Over the years, Bitcoin has gained a reputation for having a “toxic” community of users around it. This accusation is mostly thrown at Bitcoin by proponents of altcoins and those who have supported various Bitcoin hard fork[1] attempts in the past.
Of course, this is an oversimplification of the Bitcoin community. Crypto Twitter, which is the main hub of online cryptocurrency conversations these days, does not make up anywhere near the entire Bitcoin user base. When people talk about the Bitcoin community being toxic, they’re mostly complaining that some Bitcoin users were mean to them on the internet.
Having said that, there is a logical reason that some Bitcoin users get extremely angry at certain members of the greater crypto asset community.
What’s With the Hostility, Man?
Bitcoin is defined by a set of protocol rules[2]. It is these rules, which are effectively set in stone (see: Satoshi[3]), that provide the underlying value proposition of Bitcoin. Bitcoin’s most important feature is not necessarily its specific monetary policy (the 21 million cap) or any of the other specific rules. Instead, the fact that the rules are extremely difficult to change is the key selling point (I’ve written a longer explanation of this here[4]).
Of course, people could decide to abandon Bitcoin and go use something else (an altcoin or some forked version of Bitcoin), but that would necessitate the creation of a new network.
With this in mind, it should become clear why attempts to change the rules of Bitcoin through social attacks are met with disgust. Attempting to use social clout or “thought leadership” in an effort to push users over to a new network with different rules undermines the underlying value proposition of this technology.
While
