In 2008, Satoshi Nakamoto published the Bitcoin whitepaper — a manifesto of decentralized money, promising the world freedom from banks and intermediaries. Today, more than 15 years later, BTC has become a global phenomenon, but much of what was intended has not been realized.
We tell what the creator of the first cryptocurrency could not predict and what problems the Bitcoin whitepaper holds.
Technical miscalculations
The whitepaper hardly mentioned scalability: Bitcoin's throughput is only ~7 transactions per second, which is catastrophically low for a global payment system. Fees can reach tens of dollars at peak times, and transactions can take dozens of minutes to confirm.
Satoshi also mistakenly believed that mining would remain accessible to everyone. The phrase 'one CPU — one vote' quickly lost its meaning after the emergence of industrial ASIC farms. Today, a large portion of computational power is concentrated in the hands of a few mining pools.
Another problem is the astronomical energy consumption of the network, comparable to countries like the Netherlands. Satoshi did not foresee such issues.
Conceptual misconceptions
Bitcoin was conceived as 'anonymous digital cash', but in practice, BTC is transparent to the limit. All transactions are public, and de-anonymization is possible thanks to analytical tools.
Moreover, the network did not eliminate intermediaries — centralized exchanges and wallets have replaced banks, controlling the flow. Unlike the classical financial system, it is impossible to get your money back if you made a mistake with the address.
The economic model is in question
Satoshi assumed that as the block reward diminished, miners would be 'fed' by fees. But for now, they make up only a small portion of revenue. If fees are insufficient in the future, the security of the network will be at risk.
A goal that seems unattainable
Bitcoin has not become a mass payment method. It is not widely accepted in stores, and there are many reasons for this, such as the high volatility of BTC and the long transaction confirmation times. Instead, cryptocurrency has turned into 'digital gold' — a tool for accumulation, investment, and speculation.
Instead of conclusions
The Bitcoin whitepaper became the starting point for a new era in finance. However, Satoshi's concept turned out to be naive in several key aspects. The network works, the ideas are alive, but the reality turned out to be much more complex. Bitcoin changed the world, but it also changed itself — and far from the spirit of its creator's intentions.
