“A mysterious new technology emerges, seemingly out of nowhere, but actually the result of two decades of intense
research and development by nearly anonymous researchers.
Political idealists project visions of liberation and revolution onto it; establishment elites heap contempt and scorn on it.
On the other hand, technologists – nerds – are transfixed by it.
They see within it enormous potential and spend their nights and weekends tinkering with it.
Eventually mainstream products, companies and industries emerge to commercialize it; its effects become profound; and later, many people
wonder why its powerful promise wasn’t more obvious from the start.
What technology am I talking about?
Personal computers in 1975, the Internet in 1993, and – I believe – Bitcoin in 2014….
The practical consequence of solving this problem is that Bitcoin gives us, for the first time, a way for one Internet user to transfer a unique piece of digital property to another Internet user, such that the transfer is guaranteed to be safe and secure, everyone knows that the transfer has taken place, and nobody can challenge the legitimacy of the transfer.
The consequences of this breakthrough are hard to overstate.
What kinds of digital property might be transferred in this way?
Think about digital signatures, digital contracts, digital keys (to physical locks, or to online lockers), digital ownership of physical assets such as cars and houses, digital stocks and bonds …
and digital money”.
– Marc Andreessen, Founder of Netscape & well-known venture capitalist, 2014
BitHouse 