Adam Back
cypherpunk, cryptographer, privacy/ecash, inventor hashcash (used in Bitcoin mining) PhD Comp Sci https://t.co/L69Em1yrDX Co-Founder/CEO https://t.co/oZ3YfQylms
Book Recommendations:
Recommended by Adam Back
“@OpinionMachine2 @americanhodl8 @Blockstream fairly close yes, few minor niggles to my perspective but bear in mind that different people with the view that layers and moderate block size was smarter, had different ideas, motivations etc. the book is great and i think he made a real effort to explain the history neutrally.” (from X)
This book covers Bitcoin’s blocksize war, which was waged from August 2015 to November 2017. On the surface the battle was about the amount of data allowed in each Bitcoin block, however it exposed much deeper issues, such as who controls Bitcoin’s protocol rules. It is not possible to cover every twist and turn in the labyrinthine conflict or all the arguments, but I have provided a chronology of the most significant events. This book explores some of the major characters in the conflict and includes coverage, from both the front lines and behind the scenes, during some of the most acute phases of the struggle. The account in this book includes discussions with the key players from both sides during the war, exploring their motivations, strategy and thought processes as the exhausting campaign progressed and developed.
Recommended by Adam Back
“@WClementeIII Because it's the best hard money ever invented, and it's virally addictive, like the snow crash mind-virus in the Neal Stephenson book of same name, everyone who goes down the rabbit hole makes it their mission to accumulate more, and can talk about nothing else.” (from X)
by Neal Stephenson·You?
by Neal Stephenson·You?
The “brilliantly realized” (The New York Times Book Review) breakthrough novel from visionary author Neal Stephenson, a modern classic that predicted the metaverse and inspired generations of Silicon Valley innovators Hiro lives in a Los Angeles where franchises line the freeway as far as the eye can see. The only relief from the sea of logos is within the autonomous city-states, where law-abiding citizens don’t dare leave their mansions. Hiro delivers pizza to the mansions for a living, defending his pies from marauders when necessary with a matched set of samurai swords. His home is a shared 20 X 30 U-Stor-It. He spends most of his time goggled in to the Metaverse, where his avatar is legendary. But in the club known as The Black Sun, his fellow hackers are being felled by a weird new drug called Snow Crash that reduces them to nothing more than a jittering cloud of bad digital karma (and IRL, a vegetative state). Investigating the Infocalypse leads Hiro all the way back to the beginning of language itself, with roots in an ancient Sumerian priesthood. He’ll be joined by Y.T., a fearless teenaged skateboard courier. Together, they must race to stop a shadowy virtual villain hell-bent on world domination.