Very often I hear “Bitcoin has no value” being uttered by highly-regarded scholars, successful serial-entrepreneurs and the like, even though that’s completely untrue. I was watching an interview with the Chief Business Officer of YouTube, Robert Kyncl, who at the end of the interview details the 4 core freedoms YouTube stands for: Freedom Of Opportunity, Freedom Of Speech, Freedom Of Information and finally Freedom To Belong. This interview inspired me to write a post about how Bitcoin DOES have value. If you ever hear someone saying Bitcoin doesn’t have any value again, feel free to refer them to this post.

Freedom Of Opportunity

No longer are people across the globe unable to find work or receive salary due to government interference. Examples of people who don’t have the freedom of opportunity are those who live in Russia, Iran or [insert any North-African country here]. Previously, these individuals had to resort to shady, non-conventional payment methods for receiving payments (which charged an exorbitant fee and held payments for an extensive time period) because they were banned from using PayPal and other well-known services. With the rise of Bitcoin and its recent popularization, these citizens of oppressive governments now have the opportunity to work and receive international payments safely, in a timely manner and with very low transaction fees.

Freedom Of Information

Accessing information has been as important as it’s ever been. Robert mentions how he grew up in a communist country, Czechoslovakia, behind the Iron Curtain where information was scarce. People living in a similar situation where the Iron Curtain isn’t there physically, but rather as a Great Firewall, are disabled from accessing information otherwise accessible to the rest of the world. Instruments created by the governments to impede their citizens from accessing said information are possible to bypass given certain tools, however many of these tools (VPN’s, proxies and similar services) have had difficulty providing their services to affected individuals due to payment blockades, however now — with the rise of Bitcoin as a non-censorable virtual payment method — this has changed.

Freedom Of Trade and Commerce

As an extension to the above mentioned freedoms, a new freedom has manifested itself, namely the Freedom of Trade and Commerce: The sale and purchase of goods and services without government discrimination. One such, very obvious, example of how Bitcoin enables this freedom can be found when looking at Dark Net Markets, such as the Silk Road Marketplace. A less extreme, legal example can be found when looking at CoinMall — an eBay-like marketplace on which anyone, anywhere on the world is able to buy and sell any digital product without external interference or limitations imposed by the platform.

Freedom Of Saving

The issue with inflationary currencies (all fiat currencies such as the Dollar or the Euro) is that your savings become diluted over time. This means that your money becomes worth less over time, you’ll not be able to purchase as many goods or services today as you’d be next year. Thus you’re not incentivized to save, but rather spend your money. With Bitcoin it’s the opposite (hence the term HODL) thanks to its consensus-driven monetary policy and deflationary property, resulting in an appreciation of the value of your holdings.

Conclusion

I hope this post has taught at least one person something new. If it did, feel free to give a ‘clap’ or two :).