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The percentage of civilized men who breathe correctly is quite small, and the result is shown in contracted chests and stooping shoulders, and the terrible increase in diseases of the respiratory organs, including that dread monster,
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“Bitcoin uses mathematics to introduce the concept of unalterable, predictable outcomes into a payment system. This is totally alien because we’ve never done it in financial systems before, and the initial reaction to that is often, "Well, that’s broken.”
― The Internet of Money Volume Two
― The Internet of Money Volume Two
“Bitcoin is not simply a system of accounting; it is the first digital artifact that provides forever-history, that provides true digital immutability. There is no other system that provides digital immutability at that level. It is a planetary-scale, thermodynamically-guaranteed, self-evident system of immutability. Planetary-scale, because in order to do it you need to marshal resources that only exist in a planetary-scale effort. Thermodynamically-guaranteed, because you can calculate the exact amount of energy it took to create it and there is no shortcut. Information theory tells us that to flip x number of bits, it takes this y number of joules, and there is no way to do it otherwise. Self-evident, because the number that is produced as proof-of-work tells you exactly how much work has been done cumulatively. It really is a monument.”
― The Internet of Money Volume Two
― The Internet of Money Volume Two
“Do not underestimate this. Do not listen to the people who tell you that bitcoin is just for pornographers, terrorists, drug dealers, and gamblers. Remember that they said the exact same thing about the internet. But when 2 or 3 million people got online, we found out that they are not interested in those things—they are interested in sharing cat videos, and now we have an internet of a billion cat videos.”
― The Internet of Money Volume Two
― The Internet of Money Volume Two
“Bitcoin today, and all of the currencies that are built using that recipe, are at the same stage that the internet was in 1992. Only now we have the internet, and so the rate of exponential growth has already started. The innovation is growing at an astonishing rate. I spend every single day, full-time, trying to keep up with bitcoin and it’s almost impossible. ”
― The Internet of Money Volume Two
― The Internet of Money Volume Two
“4.1.1. The Blockchain and Proof-of-Work Why is bitcoin immutable? What gives bitcoin the characteristics of immutability? What is it that makes it unchangeable? The first answer that comes to mind for most people is "the blockchain." The blockchain makes bitcoin immutable because every block depends on its predecessor, creating an unbreakable chain back to the genesis block, and if you change something it would be noticed. Therefore, it’s unchangeable. That is the wrong answer, because it’s not really "the blockchain" that gives bitcoin its immutability. That’s a really important nuance to understand. The blockchain makes sure that you can’t change something without anyone noticing. In security we call that "tamper-evident": if you change it, it is evident. You cannot tamper with it without leaving evidence of your tampering. But there’s a higher standard in security. We call it "tamper-proof": something that cannot be tampered with. Not just “will be visible if it’s tampered with,” but “cannot be tampered with.” Immutable. The characteristic that gives bitcoin its tamper-proof capability is not "the blockchain”; it’s proof-of-work.”
― The Internet of Money Volume Two
― The Internet of Money Volume Two
Trey’s 2025 Year in Books
Take a look at Trey’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
29 books
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8 friends
0 books
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40 friends
1 book
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120 friends
0 books
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90 friends
0 books
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19 friends
1 book
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54 friends
10 books
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2 friends
8 books
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19 friends
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