Defining Satoshi’s twelve apostles isn’t as easy as it seems. For one thing, some of the contenders are among his predecessors. On the other hand, there are hundreds of cryptocurrency pioneers who are doing amazing things in the blockchain and crypto space. So how do you define what an apostle is?

The word comes from Classical Greek and literally means “one who is sent” or “one who is commissioned with a message.” In a word, an apostle is an emissary, or envoy. A representative.

More than one major religion uses the word to signify important people in the history of that religion. In Christianity, the 12 apostles were commissioned by Christ himself to carry out his message after he was crucified and buried. In Islam, various prophets throughout history are referred to as messengers, or “apostles.” In one sense of the word, it also signifies “laying the groundwork.” That is, an apostle could also be a foundation layer.

If we get too literal with the use of the word, it might not mean much at all in the case of cryptocurrency. As far I know, there is only one possible individual in the following list who might have been appointed or specially commissioned to carry on Satoshi’s work. There is one other individual who was the first recipient of a bitcoin transaction. Others on the list simply took it upon themselves to spread the message about the new technology channeled through Satoshi’s brain. In any case, each of the following individuals are significant in one way or another to the development and growth of the early days of cryptocurrency.

What I tried to do is narrow the list down to significant individuals who had a direct relationship with Satoshi Nakamoto in one way or another and made at least one significant contribution to the growth and development of bitcoin before Nakamoto’s disappearance in 2011 or made big multiple significant contributions or one huge contribution to the development of the cryptocurrency ecosystem between 2011 and 2014.

Hal Finney

Hal Finney made two significant contributions to the early development of bitcoin. The first is that he was the first recipient of bitcoin, which Satoshi Nakamoto sent to him to test his new technology. Finney received 10 bitcoin.

The second contribution Finney made is he helped Satoshi Nakamoto work out some bugs in bitcoin’s programming. This happened just a few days after receiving the 10 bitcoin from the technology’s inventor.

Not long after that final event, Finney announced that he’d been diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease. He died from complications five years later. Who knows what greatness he might have achieved if he'd have lived longer?

Adam Back

Adam Back is significant to bitcoin’s development in a couple of ways. First, as inventor of the proof-of-work system on which bitcoin is based, Back is one of the few pioneers in cryptocurrency to be cited in Nakamoto’s bitcoin whitepaper. Here’s what he had to say about Back on page 3 of the 9-page paper:

To implement a distributed timestamp server on a peer-to-peer basis, we will need to use a proof-of-work system similar to Adam Back's Hashcash [6], rather than newspaper or Usenet posts. The proof-of-work involves scanning for a value that when hashed, such as with SHA-256, the hash begins with a number of zero bits. The average work required is exponential in the number of zero bits required and can be verified by executing a single hash.

When prognosticators try to solve the mystery of Satoshi Nakamoto’s identity, Back is one of the people mentioned as most likely to be the inventor of bitcoin, though he has denied that he is the one. Nevertheless, Nakamoto contacted Back before publishing the whitepaper to let him know that he was going to be mentioned. In fact, Back is only one of two people to receive an email from bitcoin’s inventor early on.

Back has supported bitcoin development from the beginning. In 2014, believing that development wasn’t happening fast enough, he created Blockstream, a company focused on “building the blockchain technology of the future.”

Gavin Andresen

If anyone stands out as an appointed heir to Satoshi Nakamoto, it’s Gavin Andresen. In 2010, he became one of the principle developers of bitcoin. He also is known for starting the first bitcoin faucet, which is a reward system designed to distribute free bitcoin to its users. In the same year, he created an escrow serviced named ClearCoin, which shut down in 2011.

Another event that happened in 2011 is the disappearance of Nakamoto. His final email was sent to Andresen. It read:

I wish you wouldn’t keep talking about me as a mysterious shadowy figure, the press just turns that into a pirate currency angle. Maybe instead make it about the open source project and give more credit to your dev contributors; it helps motivate them.

When Andresen replied that he’d been invited to speak at a conference, Nakamoto never responded.

In 2012, Andresen started the Bitcoin Foundation, a nonprofit whose mission was to promote bitcoin development. After a series of controversies, Andresen stepped down from his position as lead developer of Bitcoin Core. That was 2014. Three years later, he expressed support for competing cryptocurrency Bitcoin Cash.

Laszlo Hanvecz

Two years after Nakamoto published his famed whitepaper, Laszlo Hanvecz made the first commercial transaction with bitcoin. He bought two pizzas for 10,000 BTC.

Jed McCaleb

Another event that took place in 2010 is the founding of the Mt. Gox bitcoin exchange. It was not the first bitcoin exchange. That distinction goes to Bitcoin Market. Founded in January 2010, it went live in March. Mt. Gox launched three months later.

Jed McCaleb launched the exchange that controlled 70 percent of the worldwide bitcoin trading volume by 2013.

McCaleb was not responsible for all of that growth. He had sold Mt. Gox in 2011. Two months after its purchase, the site was hacked resulting in thousands of dollars in losses to traders. That was the beginning of the exchange’s troubles. The site went on to face legal issues, lawsuits, a fraud investigation, and ultimately, bankruptcy. The site was shut down in 2014.

Meanwhile, McCaleb went on to co-found competing blockchain company Ripple, whose cryptocurrency XRP has enjoyed the third highest market capitalization for most of its life. In 2013, he left that project and co-founded another cryptocurrency called Stellar.

McCaleb’s technical programming skills are what made him one of the most successful and richest cryptocurrency entrepreneurs on the planet. And his connection to Satoshi Nakamoto is almost direct. In 2018, the New York Times named him one of the top ten people leading the blockchain revolution.

Charlie Lee

Charlie Lee’s connection to cryptocurrency is so formidable his Twitter handle is @Satoshilite. In 2011, he was a computer scientist employed by Google and began to take an interest in bitcoin. He immediately began work on a new cryptocurrency called Litecoin and released it just a few months later. By 2017, it was the fourth largest cryptocurrency by market cap. That year, Lee also sold all of his Litecoin citing a perceived conflict of interest.

