Money. Money is one of the most commonplace things in our current society. Money is something we are all very used to. Not only as an object or tool, but also as a concept. It affects our lives in a multitude of ways. It has the potential to greatly affect work opportunities, personal relationships, nation-states, politics, and military conflicts, among others. Throughout history our view of money has not always been the same. Money, ultimately, was a human invention. A product of a growing civilization where value had to be representative and all trade could no longer be dependent on barter. Fastforward to today, with the advent of Bitcoin and more widely accepted cryptocurrency, our entire view of money may be in store for a change. We have all grown accustomed to assigning immense sums of value to simple slips of paper. We fail to recognize the fragility of our current model and what could happen if it were to fail on a large scale. What does a world look like with our current system, with an alternate, or with none at all? This will be an unexpected view to one of the world's most commonplace ideas.
Since the dawn of man, humans have been exchanging with each other for goods and services. For a very long time this was limited to barter: one person trading with another for the thing they needed and giving up something the other person needed. Around 1,200 B.C. we first see the recorded use of Cowrie Shells in China, as a form of currency. A cowrie is the shell of a mollusc that was widely available in the shallow waters of the Pacific/Indian Oceans. Throughout history a multitude of different societies had used cowries as money, and even as recent as the mid-20th century, cowries have been seen used for monetary value in some parts of the African continent. Around 1,000 B.C. we see the first metal coinage. Bronze/Copper cowrie imitations were manufactured by the Chinese near the end of the Stone Age and could be considered some of the earliest forms of metal coins. Metal tool money, such as knife and spade monies, was also first used in China. These early metal monies developed into primitive versions of round coins. Chinese coins were made out of base metals, often containing holes so they could be put together like a chain.
In 2008-9 the world economy came to the brink of destruction. This was the time when the American housing market ultimately succumbed to its poor practices and utter shortcomings.
As of November 22, 2017, (1:33:25 GMT) the value of single bitcoin is 8,241 USD. Cryptocurrency, while still unknown to many people is gaining a lot of ground fast. It seems that with every successive day the value of bitcoin, the most popular cryptocurrency, increases. Cryptocurrency represents a very radical shift in how we view money. Historically money has been completely controlled by governments. From its production, to its distribution, to its regulation, to its protection, to its legitimacy, and even to its value, money has always been a tool of national governments. The validity of any money has been dependent on the public's trust and belief in that national government. If a particular government holds no trust in its people, then their money is nothing greater than colorful paper. We’ve seen in the case of the Zimbabwe, when a government is undergoing political or economic strife and over produces its currency, that the resultant hyper-inflation will lead to a complete collapse of that money’s worth. Not surprisingly, shortly after this country introduced it’s new 100,000,000,000 dollar note in July 2008 "Zimbabwe introduces 100-billion-dollar note". Agence France-Presse. 19 July 2008, the Zimbabwean Dollar was suspended indefinitely on April 12th, 2009. "Zimbabwe Suspends Use of Own Currency". VOA News. 12 April 2009.
Bitcoin though, has no central authority. It has no one to stifle its production and affect inflation. 21 million bitcoin. That is how much btc will ever exist in the world. Its structure and every single individual balance is maintained on what's called the blockchain.