 What is Bitcoin? So Bitcoin is an invention. It was created in 2008 By an anonymous person. We don't really know their identity called Satoshi Nakamori. That's not their name. They're not Japanese Nothing to tell us that they're male or Japanese or not a group of people and not one person We don't really know doesn't matter what they invented was a system of currency that can operate on the Internet And operate without any trusted central party, and that's the magic right there without trusted central party and Beyond the currency this creates a mechanism for trusting something on the internet to provide security without putting anyone in charge To provide security through the collaboration of thousands of participants around the world Now if you have a platform like that that can give you trust on a massive scale on the internet Which is not really a trustworthy platform, right? You never know who you're talking to you never know who's intercepting your communications You almost assume that there might be someone between you and the other Know that you're communicating with but this system ensures that you can't fake Who you are you can't fake whether you own Bitcoin or not You can't fake Bitcoin itself so you can trust the platform and you don't have to trust the other person you're transacting with Now we already have a system like that It's cash One of the fantastic things about cash is that I don't need to get your identity in order to give you some cash I can tip someone I don't know they don't need to check my credit records in order to know That the tip that they just received that Australian dollars is real they can inspect The currency itself and determine for themselves. It's not going through a central provider Your Australian dollars don't say sponsored by visa yet on them There's no corporation there. It's kind of like a public good. It's a commons That's great in the digital realm. We don't have that So all the forms of digital money. We have a corporate money. They're privatized money whereas with Bitcoin you have a currency commons a Public digital system that gives you currency that gives you trust that isn't owned by anyone that isn't controlled by a corporation That is controlled by a very broad set of participants who all collaborate together to enforce a set of rules we call these the consensus rules and No one can cheat in the system because everybody is checking everybody else and no one is trusting anybody else Sometimes you'll hear the Bitcoin community in these conversations. We use the word trustless Terrible terrible marketing terrible right so it trustless sounds like something you can't trust So nobody would want to use that so clearly no one is doing marketing for this thing We're trying to figure out what the right words to use and we just use this word And what does trustless mean trustless means that you can trust in the system the platform the network the consensus rules the Collaborative emergent consensus that comes out of that so that you don't have to trust the other party or any other part Meaning if I send you Bitcoin you don't need to trust me in order to receive it and I don't need to trust you All I need to know is I sent it to the right address But once I do that and you receive it it's real just like if I give you an Australian dollar You don't need to know who I am or whether you trust me or whether I have a good credit record You just look at it and say oh, yeah, this is a real Australian dollar and therefore good enough That Principle is really important because it allows us to go back in the digital realm to something very basic Which is the idea of people paying people Somehow over the last 15 years. We've started departing from that idea very very very fast In most of your interactions today in Australia you use credit cards In fact, this is one of the countries where I haven't needed to take out any cash from any ATM And I can operate with a credit card pretty much anywhere plastic and testing great But credit cards represent a system that is wholly privatized owned by a corporation and that corporation is an intermediary in every transaction Meaning you are no longer people paying people You are people paying a corporation that pays a corporation that pays a corporation that pays a people Sometimes most of the time really people can't be recipients of payments how many of you have a credit card receiving machine with which you can receive payments directly from credit cards as an individual So as a corporation so you can do people to people to corporations corporation to his corporation, but We've taken the people out of commerce And that puts us in an interesting position because as money has changed that it's become digital it's changed the balance Previously people could pay people if you want to tip your taxi driver or your bartender They're not going to take a credit card They take a credit card. I had a conversation with the waitress recently in Australia. He said no, don't tip me on the card We don't get those the restaurant keeps them I don't know if that's legal here But if it isn't I'm sure someone's gonna lobby to make it legal So if I actually want to tip a waiter I have to tip in cash cash is the person-to-person system and as we move into the digital domain We're gradually eroding that fundamental principle and that is a very dangerous path to go down You'll keep hearing this team come up again and again It's a lot of governments a lot of news media are talking about the cash flow society and They're talking about that as if this is some kind of progressive