Where the panel landed
The panel rejected Mike Hearn's declaration that the Bitcoin experiment had failed, while conceding that some of his scaling criticisms touched real issues. Blake Anderson argued that Hearn's framing was destructive and exaggerated, especially because work such as segregated witness was already underway. Tone Vays was the sharpest critic, saying Hearn never understood Bitcoin's core value as censorship-resistant, irreversible, fungible money and had always treated it too much like a payment network. Theo Goodman walked through Hearn's claims more carefully, finding some technical questions worth discussing but objecting to the article's framing, rhetoric, and presentation as final judgment.
What they were watching
The price story was grim and immediate: Hearn's article was said to have helped knock Bitcoin down roughly 10%, with Thomas noting live during the show that Bitcoin had fallen to about $365. Tone predicted a move toward $315 in the near future, while the panel connected price confidence to whether segregated witness gained credibility in early 2016. Directionally, the panel saw the selloff as another panic around governance and scaling rather than a terminal failure of Bitcoin itself.
The Resolution Of The Bitcoin Experiment
The panel discussed Mike Hearn's article claiming Bitcoin had failed after years of scaling disagreement. Blake said the article mixed real criticisms with theatrical hyperbole, while Tone blamed Hearn for worsening the scaling conflict through XT, blacklisting ideas, and a misunderstanding of Bitcoin's fundamental purpose.
Payment Network Or Censorship Resistance
Tone argued that Bitcoin's most important features are not speed or transaction count, but fungibility, irreversibility, and resistance to censorship. Theo similarly questioned Hearn's framing of Bitcoin primarily as a payment network and emphasized that people who truly need Bitcoin will tolerate higher fees if the system remains reliable and uncensorable.
Segregated Witness As Stopgap
The panel explained segregated witness as a way to separate signature data from other transaction data and increase effective capacity without an immediate hard fork. Blake called it a kind of unzippering of the blockchain, while Theo liked the idea because it reduced the risk of a contentious hard fork.
Soft Forks, Hard Forks, And Risk
The scaling discussion turned into a comparison between soft forks and hard forks. Blake explained that soft forks preserve more compatibility, while Tone used his old iPad as a plain example of what happens when upgrades strand older systems.
RoboCoin Leaves Bitcoin
The panel discussed RoboCoin ending Bitcoin services after earlier ambitions around Bitcoin ATMs and remittance. Theo pointed listeners toward CoinOutlet instead, Blake criticized companies that entered Bitcoin expecting quick riches, and Tone argued that Bitcoin remittance businesses often add needless fiat conversion layers.
Remittance Plus Bitcoin
Tone said the purpose of Bitcoin is to make the word remittance unnecessary, not to create another remittance middleman. The panel agreed that Bitcoin payments work best when both sides understand and use Bitcoin directly, rather than routing through old fiat rails at both ends.
Netflix Considers Bitcoin
The panel discussed Netflix being open to Bitcoin payments as it expanded globally. Blake said every company should accept Bitcoin, while Tone was most interested in new functionality such as paying per episode, per movie, or per short viewing rather than merely adding Bitcoin to the existing subscription model.
Cryptsy Becomes The Warning
Late in the show, the panel shifted to Cryptsy after its blog post claimed major losses from a Lucky7Coin Trojan. Thomas compared Cryptsy continuing operations after the loss to Mt. Gox-style insolvency behavior, while Theo traced a pattern of altcoin exchanges, fee shares, forks, and eventual collapse.
We had a good run everybody.— Blake Anderson
Mike, her doesn't understand Bitcoin— Tone Vays
medium is tumblr for people that think they're at a TEDx conference.— Theo Goodman
The Bitcoin group has failed.— Blake Anderson
The whole purpose of Bitcoin is to eliminate the word remittance out of the dictionary.— Tone Vays
Bitcoin still works even while the price is going down.— Thomas Hunt
Story of the Week
Hearn Declares Failure, Bitcoin Keeps Arguing
Mike Hearn's exit article dominated because it gave mainstream media a clean obituary headline and gave Bitcoiners another internal war to fight. The panel treated the piece as bad form: a former contributor leaving loudly, airing dirty laundry, and declaring the experiment resolved because his preferred vision had not won. Tone argued that Hearn's model of Bitcoin as a fast, reversible, compliant payment system missed the point of why Bitcoin had value at all. Blake and Theo both saw the real task as separating valid scaling concerns from theatrical resignation and returning to engineering work already happening in the open.
We had a good run everybody.— Blake Anderson