Lee left Google in 2013 and went to work for Coinbase, the largest American cryptocurrency exchange at the time. Since 2018, he’s been working on Litecoin full time.

Vitalik Buterin

If there is anyone in the crypto world with the power and authority of Apostle Paul, considered the “Apostle to the Gentiles” by Christians and author of most of the New Testament, it’s Vitalik Buterin.

Buterin co-founded Bitcoin Magazine in 2011 and launched Ethereum, the second largest cryptocurrency by market cap, in 2013. These two developments alone are enough to solidify his place in history for two centuries.

Born in Russia to a computer scientist, Buterin and his family moved to Canada when Buterin was a child. He was educated in Toronto. He learned about bitcoin from his father and took an interest immediately. Then he dropped out of college to start Ethereum with a $100,000 grant from Thiel Fellowship, founded by tech investor Peter Thiel. His brilliance is unmatched in the crypto world.

Roger Ver

Few people in the crypto world have done more to promote bitcoin than Roger Ver. That’s why he’s earned the nickname Bitcoin Jesus.

Ver has an interesting history. In 2002, he pleaded guilty to selling illegal explosives on eBay. He made his first bitcoin investment in 2011. After supporting Bitinstant, he began to back other cryptocurrency projects including Ripple, Blockchain.info, Bitpay, and Kraken. He also owned a company in 2011 called Memorydealers that became the first company to accept bitcoin payments. Ver went on to organize Meetups around bitcoin and co-founded the Bitcoin Foundation.

One of the most colorful characters in the bitcoin drama, Ver renounced his U.S. citizenship and moved to Saint Kitts and Nevis in 2014. In 2017, he supported a bitcoin fork and started evangelizing Bitcoin Cash. He also served as CEO of Bitcoin.com until 2019.

Ross Ulbricht

Other than Nakamoto himself, few people connected to bitcoin are as controversial as Ross Ulbricht and very few draw as much ire. Best known as the creator of the darknet Silk Road, Ulbricht may be the man most responsible for associating bitcoin with criminal activity in the minds of some people.

Ulbricht was born in 1984 in Austin, Texas. A boy scout, he attained to the rank of Eagle Scout and attended the University of Texas at Dallas before seeking a master’s degree from Pennsylvania State University. That was when he took an interest in libertarian economic theories. After graduation, he returned to Austin and started a video game company.

The year 2010 is when Ulbricht began working on Silk Road. In a private journal, he wrote, “I am creating a year of prosperity and power beyond what I have ever experienced before. Silk Road is going to become a phenomenon and at least one person will tell me about it, unknowing that I was its creator.” Everything fell apart for Ulbricht in 2013 when he was arrested for running an illegal drug operation.

Ulbricht wasn’t actually dealing drugs, but he profited from drug trafficking. Silk Road was an underground internet community that utilized Tor technology in connection with bitcoin that allowed drug dealers, hitmen, child pornographers, and other seedy criminals to conduct their illegal business transactions with anonymity. It was that way by design, but it was naivete and Ulbricht’s diehard commitment to libertarianism that did him in. When he was offered a plea deal, he rejected it. In sentencing, he received two life sentences plus forty years without parole.

In December 2020, Ulbricht’s name came up again when The Daily Beast reported that President Donald Trump was considering a pardon for him.

Charlie Shrem

If it seems like 2011 is a magical year for bitcoin, that’s because it is. It’s the year Satoshi Nakamoto disappeared without a trace leaving Gavin Andresen in charge of development. It’s also the year Jed McCaleb sold Mt. Gox. It’s the year Charlie Lee and Roger Ver took an interest in bitcoin. It’s also the year Ross Ulbricht launched Silk Road and when Vitalik Buterin co-founded Bitcoin Magazine and launched Ethereum. That same year, Charlie Shrem was a senior in college and started his bitcoin journey.

After facing some challenges with buying and selling bitcoin through existing services, Shrem found a partner and launched BitInstant.

To launch the bitcoin exchange service, he borrowed $10,000 from his parents. The company grew quickly and attracted investments from others, including the aforementioned Ver and the Winklevoss twins. By 2013, BitInstant was processing 30 percent of all bitcoin transactions. The future looked bright. Then Shrem was arrested.

When the Bitcoin Foundation was founded in 2012, Shrem was one of its five co-founders. He resigned as vice chair after his arrest.

Even as he was on trial, Shrem was out promoting bitcoin. He was convicted in 2014 on charges of indirectly facilitating $1 million in digital currency transfers through Silk Road. Shrem served his prison time from March 2015 to June 2016. After his release from prison, he’s been very active in promoting bitcoin by appearing in documentaries, founding crypto companies, acting as executives in others, and became an active supporter of upstart cryptocurrency Dash in 2017. Two years later, he launched a bitcoin podcast called Untold Stories. He was also the target of a lawsuit by the Winklevoss twins, no strangers to suing technology mavens, but that was later dropped.

Shrem is evidence that sometimes what a revolution needs most is a martyr.

Andreas Antonopoulos

Born in London, Andreas Antonopoulos took an interest in bitcoin in 2012. In wild abandon, he quit a freelance consultancy he had as a computer scientist and started a public speaking career to promote bitcoin. He has written several popular books on cryptocurrencies since then.

In 2014, Antonopoulos led a fundraiser for Dorian Nakamoto, who had been incorrectly identified as Satoshi Nakamoto by journalists whose reporting tactics became controversial. The event disrupted Dorian Nakamoto’s life, but the bitcoin community raised $23,000 in bitcoin for him.

Antonopoulos has also appeared before governments to answer questions about bitcoin for regulatory consideration.

