Cryptocurrency: The World Needs What We Are Building

[grarpamp]

“Hello friends,

MtGox is gone. So let's prepare ourselves.

On Tuesday, and for the rest of the week, all hell will break lose in
the media. It will be blamed on MtGox, it will be blamed on Bitcoin,
it will be blamed on the "bug," and it will, more than anything, be
blamed on the "lack of regulation." Pundits and "experts" of all types
will weigh in on the calamity. It will be world news in a matter of
hours.

Get ready, because it will be an ugly week.

For all of you who lost money, my heart goes out to you. Some people
lost a little, some lost a fortune. It will make people sick, and
depressed, and full of grief. Personally, I had over 550 BTC in Gox. I
will never get any of that back. If misery loves company, then we'll
be enjoying a grand feast today.

I should have known better, of course. I take responsibility for
leaving those funds with an entity that had proven incompetence
repeatedly. I chose to ignore even my own warnings, for nothing more
than the sake of convenience.

Gox is still at fault, to be sure, but I have learned the lesson. I
hope it is not such an expensive lesson for others. And for all you
observers, please take a moment to consider it as well.

Be mindful, however, that the wrong lessons are not learned, for that
would be the true tragedy, indeed.

Let me suggest that the lesson is not that Bitcoin is broken. Bitcoin is fine.

Similarly, the lesson is not that security is impossible. Those who
know what they are doing, can achieve it and help others to do so.

The lesson is not that nobody can be trusted. There are countless good
men and women in this community who are worthy of trust, and some of
the very best people I've ever met.

And finally, the lesson is not that we ought to seek out "regulation"
to save us from the evils and incompetence of man. For the regulators
are men too, and wield the very same evil and incompetence, only
enshrined in an authority from which it can wreck amplified and far
more insidious destruction. Let us not retreat from our rising
platform only to cower back underneath the deranged machinations of
Leviathan.

The proper lesson, if I may suggest, is this: We are building a new
financial order, and those of us building it, investing in it, and
growing it, will pay the price of bringing it to the world. This is
the harsh truth. We are building the channels, the bridges, and the
towers of tomorrow's finance, and we put ourselves at risk in doing
so.

We are at risk from accidents. We are at risk from fraud, from
corruption, and from evil. We are at risk from journalists seeking
headlines and from politicians seeking power and glory. We are at risk
from the very market we are trying to build - a market which cares not
about our portfolio, our ambitions, or our delicate sympathies.

For all these risks, devastation will befall us repeatedly. Some of us
will be discouraged. Some will be ridiculed and insulted. Some will be
tricked, or swindled. Some of us will be crushed or caged. We will be
set upon by all manner of antagonists, repeatedly, for a long time.

So why do we do it? Why do we build these towers that fall down upon
us? Why do we toil and strain and risk our precious time, which is the
only real wealth we possess?

Because the world needs what we're building. It needs it desperately.
If that matters to you, as it does to me, then hold to that thought.
You will see through the smoke, and your wounds will heal.

So shake it off, brothers, for this won't be the last calamity endured
before the win.

Tonight, my heart is with you all.

Tomorrow, my head is down. My eyes are open. And I am building.

Toward peace and freedom,

-Erik Voorhees”