I am not an economist, and I do not at all pretend to understand cryptocurrency at all. In fact, I am woefully ignorant of anything having to do with global financial speculation. Because I have a sneaking suspicion that it is ALL a scam.

Let's start with money itself. What is it? An arbitrary, arithmetical, zero-sum measure of the marginal value of commodities--that is, the value a given commodity has if I own it but do not need it, and you and others need it. It's all a monopoly game, and--like a monopoly game, it has only one possible outcome: as the game goes on, the rich get richer and more influential (i.e. more empowered to become yet richer), while everyone else in the game gets poorer, and ever more dependent on the rich for their houses and hotels, if they are to continue playing the game. And cryptocurrency carries this logic to an extreme, being entirely virtual. But what happens if an electromagnetic pulse--say from a solar flare, or from one of Putin's fancy nukes, simply knocks out the grid? All that "money" disappears like Brigadoon. No thanks. The more we can reduce our dependence on money, the better off we'll be when the whole infrastructure--fossil fuels, electricity, et al.--come crashing down all around us. That's why my standing advice to everyone is to grow gardens, grow community, and grow awareness--not simply to grow your (ultimately virtual) bank account!