Originally published on CoinSpice on April 11, 2019.
TL;DR: CoinText co-founder Vin Armani returns to the CoinSpice Podcast to flesh out his ideas regarding projects such as BlockUpload. He’s challenging the Bitcoin Cash (BCH) community to stay focused on peer-to-peer digital cash in light of limited resources and the race for greater adoption. Peter Ryan, executive producer for the documentary Riqzi Presents: Blockchain, is a repeat guest as well, challenging Armani to better understand distinctions and nuances of the argument. It’s an urgent and vital discussion. This episode is available embedded in the article below, and on YouTube, iTunes, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Radio Public, Breaker, PocketCasts, PodBean, and Overcast.
Vin Armani’s BCH Destination Challenge
Dear Listener, why are you here? What about crypto attracts you? Is it digital cash, permissionless, censorship resistant, and available to all … that animates you? How about the speculation aspects, technical analysis and trading talk? Blockchain immutability is a thing, and for sure mainstream media and corporate finance are hog wild for the idea, … are you?
There simply isn’t a wrong answer. In fact, there’s even more to love and learn about cryptocurrency. For the BCH community, it’s almost an embarrassment of riches really: price is doing relatively well, an active developer community is rocking, and businesses using the coin are popping up all the time.
So what’s the problem? For Armani, it’s about focus, emphasis. With regard to BlockUpload, a file storage service on the BCH chain, he notes, “No one can prevent a dev from developing something like this, but this application should be discouraged. Those who want to see BCH succeed should not promote this use case.” Citing “incredibly limited intellectual resources,” he finds file storage and projects like it to be distractions “away from peer to peer electronic cash [that] are serious threats. Mission/feature creep kills projects that might otherwise have succeeded.”
What’s more, merchant adoption, making digital cash smooth and easy to use for the world is hard enough. It’s more than enough of a challenge already. Others argue projects like file sharing or tokens or video uploading services are ways “in” for some, and eventually they’ll find peer-to-peer cash in process. Armani isn’t convinced, and he explains why in this compelling episode.