Back when I was about 12 years old, my Grandfather gave us our first computer for Christmas. I was totally excited about it. I could start it up, play some games, and even connect it the phone line and make it act like an answering machine. It was great.
As time went by, I figured out how to use the phone line to connect to a friend’s computer and send files back and forth. And after that I learned how to connect to a BBS and download shareware and games. The funny thing about this though, is that I was the only one in my house who was playing with it in this manner. Everyone else used it occasionally to type a letter or a school paper, but doing the cool stuff wasn’t easy or glamorous to do.
Eventually AOL came out and others started using it more frequently to look things up online, send an email, or join a chat session. It was still a pain at that point since you needed to hog the phone line to use it. Speeds increased and email became more popular, leading to even more every day use.
Today, my family members probably are connected to the internet more than they could even fathom back then. Checking email, browsing websites, and shopping are an every day thing.
What reminded me of this time is how Bitcoin is being used today. Only super techno-geeks are really into it, and the mainstream people haven’t found a use for it in their every day lives. Many people are just confused about how it could possibly take off and be accepted in mainstream. I don’t have that problem though, since I remember playing with computers before they were easy.
There are a lot of people saying Bitcoin is like the internet in 1995 and I guess I’m one of them. It’s a new technology that has some serious promise to change the every day lives of almost everyone, but they are blind to that fact. Many of them even think it’s a silly idea.
While I can’t say for certain that Bitcoin will be around in 10 years, I can say that there will be some sort of digital currency and that it will be used in ways we can’t even imagine.