Dan Larimer

Daniel Larimer is the late bloomer of the bunch. In 2020, he started a blog titled More Equal Animals, a reference to George Orwell’s famous literary classic Animal Farm, in which he consolidated all of his blogs from the past six years. On his About page, he tells how he was working on the creation of a digital currency in 2009 when he stumbled upon bitcoin. He even had an encounter in the popular bitcoin forum with Satoshi Nakamoto where the latter famously responded to Larimer, posting as Bytemaster, with a terse, “If you don’t believe me or don’t get it, I don’t have time to try to convince you, sorry.”

While Larimer discovered bitcoin in 2009, he didn’t become active in blockchain development until much later.

In 2014, Larimer co-founded decentralized cryptocurrency exchange Bitshares with Charles Hoskinson, who went on to create the cryptocurrency Cardano. In doing so, Larimer invented the delegated proof-of-stake consensus (DPOS) mechanism, which works considerably different that bitcion’s consensus mechanism, called proof of work. Larimer went on to co-found Steem and Block One, both blockchain companies, and launched Steemit, the first blockchain-based social media platform. He also co-founded blockchain-as-a-service company eosio and Voice, his latest project, which is also a social media platform based on blockchain technology. Additionally, Larimer was the first person in blockchain circles to talk about decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs).

Unlike other crypto pioneers, Larimer has managed to stay out of legal trouble and does not have a string of failed projects behind him. He has a strong development background and bases much of his development and blockchain philosophy on libertarian principles, which he discovered in 2005.

Larimer is different than many of the other people on this list in that he does not seek out the limelight. He is not often front and center on the projects he takes on, preferring instead to sit in the background. But his genius is evident in every project he pours himself into. He is one of the few disciples of Satoshi Nakamoto to have captured the spirit of bitcoin as well as the vision of its founder and maintained a philosophical purity that is compatible with it.

Other Contenders

There are many brilliant minds working blockchain development. The above list represents, to me, a short list of early pioneers who captured the spirit and essence of bitcoin and became its chief evangelists from 2011 to 2014. The following list of people are also significant early adopters or players in the bitcoin space.

Brian Armstrong founded Coinbase, the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the U.S., in 2012. By 2014, Coinbase had 1 million users.

Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss invested in bitcoin early. In 2013, they claimed to own almost 1 percent of all bitcoin at the time. The also invested in early bitcoin startups like BitInstant and went on to found a cryptocurrency exchanged called Gemini.

Mark “Slush” Palatinus created the first bitcoin mining pool, called Slushpool, in 2010.

Charles Hoskinson co-founded Ethereum and Bitshares. He was also the chief developer of Cardano.

Crypto freaks and geeks know Satoshi Nakamoto as that mysterious anonymous inventor of bitcoin. But did you know that none of the ideas he used to create bitcoin were his own? None of them were unique. In fact, they had all been discussed and experimented with by others before bitcoin saw the light of day. What the famed BTC creator did was bring them all together to change the world. Here are five digital currencies, and the people behind them, that inspired Satoshi to create the world's first super-powerful cryptocurrency, which has now hit an all-time high.

Digital Currency Precursors to Bitcoin

Each of these primitive digital currencies had a brilliant mind behind them, but they all fell short in some way that prevented them from catching on. Let’s discuss their strengths and weaknesses and then we can see how each development contributed to the making of bitcoin.

DigiCash

The first attempt to create a digital cash system was in 1989. The World Wide Web was still in the womb of its creator, British computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee, and wouldn’t come to fruition until 1990.

On the other side of the Atlantic, an American computer scientist named David Chaum was working on a security protocol based on a public-private key system intended to keep private communications from public view. He created what was called Blind Signature Technology and set up a company called DigiCash to allow individuals to send and receive electronic payments using his technology. At the time, of course, anyone who had large amounts of money kept it in a bank. Chaum was only able to get one U.S. bank and one bank in Germany, Deutsche Bank, to adopt his technology.

Unable to grow DigiCash, the company filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 1998.

E-gold

While DigiCash didn’t get too far, e-gold made great strides. Launched in 1996 by a company set up in Saint Kitts and Nevis, its U.S. operations were headquartered in Florida. By 2004, the company had a million accounts, and by 2006 the online company was processing more than $2 billion per year.

There were several key components that helped e-gold establish some early success. First, it received some great press. Both Barron’s and Wired wrote positively about the service. The Financial Times described it as “the only electronic currency that has achieved critical mass on the web.” They also provided a means for e-commerce transactions to build on top of it through the use of an application programming interface (API), the first non-credit-card payment service to do so.

Many different types of businesses supported e-gold, including the Libertarian Party in California, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and the Mozilla Foundation.

E-gold was backed by real gold coins held in a bank deposit box in Florida. But because of its early success and its ability to store value, it quickly became a target for all sorts of financial scams. The service is notorious for inspiring the first known phishing attack against a financial service online in June 2001.

Another problem e-gold faced was hackers. Many users thought the service allowed for anonymous transactions, however, even though users could create accounts with fake names, hackers could data mine login attempts and reverse engineer account ownership. In fact, law enforcement agencies used these techniques to catch criminals using the service.

There were other issues too. Fraud was rampant. Because the banking system at the time was not set up for digital transactions over the internet, there was a high degree of identity theft and check fraud overall. E-gold was not immune. Plus, cybercrime in general was increasing. E-gold came to be associated with the payment system of choice for financial criminals, child pornographers, and terrorists.

In 2006, the U.S. Treasury Department redefined what constitutes a money transmitter service and the U.S. Department of Justice indicted the founders of e-gold. Two years later, the founders settled with the DOJ and closed shop.

Hashcash

Adam Back wanted a stronger encryption protocol for email. In 1997, like most people, he was annoyed with the volume of email spam flooding his inbox, so he sought a solution. That solution turned out to be hashcash.

