Satoshi Nakamoto created Bitcoin and silently left at the end of the year 2010. It is believed that he had no influence on Bitcoin development and public sentiment after his leaving. Bitcoin maximalism appeared somewhere in 2014 and completely twisted all Satoshi ideas. We think that Satoshi would not agree with Bitcoin maximalists. It is needed to take a step back, have a look at what Satoshi wanted to give us and build on his visions. Maximalism does not help us in the effort to decentralize the world.

Note that the article is not about pro-bitcoin people or investors generally but about Bitcoin maximalism. Authors of the articles are fans of both Cardano and Bitcoin. Take it easy.

Bitcoin maximalism is essentially the idea that it is undesirable to have multiple competing cryptocurrencies. Trying to succeed with another project is a silly and needless attempt since Bitcoin is going to dominate the world and take a monopoly position absorbing all functionalities. Bitcoin maximalists argue that Bitcoin has the biggest network effects and claim that it is futile trying to overcome that.

Some Bitcoin maximalists might admit that Bitcoin has issues with scalability, there are no plans to have smart contracts in the first layer, and some critics do not consider Bitcoin as a properly decentralized cryptocurrency. Pretending not seeing that, they still believe that there will be a point in the future at which the bitcoin network provides everything that investors want to have in digital currency.

Nowadays, maximalists claim that every effort or project that is not related to Bitcoin is a scam. They say it without any attempt to analyze the project, checking GitHub activity, reading a white paper or anything that would give some value to their words. Generalization is a very silly and bad approach and nearly always does not work.

Maximalists' claims are often out of rationality. They are able to tell you following nonsenses:

  • Blockchain is a slow and inefficient database and it cannot be used for anything else than Bitcoin. It must be like that forever and it cannot be improved.
  • PoW is the only working consensus. Nothing better can ever be invented. PoS is bullshit and can never work. No PoS project runs.
  • Bitcoin is not a blockchain.
  • Or the other way round, only Bitcoin is a blockchain.
  • Bitcoin is not a technology.
  • 21M coins and Bitcoin’s inflation model based on halving planned for every 4 years is the best monetary system ever.
  • Satoshi left the project what is the best approach and every project with pre-mined coins must be a scam. A team does not need a leader.
  • Smart contracts are nonsense because of all ICO’s are scam.
  • Bitcoin can absorb every technology and will be able to do everything in the world.
  • Everybody will use Bitcoin one day. It is the new money of the universe. It is better than gold.
  • Bitcoin is the most decentralized project. It does not matter that there are pools and big mining farms.
  • Security is the top property. Decentralization and even scalability are not so important. Bitcoin scales just well and Lightning Network solves everything.