ideal as if we can aspire To getting rid of this anachronistic dirty pieces of paper. We're carrying out We can launch ourselves into the Star Trek flash Gordon future Okay, I'm old into the whatever sci-fi is currently popular future and And we can leave behind dirty old cash What they're not telling you about is that that represents a fundamental shift in the relationship between people and money People in the state people in corporations. We're no longer using a system of payment That allows people to pay people we're talking about fully privatized money a cashless society Is a society in which all commerce is managed mediated? controlled by corporations it Means that you cannot pay another person without a corporation getting in between that payment Getting a nice fee, but most importantly imposing its own moral standards its own Choices on whether you are allowed or not allowed to make that payment That is a very dangerous path You can find that out if you operate in any of the businesses that tend to get a lot of scrutiny by these Corporations you find out that you can't maintain an account with PayPal visa Mastercard organizations involved in political activism environmentalism human rights and Those are the examples that everybody goes. Oh, that sounds kind of unfair And then the ones that they can easily get away with organizations that sell pornography Organizations that sell sex toys organizations that Are involved in other trades that perhaps are perfectly legal under Australian law but perfectly Unpermitted under the terms and conditions of PayPal or visa or Mastercard as As a society we have the opportunity to elect leaders who help us decide or express our Choices as to what should be legal and what is illegal and we make those choices Now as far as I know Selling sex toys is legal in Australia, right? Why? Because you're responsible Adults who don't need to be treated like babies. I can tell you in half the south of the United States It is illegal to sell an adult a dildo Now you may think that's a bit funny I have a big problem with that because in those places Mastercard will open an account for you if you belong to the KKK and the fundraising The Ku Klux Klan God help you if you want to sell someone a dildo that is imposing a narrow corporate mentality and morality through an unelected system on adult citizens and They say we will make choices for consumers We will make choices for shoppers I'm not a consumer I'm not a shopper I'm a citizen. I'm a human. I'm an individual and you know what the difference between those terms is as As a human as an individual as a person I have human rights I have the right to elect representatives who decide and Pass laws and say what's illegal as a consumer. I don't have rights. I have terms and conditions That's a pretty big distinction. I don't want to live in a society where my role is that of a consumer Shopper that turns me into a baby I'm no longer an adult who makes decisions for myself. I recently did a patron campaign Where I sent out the tweets and I said a corporate talk would not have the title blockchain versus bullshit Which by the way was one of the talks I did in Johannesburg, South Africa a couple of months ago And I said for that kind of talk you need to support independent voices That was a pretty successful campaign a lot of people got what I'm trying to do That it's important to be able to use language that is sometimes provocative To make a point a point that has really important political implications a point that is not Trivial I'm not using that word just to inflame. I'm using it to very carefully Get people's attention in order to make a very important point About the corporate capture and co-option of this technology and the attempt to turn it Into something mild and manageable and marketable Bullshit sometimes that word is the right word. I tried to promote that on Facebook it got declined Because I violated the profanity rules of Facebook that should send chills up your spine Because they object to me using the word bullshit. Do they object to? Advertising banks that fund or lords in the Congo Or that are involved in the blood diamond trade hell no They have this babyist morality of corporations This kind of prudish He said bullshit Morality of those who do not want to offend but to me it's obscene to fund warlords Though run that As long as one of those banks doesn't use the dreaded word bullshit. They can fund warlords all day I have a problem with having to submit to the terms of conditions of a corporate environment in order to do commerce as an individual so free individual in the country where I Presumably have freedom of speech and I'm trying to make a very important point So all of this Kind of gives you an idea of where we're going this idea of a cashless society What does it really mean? I was born in London. I grew up in Greece but I spent a lot of time in Britain and I'm familiar with some of the concepts that the commonwealth and British common law has Spread around the world and I see a lot of that here in Australia, too And I made this observation one of the things that really caught my attention is the British concept of a commons and the commons in British common law is a large open area usually in the center of town a pastor a Park a green space That does not belong to a landowner and this goes back to the feudal times It was the only space that did not belong to a landowner It was an open common space that belonged to everyone. It still exists today And if you look under legal structures the parks you have beautiful park