This story is for you if you are a bit confused about crypto and don’t understand what all the fuss is about, and if you feel that crypto is just a bunch of rich white dudes humble bragging on Twitter. This post is for you if you like to dig into things and learn the why and how things are the way they are.

Once upon a time, in America, three white dudes were scared.

Timothy C. May was at home when he heard a noise. He ran to his living room closet. He opened the closet door and took out a big gun. He ran to the front door, gun in hand, and slid against the wall, holding the gun close to his chest. His eyes are big and aware, as he slowly opens the door. He looks down and sees a squirrel, chewing on an acorn. Phew. Not an intruder. But, oh well, why not, he thinks to himself, I may as well shoot the squirrel.

Bang.

Meh, why not, he thinks to himself, I may as well shoot the squirrel again.

Bang.

It was the late 1980s in America, the Reagan years, a time of proud political and social conservatism. It was also the super early years of personal computing. Intel, IBM, and Apple were fiercely competing to put PCs into every American home.

While most people were passively observing the technology space, and some early adopters were eagerly awaiting for their PC to arrive so they could unravel it and play Microsoft Adventure or use a word processing application, Timothy C. May was busy geeking out about cryptography with friends Hal Finney and Nick Szabo on the Cypherpunks Electronic Mailing List.

May founded the crypto-anarchist movement and along with Finney and Szabo, they also became the earliest bitcoin pioneers. Finney was the first person to receive a bitcoin transaction from Satoshi and Nick Szabo was even thought to be Satoshi. Szabo is also the inventor of the smart contract.

This trio: May, Finney, and Szabo, is quite controversial.

May’s obituary in the New York Times describes him as “cantankerous.” If you don’t know what that means, no worries, I didn’t know either, so I looked it up. It means bad-tempered, argumentative, and not cooperative. In other words, a curmudgeon. If May were alive today, he would probably be proudly starting Twitter fights. He seems to have been too smart to make straw man arguments, but definitely too full of himself to make star man arguments.

His obituary continues to say:

“Mr. May kept a careful distance from the real world, leading a reclusive life. He often wrote about arming himself and waiting for government agents to show up. After the Cypherpunks faded in the early 2000s, he began expressing racist sentiments to other online groups.”

May and Finney have both passed away, but Szabo is still alive. You can look up Szabo on Twitter, if you’re so inclined, just be prepared for some extreme views.

In 1988, Timothy C. May wrote in the Crypto-Anarchist Manifesto:

“Computer technology is on the verge of providing the ability for individuals and groups to communicate and interact with each other in a totally anonymous manner. Two persons may exchange messages, conduct business, and negotiate electronic contracts without ever knowing the True Name, or legal identity, of the other. Interactions over networks will be untraceable, via extensive re-routing of encrypted packets and tamper-proof boxes which implement cryptographic protocols with nearly perfect assurance against any tampering. Reputations will be of central importance, far more important in dealings than even the credit ratings of today. These developments will alter completely the nature of government regulation, the ability to tax and control economic interactions, the ability to keep information secret, and will even alter the nature of trust and reputation.”

According to Wikipedia, there are two definitions of anarchy. The first is the mainstream definition, one that is synonymous to chaos, social destruction, and an abolition of government. This view stems from the French Revolution, and seems to be what the May trio envisioned. The second definition, however, describes anarchy as a system that replaces government with voluntary institutions, and a system without set hierarchies.

This second definition is much more interesting to me.

What I am seeing in the Ethereum space is the active building of voluntary institutions, or DAOs. DAOs are communities of like-minded, good-hearted, people who work on projects together and also have fun. DAOs don’t have a hierarchy, meaning no one person or group of people has all the power, and decision making happens through group voting and consensus.

The future of crypto, specifically the future of Ethereum, should not be shackled by the libertarian views of Bitcoin. We can build a better, more inclusive, and diverse system with Ethereum. We are currently building this system, but we are still very early and we need help.

We need more diverse voices. We need women. We need minorities. We need people with new and different ideas from all professional and personal walks of life. We need to be challenged and we need healthy debate.

If you are interested in participating in building the future, please reach out. We need you.