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The former Blockchain executive and a cryptocurrency veteran, Dan Hedl, has said that Satoshi Nakamoto, the creator of bitcoin, wanted bitcoin to be an “alternative to banks”, and not a “new visa.”
In a series of tweets on January 14, Hedl took up an argument with other cryptocurrency enthusiasts who believe that the idea of Bitcoin was to be a currency for payments.
1/ Satoshi’s Vision is a silly endeavor, as it doesn’t matter what it was, we are where we are now. However, those pushing the “Bitcoin was first made for payments” narrative insist on cherry-picking sentences from the white paper and forum posts to champion their perspective.
— Dan Hedl (@danheld) January 14, 2019
He argued that those who have this mere belief haven’t quite understood bitcoin’s full implications from Satoshi’s vision, which is clearly shown in Bitcoin Whitepaper. In his main tweet, he said that:
“Satoshi’s Vision is a silly endeavor, as it doesn’t matter what it was, we are where we are now. However, those pushing the “Bitcoin was first made for payments” narrative insist on cherry-picking sentences from the white paper and forum posts to champion their perspective.”
World Needed An Alternative Bank, Not Another Visa
In 2008 when bitcoin whitepaper was published, it happened that there was a financial crisis the same year. During that time, many had lost their trust in Banks, so it was perfect timing for bitcoin to be popularized. According to Hedl, Nakamoto has cleverly planted a seed at the right timing.
Hedl also noted that:
“How do we determine Satoshi’s intention? We need to look at his ideology, description of functionality/architecture, timing, and audience. Let's start with how Satoshi describes the problem Bitcoin solves. In his first public comms after the whitepaper, in the first paragraph: ‘The root problem with conventional currency is all the trust that's required to make it work. The central bank must be trusted not to debase the currency, but the history of fiat currencies is full of breaches of that trust.’”
Hedl believes that bitcoin is largely a store of value and not an alternative to payment networks such as MasterCard and Visa.
In a tweet, Hedl noted that:
“The world didn’t need a new VISA; they needed an alternative to banks.”
When it comes to capacity, though, bitcoin will outdo payment processing networks like MasterCard and Visa, especially through the Lightning Network, which allow transactions to be processed off-chain.
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