Bitcoin is touted for its many improvements to traditional currency. It is easy to transfer, requires no central authority to administer, works across political boundaries, and is easy to use.



But beyond the practical niceties and technical implementation details is the true intention of its inventor, Satoshi Nakamoto, who has now vanished and is unable to tell his story. Bitcoin is trying to solve a much larger problem: the economic instabilities of paper currency that fundamentally affect us, change the nature of business in our economy, make it hard for us to put valuations on things, and lead to a cyclical, chaotic economy of prosperity and recession that is both wasteful and ravaging to the progress of humanity and the stability of our lives.



In this talk, I will demystify currency and delve into the fundamentals of economic exchange. I will discuss how currencies work, what gives them their value, why most of them are fundamentally flawed, and how these flaws manifest themselves in our world. I will discuss how Bitcoin intends to solve these problems, the rearchitecture of our economic lives that would happen if we used it for everything, and where things might go wrong.



This talk was done at CyborgCamp 2012. There is a video of the talk available here: http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/26694951



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