In a nutshell, the sender of an email message could use some of their computing power to solve a mathematical computation, which would in turn create a header line in the email consisting of some code that would require the recipient of the email to verify. Back theorized that spending the small amount of computing energy to send an email would be counterproductive since spammers tend to send many emails at once. The cost of each hash process adding up incrementally would deter the effort.

Hashcash never caught on for fighting email spam, but it did become the basis for bitcoin mining.

B-money

I’ve found no evidence that b-money was ever implemented, but its proposer, a computer engineer by the name of Wei Dai, offered two proposals for a digital currency based on creating money by solving a computational problem. The year was 1998.

Dai’s proposed system would rely on three primary values:

Two people who would agree on the cost of computing power used to solve the computational problem;

The ability to enforce the contract between them through an arbitrator;

And the ability for the two parties to operate and transact anonymously.

While Dai never implemented the protocols he proposed, his proposal was referenced in the bitcoin whitepaper published by bitcoin’s mysterious creator.

Bit gold

Another development in 1998 that led to the development of bitcoin is a proposal by Nick Szabo, another computer scientist. Like b-money, Bit gold was never implemented, but its central idea was adopted by Satoshi Nakamoto for the implementation of bitcoin.

Szabo wanted to mimic the decentralized nature of gold as an asset with security and trust characteristics.

Gold is a natural resource. As such, it isn’t controlled by any central authority. Gold investors can buy and sell and trade gold as a commodity. What’s more, gold has the ability to store and hold value. Szabo reasoned that if these qualities could be duplicated with a digital currency, then anyone could buy, sell, or trade freely without the need for an intermediary.

Szabo’s bit gold would use a similar proof-of-work system as Back’s hashcash. The problem Szabo couldn’t solve was the double-spend problem. How would users prevent transactions from going through twice, or being hijacked by a third party and duplicated with the duplicated currency going to an unknown wallet address with no traceability? Nakamoto solved the problem when he introduced bitcoin ten years later.

Who Would You Call Satoshi Nakamoto's 12 Disciples?

In a previous post, I mentioned I got a book deal. In fact, I'm writing a book on the intersection between blockchain technology and social media. One chapter of the book, currently titled “The Rise and Rise of Cryptocurrencies,” will deal with the history of bitcoin and cryptocurrencies. One section of that chapter will discuss some of Satoshi Nakamoto's most important torch bearers after he exited stage left. This is where I could use your help. Who would you name among Satoshi's 12 disciples?

In other words, what 12 blockchain and cryptocurrency pioneers after Satoshi's disappearance have had the most influence on the development of blockchain technology?

Thanks for reading, see ya soon!

In my last post, I disclosed that I've managed to snag a book deal with a small business book publisher for a book I'm writing on blockchain technology and social media. One of the first things one has to do in order to convince a publisher to take you on as an author is define your audience. In simple terms, I've segmented my audience into four categories:

1) Blockchain developers working on social media projects

2) Blockchain technology enthusiasts

3) Users of mainstream social media platforms

4) Cryptocurrency enthusiasts

While there is some overlap between these categories, one category in particular is made up largely of people who are not familiar with blockchain technology, has little or no interest in it, do not see the value in it, do not understand it, and probably are not aware that there is such a thing as blockchain-based social media. One of my aims is to educate this crowd on the benefits of blockchain technology and its uses for social media by taking a critical look at current and past social projects built on top of blockchains. Before I can get into that discussion, however, I'll need to educate the audience on the benefits and features of blockchain technology. You know, get them familiar with the basics.

It is for that reason that I've decided to make chapter one of my book all about the benefits and features of blockchain technology. It's imperative that future users of social media built on blockchains understand what they're dealing with, and why.

With that in mind, I've identified the following features of blockchain technology that I think people unfamiliar with it should have a basic understanding of before they start using it. For those of you already familiar with the technology, you can help by showing me what I've left out or by clearing up any confusion I might have on these features. Your assistance would be helpful, and I'd be ever grateful.

The 9 Basic Features of Blockchain Technology

While I've already written a first draft of my book's chapter 1, the following is a summary of its contents. Not the full contents because I don't want to bore you with details you likely already know. Again, let me know where I might be off.

Immutability – Blockchain technology is immutable in the sense that once a transaction has been recorded, it cannot be changed or deleted. They are irreversible. If Tom sends Rebekah 20 USD, for instance, Rebekah will receive that money in her digital wallet. A record of that transaction is made and there is no way to cancel it. If Tom meant to send that 20 USD to Sally rather than Rebekah, his mistake. He cannot cancel the transaction or retract it, in full or in part, after it has been completed. He is simply out of luck.

Decentralization – Blockchain technology is decentralized, which means no individual or human entity controls the technology. The U.S. government, with its three branches, is centralized. The legislative branch consists of a body of elected officials entrusted with the power to pass laws. It is a centralized entity with a defined purpose. The executive branch of the government consists of a president, a vice president, the presidential cabinet, and several administrative offices responsible for executing the laws passed by Congress. It is centralized in the single authority of the president. The judicial branch of the government consists of nine justices whose responsibility is to settle disputes and interpret the law. Blockchain technology has no such structure. The technology is designed to operate with multiple computer nodes that reach a consensus in order to approve of transactions on the blockchain. There is no one entity that controls the process.

Enhanced security – Blockchain technology is inherently more secure than ordinary internet assets. That doesn't mean it is perfectly secure. When you try to log into your Facebook account, you enter your password and are admitted based on correct entry. The longer and more complex the password—that is, combining upper case and lower case lettering with numerals and special characters—the more secure the password. However, because Facebook is centralized, there is only one attack point for hackers to use to break the security of the platform other than the number of entry points users create by the number of devices they use to access the site. No matter how strong your password is, that central attack point makes it easier for hackers to break in. While two-factor authentication is more secure, it is still fairly easy to hack for smart hackers. By contrast, blockchain technology uses something called cryptographic security that combines a public passkey with a private passkey known only to the user. Not even the platform each user is logging into keeps a record of those keys, which makes each user's access to the platform more secure.

