Crypto Biz Magazine—July, 2014/Issue.02
Digital Currencies & Crypto Innovations—We observe and explore all aspects of the crypto world, including mining, financial trading, exchanges, development and business.
Digital Currencies & Crypto Innovations—We observe and explore all aspects of the crypto world, including mining, financial trading, exchanges, development and business.
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draw in more, and so on. These were my thoughts<br />
over the next several weeks. Of course, that’s<br />
not quite what ended up happening,<br />
but I think I was pretty close.<br />
Bitcoin is now roughly<br />
one hundred times<br />
more expensive and<br />
there are now several<br />
com peting Silk Road<br />
incarnations.<br />
The Dread Pirate<br />
Roberts changed<br />
the world in two different<br />
ways. He communicated<br />
the idea of the Silk Road’s<br />
business model and<br />
produced the first<br />
sustainable source of<br />
Bitcoin profits. When<br />
the Silk Road first came<br />
online, Bitcoin could not<br />
compete with credit cards and<br />
traditional banking because Bitcoin<br />
services were so sparse. It was where these services<br />
were excluded—on the black market—that Bitcoin could<br />
be most useful. This was its path of least resistance<br />
upward. Before the Silk Road existed, Bitcoin was little<br />
more than a curiosity. Afterwards, Bitcoin was something<br />
the world needed. This was understood by some at the<br />
time: the opening of the Silk Road sparked the first<br />
Bitcoin mania in 2011.<br />
Every Bitcoin venture must build upon Bitcoin’s former<br />
successes because each step in Bitcoin’s growth makes<br />
Bitcoin more useful and makes new opportunities<br />
possible. Without the early proof, courtesy of the Silk<br />
Road, of Bitcoin’s viability, Bitcoin would not have<br />
attracted the investors that it did then, and consequently<br />
would not now be attracting the investors that it does<br />
today. All Bitcoin entrepreneurs today build on top of the<br />
success of the Silk Road. His made their work possible.<br />
I confess, I never actually bought anything at the Silk<br />
Road and I never engaged with the community there.<br />
Now that the opportunity is lost forever, I really wish I<br />
had. However, I did do some things.<br />
It was shortly thereafter that I<br />
gave a presenta tion to the<br />
Libertarian Longhorns in<br />
which I advised them<br />
to cease all political<br />
activity immediately<br />
and focus entirely<br />
on crypto anarchy.<br />
A libertarian victory<br />
was no longer<br />
impossible, but nigh<br />
inevitable. Shortly thereafter<br />
another group I attended, The Mises Circle<br />
at UT, became the first Bitcoin student group that<br />
I know of, and not long after that we started the second<br />
Bitcoin student group I know of (The <strong>Crypto</strong>anarchy Club<br />
at UT). The first group was for economic discussions and<br />
the second for cypherpunk discussions. Finally, we started<br />
the Satoshi Nakamoto Institute in mid 2013.<br />
When Ross Ulbricht was caught in late 2013, I was surprised<br />
because I had met Mr. Ulbricht briefly in 2009, at<br />
an event called 3-Day Startup. If he is really the Dread<br />
Pirate Roberts, then I had met him before he was famous,<br />
before he had created his great work. This is not so<br />
unlikely; we did have some unusual interests in common.<br />
Unfortunately, I don’t really remember our meeting<br />
very well, but a friend recalls me telling him that digital<br />
currencies are a stupid idea. That’s how life is sometimes.<br />
The evidence strongly suggests that Ross Ulbricht and<br />
DPR are the same person. If this is true, then DPR is a<br />
political prisoner, and he is nearly alone when he deserves<br />
the whole of the agorist and Bitcoin communities to<br />
honor him as their master. I wish I had written this article<br />
for him sooner, but it is easy to get caught up in dayto-day<br />
concerns and forget what is most important.<br />
He is the greatest agorist of our times, and, probably,<br />
who will ever live, and I would rank him as the second<br />
most important Bitcoiner after Satoshi Nakamoto. Please<br />
support his cause at freeross.org. —S<br />
DANIEL KRAWISZ graduated<br />
with his Master’s degree in physics<br />
from The University of Texas at<br />
Austin in 2010. He is a founder of<br />
the Satoshi Nakamoto Institute<br />
and is now its Director of Research.<br />
Daniel accepts Bitcoin tips:<br />
19zEabLpYpB7yMQCXF8K9un67ZL7U59M3h<br />
July.<strong>2014</strong> Page.41 <strong>Crypto</strong> <strong>Biz</strong> Magazine