Sure, it’s exciting when the exchange rate goes up. Sure, it’s heart-stopping to hold through the weekly mini-crashes (MtGox lag, hard fork, more lag, wallet hacks, more lag …). Sure, I consider cashing out my cost basis to mitigate my Bitcoinity compulsion.

But even if the exchange rate dropped to zero this instant and stayed there forever, I’ve locked in a permanent gain that’s worth even more to me than my Bitcoin holdings. That’s because Bitcoin is not just a currency, not just a protocol, and not just a peer-to-peer payment system. It’s a social network. Regardless of what happens to Bitcoin itself or to my individual Bitcoin holdings in the future, I’m now part of that network.

For me, the network brings with it the following benefits: