Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain: Bitcoin, Blockchain, Ethereum & Smart Contracts

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The controversies of recent months, such as the use of the Tether token by Bitfinex and recent moves by the financial regulators to enforce greater scrutiny of exchanges are not included. There are an estimated 18,000 cryptocurrencies in existence and while there were not nearly as many when this book was published. However, the final few months of the year produced large rises, and larger volatility, in Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.

But for all the strangeness of his subject matter, Gerard remains resolutely committed to the common sense aesthetic, and it’s one the world of blockchain sorely needs. I’ve seen a quote to the effect that crypto-currencies in general seem to be trying to recreate every scam, con, and mistake ever encountered in any financial system in recorded history.But in that light, the extensive source list in this book is probably going to be valuable if you've never heard of the funny stuff and want to go digging further. It so happens that early adopters (and the mysterious inventor of Bitcoin) were motivated by a desire to make a payment network which would operate outside of public institutions’ jurisdiction.

Gerard's writing is clear and he has a way of cutting through jargon and PR-speak that I found refreshing. The problems that cryptocurrencies (such as Bitcoin and Litecoin) have had with criminality, fraud, lack of security, volatility, and more recently with capacity. While there are probably many more books to be written about the history, technology, and culture behind this stuff, Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain is an excellent primer on the foolishness surrounding Bitcoin, and a bracing reminder of just what a bad idea the whole thing was in the first place. The primary holders of bitcoin fundamentally do not deserve vast piles of real wealth, and it will not flow to them.Its discussions of business blockchain failures (especially in the music business), The DAO clusterfuck, Craig S Wright, and Vitalik Buterin's past as a quantum computing scammer managed to be both informative deep dives and quite funny. They probably aspire to be robots – robots that don’t need to eat or sleep or do anything except refresh market depth charts twenty four hours a day.