Distributed ledger – A ledger is an accounting tool used in business. There are different types of ledgers, but, generally speaking, the format is based on two sets of entries—debits and credits. The current standard in accounting is the double-entry bookkeeping system established in Medieval Europe. Double-entry bookkeeping requires an intermediary. Our modern centralized banking system is built on the double-entry ledger. When a loan is made, that transaction is recorded on one side of the ledger as a credit and on the other side as a debit. If the borrower can’t trust the bank, there will be no lending. If account holders, people who keep their money in banks to be used for lending, can’t trust the bank, then there will be no money to lend. A distributed ledger takes the intermediary, the bank, out of the picture completely and gives access to the latest edition of the ledger to all parties on the blockchain.

Faster settlement – Today, bank-to-bank money transfers typically take three to five business days. International transfers take longer. Accounts at the same bank can take less than 24 hours. Blockchain transfers occur within minutes. Sometimes, seconds.

Consensus – Consensus is the computing mechanism used by blockchains to approve and record transactions. There are different types of consensus mechanisms used by different blockchains. Each has its own set of advantages and disadvantages. I will not go into all of them here, but, in short, politics and personalities are not a part of the equation because it is the computers themselves and not the human agents that own them that are doing the heavy lifting.

Increased computing capacity – Because blockchains involve multiple computers on a network working together or competing to keep the distributed ledger up to date, enhance the security of the network, etc., the entire network has access to more computing capacity than a single computer could achieve on its own. Essentially, computing power can be increased exponentially based on the computing power of all nodes on the network.

Peer-to-peer interaction – This may seem redundant, but the peer-to-peer component of blockchain technology deserves its own explanation. In reality, it’s simply an extension of the other features, especially decentralization and distributed ledger. Because there is no need for an intermediary, participants can interact with each other without interruption or coercion from other members. For instance, when Tom sends Rebekah 20 USD, there is no need for any other party to be involved. The money moves seamlessly through the network from Tom’s wallet to Rebekah’s with no middle participant.

Minting – Minting refers to the process of making money. Because blockchains involve cryptocurrencies, which can be spent on the blockchain network or traded on exchanges for other cryptocurrencies, there must be a method for creating those digital monetary units. Each blockchain has its own minting mechanism. One popular method for minting is called mining. Miners create blocks by solving mathematical calculations. The data created within each block involves a certain number of transactions and is encrypted for enhanced security purposes. Each time this happens, cryptocurrencies are minted and distributed among the different participants based on their level of participation.

These basic features of blockchain technology vary from blockchain to blockchain and platform to platform. Not every social media platform built on a blockchain has all of these features. Some utilize these features more successfully and efficiently than others. Even among those who make excellent use of the underlying technology, there are vast differences in style, design, and the benefits of using the platforms. In the next installment, I'll cover some of the basic benefits of blockchain technology as it pertains to social media.

Hello Crypto Friends!

This is my first blog post at Coil, so I thought I'd break the ice with a huge announcement. I'll be writing a first-of-its-kind book about cryptocurrency, but before I get to that, here's a little small talk.

As we enter the COVID-19 holiday season, it appears that crypto news is gaining steam. As you may already know, Bitcoin is now over $19,000. Here’s what the Bitcoin chart for 2020 looks like:

On another note, I recently launched a fintech YouTube channel titled Friday Fintech Roundup. I’ve posted four updates so far. Here’s the latest:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFdQpHkuT5M

Hey, stop by, like the videos, share with your friends, and subscribe.

The real announcement this week is this:

I’ve signed a book publishing deal with Business Expert Press to write a book titled Is Social Media Ready for Decentralization? A Critical Look at the Leading Blockchain Social Projects. The first draft of my manuscript is due in April 2021, and one of the projects I plan to write about is Coil.

Want to Help Me Write My Book?

I know you like to keep up with the latest news on cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology. If you’re still interested, stay tuned, because I’ll be sharing updates on my progress in writing my book as well as some of the content to be included. You’ll be among the first to read as long as you subscribe to this blog.

But you can help in other ways too. Here’s what I’d like you to do for me to help spread the word about my book, its publisher, and cryptocurrencies in general:

1) First, leave a comment below and let me know you want to keep up with the progress in writing my book. Doing this will let me know how many people are on board and ready for new content.

2) Secondly, please share Cryptocracy with your friends.

3) If you’re not yet subscribed, subscribe to my newsletter.

4) Subscribe to my Coil channel for some exclusive content.

5) Also, I’d appreciate any suggestions on topics you’d like me to cover in the book, blockchain-based social media projects you’d like me to write about, and your suggestions on professionals working in that arena that I can interview for my book.

Is Social Media Ready for Decentralization? A Critical Look at the Leading Blockchain Social Projects will be the first book published that specifically discusses the intersection between blockchain technology and social media. I’m very proud to be leading the pack on this and I’d like to take you along. Are you with me?

Folk rock began to catch on in the early 1960s with such hits as Mr. Tambourine Man by The Byrds and California Dreamin' by the Mamas & the Papas.

Folk rock became such a big hit in the 1960s that one could easily fill a blog post or ten with the great music of the era. Peace, brotherly love, and getting stoned were the themes of much of the music as the Vietnam War grew more unpopular, young people began to rebel against their white vanilla Christian roots, and, well, they just wanted to have fun. Of course, Reefer Madness (links to the trailer; the full film is also available in the public domain), the propaganda film from the 1930s, didn't help.

