The biggest news in the digital currency industry so far this year was the passing of 11 spot BTC ETFs by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
After much resistance and wrangling, SEC Chairman Gary Gensler gave the long-awaited ETFs the green light, sending BTC maximalists into a euphoric frenzy, calling for new all-time highs and making the usual ridiculous price predictions.
So far, the ETFs have been somewhat of a damp squib, triggering a minor selloff rather than a new bull run. It remains to be seen whether the much hoped-for liquidity will pour into the ETFs and drive the price of BTC higher.
Yet, amidst all of this excitement and greed, few have stopped to ask themselves how we got here and whether this is what Bitcoin was supposed to be about.
Bitcoin—A peer-to-peer electronic cash system
When Satoshi Nakamoto released his white paper in October 2008, we only had to read the title and abstract to realize what it was: a peer-to-peer electronic cash system designed to facilitate small, casual payments.
In his writings, including his very first public post, Nakamoto talked about how the costs associated with trusted third parties made micropayments infeasible. At no point did he refer to Bitcoin as a store of value, although he did later say it might make sense to get a few in case they appreciated in value.
Back in the early days, Bitcoiners were of a revolutionary bent. While some of these ideas were misguided, the spirit of change was exciting. Finally, it seemed we had an alternative to centrally controlled systems and the abuses of power that go with them. For the first time, we could send cash to each other anywhere on earth with no middlemen dictating terms and taking percentages. The possibilities seemed endless!
Sadly, many of the same people who were so excited about changing the world are now prostrating before Larry Fink, Cathie Wood, and institutions like BlackRock, Fidelity, and other Wall Street titans.
Isn’t this all just a sign that Bitcoin is growing up and taking a seat at the big boy table? That’s one way to look at it. The other is that it has been successfully co-opted and changed from a scalable peer-to-peer cash system that could challenge financial elites into one of their many playthings. And all it took was the promise of bags of the very same fiat currency early Bitcoiners, including its inventor, so vehemently distrusted.
The exciting stuff is happening on the original Bitcoin (BSV)
While many of the original Bitcoiners have sold out and are content for bankers to pump their bags, not everyone took the 30 pieces of silver. Some actually cared about Bitcoin and went to great lengths to save it. Today, the original protocol has been restored and is scaling just as Satoshi Nakamoto said it would.
Currently, Bitcoin SV (BSV) is capable of processing 100,000 transactions per second. With innovations like Teranode in the works, that’s going to be millions of transactions. This is true enterprise-level scaling. Better yet, the fees are, on average, 0.000002 per transaction, making the small casual payments (micropayments) Nakamoto repeatedly mentioned in his first public post realizable.
Most of the original opcodes and Bitcoin’s native script have been brought back, too. This has led to all manner of applications being built on the original Bitcoin. From next-generation cybersecurity tools like Sentinel Node to arcade games in the Haste Arcade, BSV is showing the industry what can be done.
Thanks to the sCrypt smart contracting language pioneered by Xiaohui Liu, the emergence of 1Sat Ordinals, and many other innovations, what we have seen so far is barely scratching the surface. We are rapidly moving toward an on-chain economy. With the skyrocketing prices of tokens like $ORDI on BTC, the market is signaling that this is the next big thing, but it hasn’t yet figured out that it will only be workable at scale on the original Bitcoin.
As the industry matures and BSV tooling and infrastructure finally reach the stage where they’re ready for mass adoption, we’re about to enter the next phase in the evolution of blockchain technology: the era of utility. It’s time for all that potential to finally be realized and the efficiency, transparency, and micropayment-fueled growth to be unlocked.
BTC advocates can clap like seals for BlackRock’s fiat inflows, but over here on Bitcoin, we’ll continue innovating and building the future. BTC ETFs are so boring when compared with how Bitcoin can really change the world!
Watch: Crypto regulation will make life easier for BSV
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