Bitcoin 2022 is the culture’s biggest event. Here are the conference’s Top 5 best panels

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In late March, bitcoiners from all over the world converged on Miami. For the second year in a row, Mayor Francis Suarez welcomed the hordes with a speech about bitcoin’s world domination. This time, he unveiled the “Miami Bull,” an updated and cybernetic version of Wall Street’s “Charging Bull.” The symbolism wasn’t lost on the attendants.

The 2021 conference ended on a high note with the announcement that El Salvador was going to make bitcoin legal tender. Could Bitcoin 2022 top that somehow? That was the question in everyone’s mind. The expectations were high, maybe too high. And you know what that means. A high potential for disappointment.

On what the conference organizers called “General Admission, Day 1,” Samson Mow, who recently left Blockstream to focus on bitcoin national adoption, announced pretty impressive developments. Both Prospera, a tourist-focused island in Honduras and the autonomous region of Madeira in Portugal will make bitcoin legal tender. Plus, Mexican Senator Indira Kempis promised she was going to introduce a proposal to accomplish the same in her country.

Sadly, El Salvidor President Nayib Bukele had to cancel his keynote presentation. El Salvador is going through internal struggles and he couldn’t leave his post to speak at the conference. Was Bukele planning to reveal something? We’ll never know for sure. Besides that, both Strike and Lightning Labs had aces up their sleeves. And their announcements, which this article will cover, may have important and impressive consequences over time. 

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However, the general consensus was that the Bitcoin 2022 conference didn’t deliver. On the positive side, though, it grew tremendously compared to last year. This time, it received around 30,000 people. It added two whole new days, for a total of four, including an Industry Day” at the beginning and a “Sound Music Festival” day with high-profile artists at the end. Plus, three stages ran simultaneously: the mainstage also known as the “Nakamoto Stage,” an “Open-Source Stage” for developers, and a “Mining Stage” for that part of the industry.

Let’s explore and watch the five most important panels and keynotes, selected with care by SmartBlocks. 

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1.- “Bitcoinizing the world: The Future of Lightning” with Elizabeth Stark, Ishaana Misra, and Autumn Domingo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M130SNz3NVk

The CEO of Lightning Labs, Elizabeth Stark (no relation to Tony), showed everyone her vision for the future. She had the great idea of bringing two very young, female programmers that Stark had met in a BitDev meeting to do the presentation with her. The two women have several projects in the works and founded a group called “Generation Bitcoin,” which is “a community built to support, encourage, and inspire teens to jump into the world of Bitcoin.”

For her part, Elizabeth Stark promoted her company’s latest project. Lighting Labs recently submitted a bitcoin improvement proposal that goes by the code-name “Taro.” It’s a protocol that, if approved, will allow users to create and transact stablecoins and other assets over the Lightning Network. 

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2.- Jack Mallers’ Keynote

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dD2-T7TX2rk

Strike CEO Jack Mallers was the star of the 2021 conference because he had the honor to announce the El Salvador news. What did he for an encore? His company partnered up with Blackhawk and NCR to bring Lightning Network payments to stores all across the US. The Point-of-Sale terminals are already deployed, just waiting for the update that will connect them to the world’s fastest open network.

On the e-commerce front, Strike partnered with Shopify. They were faster to implement the deal and are already accepting Lightning Network payments. Many people didn’t regard the Strike announcement as particularly significant, but we’d argue this has the potential to change the world. The next step for bitcoin is generating circular economies in which BTC can circulate, and Jack Mallers and team took us one step closer to achieving the goal.     

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3.- “Bitcoin is Freedom” with Yeonmi Park, Farida Nabourema, Fadi Elsalameen, and Alex Gladstein

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cR4sMsI8z7U&t=332s

The Human Rights Foundation’s Alex Gladstein hosted a panel with North Korean refugee Yeonmi Park, Togolese Human Rights activist Farida Nabourema, and Palestinian anti-corruption advocate Fadi Elsalameen. The three of them presented the case of how bitcoin could help each of their countries’ situations tremendously. 