By the time the 1970s rolled around, some of the best folk rock artists of the time had solidified their fan bases and performed some of their best music. Bob Dylan recorded Blowin in the Wind in 1963 and Simon & Garfunkel released Sounds of Silence in 1964. But the folk rock era was just getting started. By the time we got to Woodstock, there were nearly a million songs. That's only a slight exaggeration, but Arlo Guthrie, son of the famed folk singer Woody Guthrie, recorded his folk rock anthem Alice's Restaurant in 1967 (see below), just two years before the biggest party of the decade spontaneously erupted in a small town in New York.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m57gzA2JCcM#action=share

And now, without further ado, let's get to the music you came here for ....

10 Iconic 1970s Folk Rock Songs

The 1960s officially came to an end the year Simon & Garfunkel released their final album. “Bridge Over Troubled Water” is a fitting song to end the decade with because the duo decided to go their separate ways. Garfunkel took up acting and Simon went on to record some of his most commercially successful music. To this day, they can't stand to be in the same room together. So much for peace and brotherly love.

Still, you can't argue that the title track of this fifth studio album isn't a watershed moment in folk rock music history. It was released in January 1970.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrcwRt6J32o#action=share

Other great folk rock tunes were released in 1970, including “Wild World” by Cat Stevens. It became one of his biggest hits, but he'd later make a religious conversion and change his name to Yusuf Islam.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jta56wBl7SM#action=share

Van Morrison doesn't get enough credit as a songwriter, in my opinion. He'd already been successful as the lead singer of the rock band Them, but “Moondance” would usher in his solo career and he'd later record other iconic songs of the 1970s.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vo3JznMhpWc#action=share

No list of 1970s music would be complete without at least one Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young song on it. In this case, “Teach Your Children” has a message so simple and elegant it should be the title of sermon. It probably is, somewhere. But if it isn't, the song has a message of theological import, whether intended or not.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2vnYKRacKQc#action=share

In 1971, a rock band by the name of America raced onto the scene with “A Horse With No Name.” The three young stars were sons of US servicemen stationed in London, England. They'd later record another iconic folk rock song by the name of “Sister Golden Hair.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oEHBTjIYejE#action=share

One year later, Jim Croce released his third studio album and the one that put him on the charts with three big hits. One of those was “Time in a Bottle.” He died a year later in a tragic plane crash.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dO1rMeYnOmM#action=share

That same year, Neil Young came back with one of his greatest studio albums, titled Harvest. The album included two awesome No. 1-charting folk rock tunes that are still worth listening to today, “Old Man” and “Heart of Gold.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u925g6CgKuw#action=share

Bob Dylan needs no introduction. One of the pioneers of folk rock, he continued to record power ballads throughout his career. In 1973, he put out “Knocking on Heaven's Door,” which has been covered so many times you likely have your favorite version of it. This is Dylan's:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnKbImRPhTE#action=share

If you were wondering if there might be any female artists on this list, yes. One folk rock artist who has continued to record and perform is Joni Mitchell. She achieved some fame in the 1970s, but not enough in my opinion. Her voice is soft and angelic, the kind of voice you can listen to over and over again. Her only Top 10 hit was “Help Me,” released in 1974.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4oY8ojxp_8#action=share

Harry Chapin was more than a singer and songwriter. He was a raconteur who enjoyed fame for telling great stories through music. One of those stories is “Cat's in the Cradle,” released in 1974 on his album titled Verities and Balderdash.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etundhQa724#action=share

I'm sure you can think of your own great folk rock tunes from the 1970s. There were others. By 1975, however, progressive rock, hard rock, southern rock, and Disco were taking center stage. Folk rock began to fade into the background.

If you're wondering if I remember this era of great music, some of it. I definitely have a handle on the 1970s. I was born in '66, so I'm not that old.

This post originally appeared at Steemit.

Just for hanging in there, here's a bonus. The track is “Avalanche” by Leonard Cohen.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aye1wrXt7yM#action=share

Awhile back, I was editing three different niche online publications. Two of them had to do with crypto. When one of those gigs came to an end, I had a reader write to me and ask where else I was writing. I dropped a little nugget to see if he would bite, letting him know I was thinking about starting my own (Hey, why get paid cheese to milk the cow when you can own the dairy farm?).

This former reader of mine got excited. Not only did he say he'd read my publication, but he said he'd pay $5 a month to do so if I wrote it the same way as the last one. That was all I needed to hear.

So last month, I kicked of Cryptocracy, the newsletter that highlights the best content from the crazy world of crypto. But I do not charge $5 for it. Not yet.

Rather, I'm keeping it free until I get to 100 subscribers, then I'll start publishing premium content. Today's issue is chock full of awesome content featuring interesting news, the future, and Taylor freaking Swift. Here's a sampling.

Today's Top News

Don't touch that! You don't know where your email has been! But you'll soon know where it's going.

Coinbase patents crypto-sending email technology

Coinbase is about to get bigger. On Tuesday, the crypto exchange secured a grant for technology that will allow cryptocurrency users to send their favorite cryptocurrency via email. The sending email address is linked to a wallet, and if the wallet has the minimum balance required to honor the transaction, the receiver will see the crypto appear in their own wallet within 48 hours. This has the potential to benefit XRP, the fifth most favored coin on Coinbase, because of its ability to pay cross-border remittances. It could also allow generous crypto holders to give to charity, though not in time for this Christmas. — COINDESK

Bitcoin's Wealth Inequality Drops

Unlike the wealth equality of Litecoin, which could cause the next bull run, according to one analyst, and Ethereum, Bitcoin’s distance between the whales and the minnows has declined this year from what it was in 2018. Ethereum’s Gini coefficient, a measure economists use to determine wealth inequality within a specific economic system, went from 0.69 to 0.78. Bitcoin Cash went from 0.73 to 0.75. Bitcoin’s dropped from 0.66 to 0.64. Clovr cautions traders to avoid anything with less than a $100 million market cap, such as Huobi Pool Token, where 70 percent of tokens are owned by a single address. — COIN TELEGRAPH

[](https://cointelegraph.com/news/bitcoin-wealth-inequality-drops-in-2019-unlike-ether-litecoin-report)

Please, Don't Click Taylor Swift

As Binance Singapore moves to block Wasabi Wallet withdrawals, some other ne’er-do-well is using images of Taylor Swift to hide malicious malware with a crypto-mining botnet. The MyKings botnet uses a process called steganography, which is not the study of the Stegasaurus. If you’re a Taylor Swift fan, think before you click. — THE NEXT WEB

[](https://thenextweb.com/hardfork/2019/12/19/cryptocurrency-mining-botnet-taylor-swift-photos/)

Interesting Reads and Deeds

This is when crypto heads back to the future.

