This is not all due to COPA's 'skill' in the high courts. Nevertheless, COPA is clearly winning the reputation battle, they know it and they know exactly what they're doing. And they're acting far more skilfully than Bitcoin. By having an approach focused on results. Winning.
Caveats before proceeding:
- When I say "Bitcoin" with a capital B, I mean the blockchain running the original blockchain protocol designed from the root for peer to peer ecash exchanges at ultra high scale. Not to defeat the banks, but as an innovation good for everyone, to raise the general productive power. It works fully but has never had widespread adoption so is seen as useless.
- When I say "bitcoin" with a small b, or COPA, I mean all other forks of that blockchain, but mostly Bitcoin Core(BTC) the one which the great masse of stupid people think is Bitcoin largely because its 'number go up'. It has never worked, especially at scale, except as an unregistered financial security, so is technically illegal. All it can do is act like a poor form of gold. Or an instrument of gambling which to be fair is identical to most other securities in the financial world.
Reputation is everything. There are two overwhelming reasons why Bitcoin has not been adopted wholesale as has its forked cousin Bitcoin Core(BTC). The first is because business and people make a final decision to adopt, based on reputation. Particularly when the transaction is financial. That is to say, once all due diligence is complete, reputation is the final activity before signing. And Bitcoins reputation is about as low as it can get here. Many supporters recognise this but have no power to influence those who control Bitcoin. COPA is well aware of this too and again utilises this knowledge well for it's beneficiaries.
The other reason is that Bitcoin contains no 'embedded rent' by design, (though the designer does not fully understand the consequences of this for ideological reasons, it is nonetheless a good reason). And COPA's Bitcoin Core is ALL economic rent as an unregistered financial security. I'll discuss this elsewhere for brevity as it's a hugely misunderstood topic in it's own right. To cut it short, Bitcoin is not a thing that is good for gambling. And BTC is. So most of the world has adopted COPA's BTC. Hello!. This might sound unfair. We are where we are and this is the world red in tooth and claw.
Allow me to make myself abundantly clear. I am pro Bitcoin. I believe Dr. Wright is it's inventor. And I want to see Bitcoin adopted wholesale as soon as is possible. And Bitcoins dreadful reputation is largely unjustified. Yet for some reason Bitcoin enjoys owning it. From my investigations, this owning appears to be ideological. The inventor is happy to say he is hard core Randian. The VC is often observed speaking in planet saving tones. Much of it's core of support and development is classical libertarian and planet saving too. Any institution driven ideologically like this will never make way compared to a more authentic outlook. Religion does not work on the earth, it only works in heaven. And Bitcoin only acts on the earth.
Bitcoin is making strategic mistakes but seems to be unaware of itself doing it. These are objectively observed facts of the collective psyche. Well understood analytical depth psychology theory.
Bitcoin has a dreadful reputation for several well understood reasons. But Bitcoin strategy still proceeds with actions that fail to rejuvenate reputation. And it does not seem to realise this. COPA recognises this all too well and plays on it with great skill I'm afraid to say. The latest action is a petition to bring the judiciary deciding on Bitcoins fate, under scrutiny for bias in high court cases.That can hardly be the act of rational material world wisdom. Even if the bias is true, a successful action to prove this just damages reputation of blockchain tech in general further still. And when you're losing badly, the current leader in a general reputation problem can hold out far longer than you. COPA wins again and didn't have to do anything or spend any money.
Bitcoins poor reputation is also largely self induced. Due to the network of outreach and possibly leadership within the Bitcoin institution itself. Which has a tendency to mob and censor any supporters who do not tow the party line with precision (curiously in the exact same way they complain about of COPA, except COPA are better at it). Thus sending any new ideas, some of which might deliver results, to the deep. These internal characters holding tiny power are well known to Bitcoins support base as a nuisance. For some reason they're allowed to proceed. I'm pretty sure this is also an unconsciously ideological decision too.
It's not at all clear who decides on strategy if anyone. It might simply require better hierarchy. It might be one or more of several players: The well known inventor of Bitcoin, the VC company which is thought to fund it, or it's NGO like supporting institution. I do not know and it might be someone else I have no evidence for it. Even if I did it would be inappropriate to say anyway. Yet COPA has an excellent strategy driven by well honed corporate leadership in Big Tech and the payments industry, who obviously have very serious business reasons to see that Bitcoin never hits the road. They are performing 'excellently' here, apparently without much trying compared to Bitcoins efforts. That COPA might be anti competitive, AKA rent seeking, merely reinforces the key drivers for adoption already stated clearly above.
There's also a more honourable and earnest Bitcoin faction which is trying it's best. But has a tendency to get embroiled in frivolous actions like those mentioned above, that though on the face of it appear justified, are in danger of harming Bitcoins reputation yet further even if the actions are a success. What will the net effect of these actions be - will it be more or less likely to see Bitcoins reputation restored or it's hastened adoption? Shouldn't these be the primary considerations for Bitcoins support base, because currently they do not seem to be.
Reputation is everything. The overwhelming reason Bitcoin has not been adopted wholesale, as has been the case with its forked and passed off cousin BTC, is because businesses and people make a final decision to adopt, based on reputation. I'm wondering when Bitcoin, as a group of excellent developers, managers and entrepreneurs will wake up and recognise their losing approach. Life is about 'winning'. Whatever a planet saver might spout palliatively.
And for several years I've watched many excellent people ask the same sort of questions. Be disappointed with the responses. Only to see them depart forever, from a space with enormous opportunity, once, the time and place is right for it. And that is not now evidently.
Its my forecast that the only hope remaining for Bitcoin will come from the 'heavens'. That there's something like a global financial crisis(mortgages really) - which there *will* be within a couple of years, and the original Bitcoin technology by chance fits right in, for Power, and with the power, to mitigate all these years of failure.
The irony would be that as always, every labour saving device which has ever been adopted fully, only ever adds to windfall gains in real estate, through the vehicle of economic rent. I've tried to put this to Dr Wright but he dismisses it our of hand because he reads 5 books a day and has a plethora of qualifications leading his though outside of his control. We can see this happening already with the advent of AI which is merely another labour saving device.
Does Bitcoin care more about fake planet saving and fake justice, than winning? If winning and results are the goal, then Bitcoin needs to be ready to act at very short notice when called upon to help remedy a systemic global crisis. Teranode is superb blockchain scaling tech for transaction processing at ultra high scale on Layer1 and works already unlike all the forks which can only talk about it. But it requires the engineering of Big Tech to make it ready for prime time, again another irony given it will destroy their current business model overnight if adopted.
Maybe they will finally support it rather than bury it. Actually this is the most likely outcome. But Big Tech have monopolised the Internet for too long and could have done so much better - all we have is a 50/50 chance of getting into orbit and EV's which most people cannot afford. Plus much much more wealth being produced. Not bad, but it could have been so much better and that should be the target, which monopoly power always cripples of course.
Just make sure it's ready for prime time more than it can scale. Ideally be ready with both. But BE READY! And nurture this new found reputation with wisdom, not books, qualifications and sentimentality.