After a very busy night that saw John McAfee and Pierce Brock, main speakers of this Blockchain Cruise, as DJs until 2 am (photo and video below), today we move on to the real deal, with many interesting conferences throughout the day.
The organizer of the cruise and CEO of CoinsBank, Andrew Vi, takes the floor to start off the day.
“This is the third cruise and every time it gets bigger, with more guests and speakers. Each time, at the end of the cruise, we receive thousands of feedbacks. The cruise is made of real characters and it is this connection between people that is most important to us“.
The first keynote was that of Bobby Lee, co-founder of BTCC and board member of the Bitcoin Foundation, with a speech that started punctually at 9.30 am, regardless of the fact that the room was decimated by the white sensational party last night.
The theme was “Bitcoin is the Freedom of Money” and the moderator was Bruce Porter, CEO and chairman of GlobalBoost,who has nicely invited those present to do some stretching before starting the conference as if we were preparing for tomorrow’s possible clash between Roger Ver and Jimmy Song on the Bitcoin Cash theme.
“Property is identity, but in the future, the real property will be information. Governments have control. Identity gives the government power because everything is nominative and the government can blacklist you and control you, prevent you from taking a train or plane. They have control over all of your bank accounts and over your mileage points, they can control how you use them or whether you transfer them to someone. The control is exercised on physical money as well because you withdraw it from an ATM and as happened in Cyprus in 2013, they can prevent you from withdrawing it“.
In short, as more and more is affirmed especially in the crypto environment that was born as an expression of the anarchist and cyberpunk movement, the government and the banks are the enemies to fight and the weapons are bitcoin and all the decentralized cryptocurrencies.
“The future is in digital assets, we are in the age of the Internet and e-commerce. I’ve been in the bitcoin business since 2011, we don’t have to trust institutions, only mathematics. Modern cryptography is based only on mathematics, which is immutable. The private key is our priesthood and you will have ownership of those bitcoins forever. Freedom of money is freedom of speech: it is your freedom to send and receive money. There’s real freedom of money with bitcoin. With cash, however, the value is controlled by governments and third parties”.
Bitcoin not only gives you the freedom to spend what and when you want but it is also freedom of speech and movement.
“Since bitcoin is money in the cloud, I can move as many bitcoins as I want. It’s not subject to rules like cash. In addition, Bitcoin is your vote for the freedom of money. That’s why I have bitcoin. Bitcoin is the ultimate freedom.”
Bitcoin is definitely the solution to these problems, but it certainly has some challenges to overcome.
“There are too many controls on ICOs, like KYC and all AML procedures, there are limits on exchange transfers, which are getting tighter. There’s FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt) and banks are banning transfers. Yesterday I was at the airport in San Francisco to go to NYC and then to Barcelona to get on the cruise and I wanted to withdraw some cash. I went to an ATM and could only withdraw 800 euros because my bank didn’t want to give me 1000 euros. 3 months ago I played poker in Las Vegas, I wanted to withdraw 20k euros and they didn’t allow me, they called the manager of the bank because it seemed unthinkable … The point is that even if the money is yours, they have the power and can decide for you”.
Finally, Bobby Lee makes his prediction on the price of bitcoin:
“The more they restrict our freedom, the more people will switch to bitcoin and the price of BTC will increase. That’s what I’m thinking”.
