Читать книгу Bitcoin, Blockchain & Co. - Joe Martin - Страница 3

I stumbled across Bitcoin late—not until 2016. Maybe you discovered it even later than me, or years before me. Regardless of when Bitcoin came to your attention, I am sure you have a few questions that no-one has been able to give you a satisfactory answer to. I am also sure—since you’ve picked up this book—that you are interested in the topic of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency. As an author and journalist, I am fascinated by the subject of crypto. However, no matter how hard I tried to grasp it, to understand it, to get a handle on how it all works, I kept finding myself in a deep dark wood. The more I learned, the more questions I had.

Even after reading dozens of reports, listening to even more podcasts, attending conferences and speaking to lots of crypto experts, I was still in those woods looking for clear answers. But my problem had changed. It wasn’t dark in the woods anymore. On the contrary; now the sun seemed to be illuminating my path, but I could no longer see the wood for the trees. Total information overload.

More conversations, more reports, more articles, more podcasts, and none of it really helped. The only reassuring thing was that I was finding more and more people who were experiencing the exact same uncertainty. There was more confusion than expertise in this new, specialist area. Again and again, I participated in conversations until both sides exhausted our logic and still were no closer to clarity. Why was that so, and how could it be solved?

I believe that anyone who has had any dealings with Bitcoin, blockchains and other cryptocurrencies will know instinctually that this new technology will change the world for the better. Many are intuitively of the opinion that we are approaching a new industrial revolution, or perhaps are already within it. But the world of cryptocurrency and blockchain is anything but intuitive. It runs counter to every framework and system that form the foundation of our modern lives. In large part, it is counterintuitive, strange, unknown, alien. I have often stood with almost literal question marks on my face, my lips forming one astounded “Pardon?” after another. I kept hearing the same stock answer from my friends: “I just don’t believe that.”