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Unchained

Why Bitcoin Now: David Chaum and Adam Back Reflect on the Crypto Wars - Ep.186

Unchained

Laura Shin

News, Tech News, Business News

4.61.3K Ratings

🗓️ 18 August 2020

⏱️ 83 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

David Chaum, the inventor of eCash and CEO of xx network, and Adam Back, the inventor of Hashcash and the cofounder and CEO of Blockstream, discuss their involvement in digital currency well before Bitcoin existed. In this episode, they discuss: how they each became enamored with the idea of digital currency years before such an idea was widely discussed the crypto wars of the 1990s and the U.S. government’s attempts to control access to advanced cryptography Digicash, the creation of eCash, and the difficulties of implementing the system with the technology available at the time the innovation of blind signatures used in eCash what caused the demise of Digicash, and David's role in that the development of Hashcash and the problems Adam was trying to solve by creating it their initial reactions to learning about Bitcoin for the first time how they think Bitcoin might improve in the future the stock-to-flow Model, and where they believe the Bitcoin price might go next why the Hashcash proof-of-work mechanism became so widely used    Thank you to our sponsor!  Crypto.com: https://crypto.com/   Episode links:  Adam Back: https://twitter.com/adam3us Blockstream: https://blockstream.com  Adam's website: http://www.cypherspace.org   David Chaum: https://twitter.com/chaumdotcom Elixxir: https://elixxir.io  XX Network: https://xx.network   Previous Unchained episode on the history of digital currency: https://unchainedpodcast.com/why-bitcoin-now-the-history-of-digital-currency/   Wired article on “e-money”: https://www.wired.com/1994/12/emoney/     Translated Dutch article on why DigiCash failed:  https://cryptome.org/jya/digicrash.htm   Aaron Van Wirdum's Bitcoin Magazine series on the history of digital currency:  https://www.whatbitcoindid.com/podcast/the-beginners-guide-to-bitcoin-part-3-bitcoins-pre-history-and-the-cypherpunks-with-aaron-van-wirdum    David Chaum's e-Cash: https://bitcoinmagazine.com/articles/genesis-files-how-david-chaums-ecash-spawned-cypherpunk-dream Hashcash: https://bitcoinmagazine.com/articles/genesis-files-hashcash-or-how-adam-back-designed-bitcoins-motor-block Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

Unchained is about a lot more than just podcasts.

0:03.0

On our website unchained crypto.com,

0:06.0

you can also find crypto news, web three tutorials,

0:09.0

and original videos.

0:10.0

Check it all out at unchained crypto.com.

0:13.0

Hi everyone.

0:15.0

Welcome to Unchained, your no-hype resource for all things crypto.

0:20.0

I'm your host Laura Shin, a journalist with over two decades of experience. I started

0:26.0

covering crypto five years ago and as a senior editor at Forbes was the first mainstream media

0:30.6

reporter to cover cryptocurrency full-time.

0:33.0

Subscribe to Unchained on YouTube or you can watch the videos of me and my guests.

0:38.0

Go to YouTube.com slash-C-Chained podcast and subscribe today.

0:43.0

Crippo.com is waiving the 3.5% credit card fee for all

0:47.1

crypto purchases until the end of September. Download the crypto.com app today.

0:52.0

This is the fourth installment in the Download the crypto.com app today.

0:56.5

This is the fourth installment in the Y Bitcoin Now series, which takes a closer look at Bitcoin in the context of larger macroeconomic forces,

1:01.0

such as the pandemic and geopolitical moves happening in crypto.

1:05.2

My guest for today are Adam Back, the inventor of Hash Cash and the co-founder and CEO of Blockstream,

1:10.9

and David Schomm, the inventor of eKash and the co-founder and CEO of

1:14.7

Elixir. Welcome Adam and David. It's great to be here or nice to see you. Yeah,

1:20.6

likewise, it gets to be here. So just a quick note before we begin, I've been a little bit under the weather.

1:26.0

I've managed to, um, to gather the fortitude to do this episode. Hopefully it will all turn out fine, but I just wanted people to know that's what was happening while I was trying to prepare for this.

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