That is an opinion editorial by BitcoinActuary, an actuary primarily based within the U.Ok.
I’ve lately returned from spending a protracted weekend with round 200,000 others at one of many loves of my life, Glastonbury Pageant. The 2023 model of this annual music pageant was peppered with units from huge identify acts — Elton John, Weapons N’ Roses and Foo Fighters, to call just a few — however the inevitable media concentrate on these tends to mislead these viewing it from the skin. Glastonbury is a phenomenon of huge scale; it could possibly be described as 10 festivals wrapped into one. Almost everybody who goes will inform you they’ve had a good time, however in all probability all for various causes.
So, what hyperlinks Glastonbury with Bitcoin? Some cursory analysis and my very own journeys to the pageant in recent times counsel that only a few have ever made a hyperlink in any respect, barring this typically-scathing Guardian effort from a few years again.
Certainly, many in all probability see the 2 as polar opposites. Glastonbury is famously left wing — there stays the Left Discipline tent, which homes talks and debates by activists and union members, led by the ever-present, “broadly leftist” Billy Bragg. The pyramid stage area featured grass coloring this year to display the giant message: “We Stand With The NHS” in help of the U.Ok.’s Nationwide Well being Service.
Bitcoin, in contrast, is usually characterised as a expertise that appeals to the precise wing. David Golumbia went about so far as it’s potential to go in his 2016 guide “The Politics Of Bitcoin: Software program As Proper-Wing Extremism.”
Secondly, the pageant is environmentally acutely aware and has lengthy supported Greenpeace. In contrast, Bitcoin is continually criticized for its supposedly-wasteful power use. Greenpeace’s U.S. arm has been accountable for its infamously poor “change the code, not the climate” marketing campaign in opposition to Bitcoin, funded to the tune of $5 million by Ripple’s Chris Larson.
However are Glastonbury and Bitcoin actually irreconcilable? Under no circumstances.
Firstly, on the political entrance, Bitcoin itself is definitely apolitical. It’s a algorithm with out rulers. Anybody who makes an attempt to argue in any other case tends to mischaracterize it, and sometimes depends on typecasting the common Bitcoiner as proper wing. In response, I’d encourage readers to take a longer-term take a look at financial historical past, and to ask the likes of Golumbia what it’s about this open-source, universally-accessible, elective, non-coercive protocol that’s so detestable. The neatest shortcut response to this hypothetical comes from Natalie Smolenski: “Being an enemy of a expertise is a reasonably dumb approach to waste your time since you’re not accountable for whether or not a expertise is adopted at any significant scale.”
Furthermore, these from the “progressive” finish of the political spectrum are starting to make their voices heard and present that Bitcoin has common attraction. Reminder: Bitcoin is for enemies.
Onto Bitcoin’s environmental impression. As argued right here and right here, all will not be what it initially appears when evaluating Bitcoin’s ongoing power use. In actuality, Bitcoin is working with ever-increasing effectivity and it drives behavioral change by decreasing an people time desire, which could be a important step in decreasing the rampant and wasteful consumerism that we see on this planet at this time.
In abstract, on each the political and environmental fronts, Bitcoin and Glastonbury are usually not the polar opposites that many would assume. There are commonalities, too. Each go well with a libertarian outlook. Every has one-word model recognition. Each would seem to promote themselves — Bitcoin, after all, has seen explosive development with no formal advertising division, whereas Glastonbury tickets over the earlier decade have typically offered out in lower than an hour and round eight months earlier than the occasion is definitely held. Bitcoin has memes, Glastonbury has memes on flags.
So, how may Glastonbury embrace Bitcoin?
This previous yr, it was hanging simply what number of funds have been being made by card versus just a few years earlier, when money reigned supreme. With many small retailers on the pageant, it might massively cut back charges of wherever between 1.5% and three.5% presently levied on each buy, by embracing Bitcoin’s Lightning Community as an added fee choice. Within the U.Ok., I’d counsel testing the superb work accomplished by CoinCorner and Bridge2Bitcoin in driving ahead the Lightning Community as a low-cost fee mechanism for retailers.
As well as, bitcoin might symbolize a pure, long-term treasury reserve asset for Glastonbury — a long-term holding in bitcoin might assist journey out any tough instances in future. Certainly, the pageant isn’t any stranger to the pernicious nature of inflation: Ticket costs have been £105 in 2003 and had elevated to £335 in 2023, which little question displays the numerous will increase in prices confronted.
Glastonbury have lengthy been forward of the curve in making sweeping adjustments forward of others. In 2007, it eradicated ticket touts and scalpers in a single fell swoop by together with pageant goers’ photographs on tickets. In 2019, it banned single-use plastic bottles totally from the location, and in 2023, round 22,000 tickets have been offered particularly for pageant goers touring by bus. May it additionally get forward of the curve in embracing Bitcoin?
Admittedly, in all probability not, primarily based on any present proof. However I’d say to Michael and Emily Eavis, the organizers of the occasion: Dig a bit deeper than the present, skewed output on show from mainstream publications within the U.Ok. There’s far more to Bitcoin than first meets the attention.
Michael Eavis confirmed on this yr’s pageant program that the native council has now issued a license for them to carry the pageant in perpetuity. This should really feel significantly candy, given his struggles with them over time. For Glastonbury, it appears, there’ll at all times be one other yr. And so too for Bitcoin.
It is a visitor put up by BitcoinActuary. Opinions expressed are totally their very own and don’t essentially mirror these of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Journal.