What Is The Staying Power of Crypto?

Six prominent crypto enthusiasts weigh in on the future of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. One prominent analyst says it will transform banking. Another says it’s an excellent long-term investment. One expert calls it “the future.” A crypto firm CEO says it will “beat the critics.” And another says 2020 will be a historic year. See who says what. This is an awesome read. — ENTREPRENEUR

[](https://www.entrepreneur.com/slideshow/343984)

This Man Knows The Future of The Blockchain

Given that there isn’t just one blockchain, there is a lot happening in the world of crypto today. Orchid pumped 22 percent after listing on Coinbase. Justin Sun donated $1 million to Greta Thunberg. Forbes partnered with Unlock to give readers ad-free reading. And Venezuela plans to airdrop Petro to its citizens. All of that looks promising. So, what’s the future of blockchain technology? Sebastian Markowsky, the man who predicted the 2018 bubble-bursting, has his say on that. — VALUEWALK

[](https://www.valuewalk.com/2019/12/crypto-bubble/)

Bonus: Ledger Technology Can Secure Your Email Account

Using two-factor authentication, Ledger has taken its hard wallet security technology and developed it to apply to Facebook, Gmail, Dropbox, and Github. Break open the Champagne — DECRYPT

Read the full issue

Images:

First image: From Clovr.

Second image: From Hard Fork.

Third image: From a YouTube video.

Editorial note: As a former newspaper editor, I feel a sense of duty in reporting the news without bias, though I might get snarky.

After the demise of social blogging platform Narrative recently, I decided to go back to Steemit, which I joined in March 2018. In June this year, I significantly reduced my content creation on Steemit to focus on Narrative. That was a bad decision, but an instructive one.

Narrative had issues from the start. While the site got its aesthetic right, it also proves that aesthetics is not enough to make a platform successful. If the underlying technology isn't up to the snuff, how attractive the site is doesn't matter. The following post includes suggestions based on my experience with Narrative and what I observed were its shortcomings.

4 Essentials of A Healthy Crypto Economy

Since Steemit launched in 2016, there have been many other social blockchain projects launch in an attempt to compete. Some have done fairly well while others are struggling. Steemit is still the market leader.

If I were to start today in building a social blogging platform that competes with Steemit and has a fighting chance at becoming the next big thing, I'd make sure I include at least the following four elements.

1. Economic stability

The world of cryptocurrency is inherently volatile. This is the first thing anyone should know about crypto. Because of its immaturity and the lack of regulation, the entire crypto market—from Bitcoin to the lowliest altcoin—has built-in volatility. For that reason, any attempt to build an economy around crypto—whether that economy is based on a single coin, a token, or multiple cryptocurrencies—the first step should be to affect this volatility with a viable and well thought out monetary policy that should begin with a stablecoin.

The stablecoin can be an existing coin such as USDT or TrueUSD, or it can be a proprietary cryptocurrency like Steem's Steem Dollars (SBD). In my opinion, this is one thing Steemit got right.

You can learn more about stablecoins from this awesome post at CoinSutra.

2. Sinks

Sinks are useful ways of spending a cryptocurrency that make it valuable. A utility token with no sinks is not a utility token. In Narrative's case, the intent was there, but development was so slow that the platform never survived long enough to create more than a single sink — the ability to purchase niches (content subject silos).

Practically speaking, it doesn't matter what the sink is as long as it encourages members of the economy to keep the currency within the economy.

Imagine if the U.S. government encouraged everyone who earned U.S. dollars in some way to convert those dollars to another world currency rather than spend them in the U.S. economy. How much value would the U.S. dollar have?

Absolutely freaking zero!

This is essentially what Narrative did. Instead of creating sinks for its own token, the founders made it easy for users to cash out their platform token and convert it to fiat money. And that's precisely what a large number of users did. As a result, the token value plummeted to near zero by the end of the year.

If you want a healthy economy for your crypto project, create several sinks.

3. Staking

Staking is a particular kind of sink. It involves committing the cryptocurrency to a long-term holding within the economy for some useful purpose. Steemit allows users to convert STEEM, the liquid currency of the platform, into Steem Power. To incentivize this action, the sage wizards of the platform tied the voting power of users to the amount of Steem Power in their accounts. The more Steem Power they have, the more voting power they have.

Staking can take place in any number of ways, but it's essential for the long-term stability of an economy. It's the equivalent of the stock market or certificates of deposit in the U.S.'s fiat economy. Rather than encourage all users to keep their crypto assets liquid all the time, any healthy crypto economy should have a fair number of users staking their currency at any given time. Whatever ways you can devise for encouraging that should be well thought out and implemented from Day One.

4. Security

No one wants to participate in an economy that isn't secure. If users are afraid their accounts will be hacked or they could lose their hard-earned cryptocurrency, they will not stick around long. So you've got to ensure the platform and each user's wallet has maximum security.

It's important to understand that this security must exist at multiple levels.

1. User level - First off, if you issue user wallets, each wallet must be secure using cryptographic encryption. All account data should be secure, as well.

2. Platform level - Not only must user data and wallets be secure, but the platform itself must be secure from hacking and other bad actors.

3. Server level - Make sure you host your servers with a secure authority that can lock down all data and prevent your system from being hacked. This is especially important if your content assets and front end are not on a blockchain.

