereum claims it is “sound money”, which is a joke. Its entire issuance schedule was updated just two years ago, and a burn mechanism was bolted on to make it appear “deflationary.”
Solana did five rounds of private sales, including a validator sale, and several strategic sales. On the way, the team got 20% of the tokens, for free. This is not the kind of chain that could ever qualify as money.
There will only ever be 21 million Bitcoin. No matter which country is leading the world, no matter what the deficit or interest rates are, no matter who is in power, and what wars are being fought, the fundamental idea of Bitcoin is this: exactly 21 million units.
Yap stones worked because of a similar finiteness. For hundreds of years, there were a maximum of 10,000 stones (roughly) on Yap Island. No other stones could be created, because there was no natural limestone on the island. So, when transferring an asset, a verbal transfer of Yap stone ownership was made.
I spent seven years of my life deeply immersed in mathematics. To me, Bitcoin is what we call a “canonical form” of proof of work. Everything else can be reduced to it. As Adam Back noted, you can tinker with it, but you can’t improve it.
Ethereum, on the other hand, has now been tinkered with for eight years. That is NOT A GOOD THING. People keep saying “keep on building” in blockchain, but great results in math do not need tinkering with. Solana is again being tinkered with through some kind of new “Firedancer” protocol. This is fine for a product, not for money. I can’t see people using SOL tokens 50 years from now. Or ETH. But they will be using Bitcoin.
Eventually, we will, as a planet, be thinking in units of Bitcoin. It’s a mathematical certainty, and it really has nothing to do with any of the “add-ons” to Bitcoin, or any competing chain. It’s just the fundamental mathematical idea that will continue working.
Our lives are finite, and the goal is not to die with the most Bitcoin, but to use it over the course of your life to enjoy it to the maximum. If you truly understand this, you are incredibly fortunate — I’m convinced it’s like really getting Amazon or Microsoft at the very beginning of these companies. It will be enough to be early.
Source: Twitter – Fred Krueger