There's just few blocks from here with a botanic garden Open 24 hours a day open to the public is Classified on the laws of commons What is the commons? Ironically the term the tragedy of the commons If we could turn off that project that'd be good or change the background, please The term the tragedy of the commons actually comes from the idea that if you just let anyone pasture their Her it's on the commons eventually is going to turn into a mud field and everybody loses the commons Historically, there's no evidence that actually happened The commons represents this space that is carved out It's carved out from our society in order to allow the full range and freedom of expression activity Participation to everyone it doesn't matter if you can afford it or not if you're a peasant or lord a landowner or a pleb You have access to the commons and these beautiful parks That you see throughout the Commonwealth are a direct result of this Mentality in many places in the world those don't exist in many places in the world Parks are private. They're run by corporations. They're Disney 5 And what happens when the park the commons is Disney 5 is That the range of activity the range of expression the access to that space is severely limited If you want to roll a skate Get out if you want to protest get out. Is there a speakers quarter at Disney World? Hell no Do you want to speak up about your government? Do you want to sunbathe get out? Are you homeless get out? Are you poor get out? You can be trespassed Under law you cannot be trespassed from the commons. Why you are the landowner you the public When we speak of a cashless society, we are speaking of a parkless city We are speaking of an environment that's equivalent to taking the commons privatizing it giving it to Disney to run and saying you know what We will eradicate homelessness this way eradicated from view There will be no more poor people within your field of vision Because they got trespassed It's very easy to fall into the mistaken assumption because of privilege to say I have a garden I don't need a park. I Have a credit card. I don't need cash. I Have access to banking. I don't need the things that people who don't have access to banking need When you talk about a cashless society you hear these examples again and again It's going to be used to reduce criminal activity. It's going to be used to reduce black money It's going to be used to reduce money laundering Bullshit It's going to be used to reduce criminal activity by poor people rich people Can do as much criminal activity they want the banks will line up and help them arrange it Money laundering is what banks do With a banking license in the tune of billions and no one goes to jail What it means is that if you're homeless and immigrants and native First nations you call them here the aboriginals. They're your own native peoples They have the highest levels of unbanked in Australia Immigrants it's inherent workers people who are illiterate to newer do not have access to banking a cashless society Is like a city without public parks? It doesn't make the bad things go away It simply hides them from view and in the process it also removes all of the freedoms that you had before You want to send money to WikiLeaks? We shut down your PayPal account Sorry that kind of political expression isn't allowed. We still take money for the KKK You want to send money to Greenpeace? Sorry, they were recently classified as an activist organization by visa's filtering system denied You no longer have control over commerce the opportunity for expression is gone We have a choice Bitcoin is digital cash Bitcoin is the currency commons And not just Bitcoin But the thousands of other things that it has spawned that operate similarly It belongs to the public. It is open for everyone 24 hours a day. It does not discriminate It does not control access access to everyone everyone can innovate and yes When you open the commons, there's going to be homeless people in it And when you open the commons, there's going to be a junkie shooting up in the park The solution to that is not to eradicate parks. It's the fund health there Maybe I don't know. I'm not a politician. I've come up with a few other ideas But shutting parks doesn't change addiction and Shutting down access to currency by privatizing every aspect of a payment system Does not lead to a utopia without crime it leads to a dystopia where The corporations are the only ones who do crime and they do mega crime where your government Gradually shifts into not representing you but representing them and in Some places that means your government is going to become a criminal organization probably can't see that is likely happening in Australia How about you ask a Venezuelan about what's happening in their country in countries like that? Bitcoin is not just a possibility of opening the range of expression and offering some opportunities and creating breathing room for the future Subverting this plan of completely privatized digital money and creating this currency commons. It's life and death right now in Venezuela and places like that and Bitcoin is a defense system a safe haven a way to Give an opportunity to the next generation Bitcoin isn't just PayPal Bitcoin isn't just a fancy way of making payments Bitcoin isn't to get rich quick scheme It is a fundamental technology that puts currency on the internet and By doing so and opening the system of control It creates a currency commons an open space Where everybody can be not a consumer not a shopper? But a citizen a person an individual