4. Blockchain level - Whether your entire system exists on a blockchain, like Steemit, or you simply use a ledger for transactional data, as was the case with Narrative, you've got to ensure the blockchain is secure.

It doesn't matter how much else you get right, if users cannot feel secure in using your platform, your economy will suffer.

3 More Signs of a Healthy Crypto Economy

In addition to the above essential elements of a healthy crypto economy, I'd figure out more ways to improve the economy. The following three elements are not as essential as the above four but are certainly helpful.

1. Monetary scarcity

This is such a basic economic principle that I'm surprised it isn't talked about more often in crypto-social projects. One of the things that drives Bitcoin's value—in fact, one of the most important drivers of BTC value—is its built in scarcity. By programming, Bitcoin will only ever have 21 million BTC mined. For an interesting read, learn what will happen after all of those are mined.

When you limit the supply of an asset, you increase its value. That's a simple economic principle. If the asset has intrinsic value to begin with, its intrinsic value will be greater when you limit how many can be in circulation at any given time.

There are any number of ways to increase scarcity. The most obvious way is to program an upper limit that can be mined, minted, or created for your economy. That's not a perfect solution because programmers can always change the code. If you're the programmer, I strongly encourage you to pick a reasonable number, and don't change it.

Another way is to “burn” your tokens.

In a token burn, an entity within the economy (it can be a miner, the minter, a user, or anyone within the economy) sends a number of coins or tokens to a wallet address that cannot be accessed. For this to work, the wallet has to be created and the cryptographic keys destroyed so that no one—not even the wallet's creator—can access the wallet. All burned tokens go to that wallet address never to be seen again.

If you want a healthy crypto economy that encourages more participation and creates a natural competition for valuable tokens, find a way to create monetary scarcity.

2. Incentivized & disincentivized activities

As important as incentivizing and disincentivizing behavior is, it's easy to get wrong. It's likely that you'll end up spending a large amount of time experimenting with what works and what doesn't work, but it will be time worth spent. User experience on a crypto-based social blogging platform is tied to how well the platform deals with this Lincoln log.

Incentivization - Figure out early on what you want your users to do, and assign a level of importance to each activity. Your incentives should be tied to those actions. In Narrative's alpha stage, it was important to create the niches that users would later—once beta launched—bid on and own. Therefore, Narrative incentivized the niche suggestions and voting on niches. However, once beta launched, this activity was not as important. The platform missed an opportunity by continuing to reward users for suggesting niches and created issues for itself by increasing reputations too rapidly. This led to some high-rep users gaming the system unfairly.

Not only is it important to incentivize useful activities, but it's important to get the incentivization percentages right. Users will behave according to your rewards system. If your algorithm rewards short posts and photos over long-form content, that's what you'll get. Put a lot of thought into your incentivization practices.

Disincentivization - Just as important is what you disincentivize. In my opinion, Narrative was too hard early on with regard to certain infractions, but they proved not to be hard enough on the serious infractions.

It's natural for people to behave in such a way to maximize benefits in their favor, and if they can get away with it, they'll rig the system to work against others—especially if there is an equal and opposite benefit to themselves. To create a platform that doesn't account for this seedy side of human nature is irresponsible.

While there are exceptions, in general, people will put forth the least amount of effort necessary to get the maximum reward. What you want to do is create an economy that is fair to all users. That means dealing harshly with the seedy elements: Spam, low-quality content, and plagiarism can kill a social site.

As controversial as discouraging adult content is in some circles, it's worth considering whether you want to allow it, discourage it, ban it, or relegate it to a certain corner of your platform. The answer may be different for every platform, but it's a discussion that you should have.

In my opinion, Narrative got the adult content issue mostly right, but they got the spam, low-quality content, and plagiarism part all wrong. That, and the aforementioned sink hole, are what killed the site despite Narrative Company's insistence that it was the crypto market and regulation that did them in.

In short, put some thought into what actions you want to incentivize, what actions you want to disincentivize, and the weight of each activity with regard to your economic incentives and disincentives.

3. User interaction

It might seem like this point might belong in the “essential” category, but I don't think it's necessary for a social blogging platform to receive feedback from users if you have an economic model that is well thought out and proven to work. Naturally, you want some way to communicate with your users and to get their feedback, but if you get user interaction right and everything else wrong, you shouldn't expect success.

Narrative had a community support platform where they received suggestions for improvement and communicated with members of the community. There was a strong core group of users who routinely made suggestions and interacted with the company on its support site. But rarely did suggestions go further than on the digital page. In its eight-month life, Narrative only saw a couple of updates with user suggestions implemented. If you do provide a way to receive user feedback, it's far more important that you act on that feedback than that you receive it.

Nevertheless, I recommend that you provide a way for users—especially early on in the life of your platform—to give you feedback and make suggestions on improvement. But I can't stress this enough: If you do, take suggestions seriously and act on them.

Conclusion

It's important to realize that cryptocurrencies are still fairly new, and crypto economies are still in the experimental stage. There's no such thing as a perfect economy. With some work, you can have a healthy economy, but it requires some forethought. You can't just throw one together.

As much as I believe in free markets, I'm also a practical believer in Libertarian ideals. What that means is, you can allow your platform users a lot of freedom in terms of what they can do on your platform as long as you implement a strong monetary policy and you prevent bullying and other forms of abuse.

A lollipop attitude toward human nature will only lead to a weak and unhealthy economy. Bad actors will take over your platform if you give them an open door and a foothold. When that happens, the best content creators will leave and your economy will suffer. Death of the platform will not be long after.

First published at Cryptobloggers and Steemit.

Cryptocracy

Image Credits:

Header image: By Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

First image: By Reimund Bertrams from Pixabay

Second image: By Pexels from Pixabay

Third image: By Lisa Johnson from Pixabay

Fourth image: By Reimund Bertrams from Pixabay

Fifth image: By Gerd Almann from Pixabay