Staying with the NYC Inside Bitcoin Conference theme one more time it’s time to discuss the hot topic of that week – Regulation. As a Bitcoin enthusiast it’s really hard to watch as those with money and connections start new companies in the Bitcoin space attempting to push Regulation on everyone else. This was clear to everyone in attendance from the opening Keynote address by Jeremy Allaire. I’ve heard of his company for over a year now yet no matter whom I ask or look around the web it’s still completely unclear what his company will do. The description sais “…make it easy to exchange, store, send and receive bitcoin” but considering the fact that these things are pretty easy to do right now, this could not be any more vague.
His speech did not go over well in the Bitcoin community as can be seen here (and even clearer in comments to the ‘Keynote’ link above), mostly due to statements like “critical component to ultimate mainstream acceptance is the ability to assign identities to transactions” this was followed by a contradiction “while still maintaining financial privacy and even anonymity”. It would seem that Mr. Allaire would like nothing better than the combination of Governmental & Financial Institutions to oversee the usage of Bitcoin because they would know best. The rest of the speech was spent on praising Wall Street and how they would take Bitcoin to the next level for us (since they’ve done such a great job for our benefit the last 10 years). Of course before this technology should be taken over by Wall Street, clear cut regulation would need to be established, because as we all know Wall Street can’t go around speed bumps unless they know where they are. At one point I clearly heard him say that we also need Central Banking direction as to where Bitcoin’s future is.
Later that day there was a Keynote address by Nicolas Cary the CEO of Blockchain.info. He decided to take a completely different approach, and instead of taking about what Bitcoin needs from the current financial system, he spent his time talking about what Bitcoin is doing to improve people’s lives by mostly ignoring the current financial system. His presentation “Bitcoin Stories from Across the Globe” was clearly one of the highlights due to his enthusiasm and first hand stories of people and business he highlighted in his slideshow. For the last few years his company has not just been talking about making Bitcoin better but has been providing valuable services to consumers at no cost. They are the leading blockchain explorer, which keeps track of every Bitcoin transaction and also a trusted wallet service. You always have to be careful with hosted wallets, but it appears they have earned the trust of the Bitcoin community. They are living proof that not only do we not need the current financial system it is also possible to succeed without them as they have created a multi-million dollar company satisfying Millions of users, all that while never having a bank account.
So can there be a common ground? When you ask a die-hard Libertarian the answer will be there should be absolutely NO regulation at any point. As hard as it is to disagree with that statement it’s hard to imagine today’s society going along with it. But why is the compromise to hand over regulation rules to those that have put us in the economic conditions which have led to the creation of this financial protocol and are fuelling it’s adoption. Perhaps those regulating are the problem and any compromise with that group is what is most concerning. Let’s hope the die-hard Bitcoin community fights off the establishment long enough to allow the Bitcoin regulation to be born organically from within. That might be a compromise some of us are more willing to make.