North Koreans are trapped, and those that managed to escape haven’t been able to take their wealth with them. Bitcoin fixes that. Togo is under France’s thumb. The country, plus 13 others around Africa, uses the CFA Franc, a currency they have absolutely no control over. Bitcoin fixes that. Palestinians around the world have trouble sending money to their loved ones because of US, Israel, and the Palestinian government oversight of those financial operations. Bitcoin fixes that.

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4.- Olaoluwa Osuntokun’s Keynote

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=veIuDwQTunw

This was at the Open-Source stage. Lightning Labs’ Olaoluwa Osuntokun presented the Taro project by speaking at the speed of light. Taro’s objective is “bitcoinizing the dollar,” and they’re going to do that by deploying stablecoins over the Lightning Network. Does this render obsolete most of the altcoins’ use cases?

We recommend that you listen to this fairly technical talk at 0.75 speed, Osuntokun’s brain works too fast. It almost seems like someone increased the video’s speed, but Osuntokun’s movements suggest otherwise. In any case, listening to this will make you smarter. And that’s a guarantee. 

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5.- “Bitcoin Macroeconomic Landscape” with Trey Lockerbie, Jeff Booth, Dr. Jeff Ross, Mark Moss, and Preston Pysh

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I2Q-HPCJ57k&t=508s

Podcaster Trey Lockerbie hosted who he called “the biggest heavyweights in the bitcoin space.” They talked about the dollar’s collapse and explained why, irremediably, every fiat currency eventually goes to zero. They discussed inflation and explained the reasons why governments debase their countries’ own currencies. 

The three powerhouses explained that all fiat money is debt, spoke about the velocity of money, and mocked Peter Thiel’s keynote. In that one, the billionaire posed the outdated idea that bitcoin was a very slow store of value asset, and had the audacity to point at Ethereum as the example of an asset with velocity. 

In the talk that concerns us, Moss explained that bitcoin has the store of value aspect mixed with the medium of exchange one, and thus, is the best currency known to man. It can do it all without any help. Pysh predicts that the US bank system and economy will collapse under their own weight. The shock will generate more rampant money printing, which in turn will generate more inflation. And then, the cycle will start again. 

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BONUS.- “Pioneers Of The Years Before Bitcoin” with Nick Szabo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5gj2YmQUhQ

Overall, Bitcoin 2022’s “Industry Day” was the weaker content-wise. However, hidden in there was this gem of a masterclass by Nick Szabo, one of the original cypherpunks. The creator of “Bit gold,” a direct precursor to bitcoin, took us through memory lane. His talk consisted of a brief history of the movement, and an homage to the pioneers that created the concepts and technologies that lead to Satoshi Nakamoto’s invention.

Throughout this history lesson, Szabo throws some illuminating gems and ideas that will help newcomers understand what we’re dealing with when it comes to bitcoin.

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About the lack of headliners in our List

As you might have noticed, Bitcoin 2022’s biggest names are not present on our list. The reasons for this vary. On the one hand, the bitcoin celebrities invited didn’t present any new ideas. They’re ever-present throughout the year on podcasts, live streams, and Twitter. Most of what they said, we’ve heard before. 

On the other, the conference’s organizers, Bitcoin Magazine and company, took a risk and gave the headlining slots to bigger names who had discovered bitcoin in the last few months. Both Jordan Peterson and Eric Weinstein’s talks were totally unrelated to the topic at hand. They might have been interesting, but they were not what the public came for. 

For his part, billionaire Peter Thiel’s premise was that bitcoin was a good store of value, but it lacked velocity, so it couldn’t become a medium of exchange. Outdated information that the Lightning Network obliterates. At least he did his homework and prepared a presentation that was on topic.. 

In general, the Bitcoin 2022 conference was hit or miss. In some aspects, it was a triumph of epic proportions. In others, it lacked focus and surprises. The production, though, improved tenfold. There were no complaints about massive lines under the sun or difficulties getting food. The size of the event grew, the trade show looked massive and full of bitcoin companies, and the small stages served the more bitcoin-focused population.

The live stream also improved tremendously, with a news desk in which the Bitcoin Magazine team and a variety of the culture’s stars provided color commentary on every panel. It served as a connector and stitched the transmission together. Plus, there were moderators in the live chat that kept the spambots to a minimum. There were still spambots and people shilling questionable crypto projects, though.

That’s it. See you all in Bitcoin 2023.