Secrecy and confidentiality are two opposing concepts that are often confused. In everyday language, the two terms are often used interchangeably. While this is a convenient simplification, it is conceptually incorrect. This confusion has real consequences: it alters the way we interpret technology, power and individual freedom. Before addressing any digital infrastructure, it is necessary to clarify this distinction. Secrecy is an asymmetrical relationship. It presupposes the intentional concealment of information from others. It is usually hierarchical: one person knows, while another does not. Secrecy does not arise to protect the individual, but to consolidate an informational advantage. Throughout economic and political history, secrecy has been a tool of power, manifesting as administrative opacity, incomprehensible budgets and rules accessible only to a select few. Secrecy does not seek consent; it imposes itself. Privacy, on the other hand, is a symmetrical relationship. It is not about what is hidden, but what is chosen. It is the exercise of informational self-determination: deciding which data to share, with whom, and on what terms. Confidentiality does not create systemic opacity; it establishes personal boundaries. It is not an escape from responsibility, but an expression of it. It protects the dignity of the individual rather than the privilege of an institution. This distinction is crucial because modernity tends to reverse it. In contexts of high surveillance, confidentiality is often viewed with suspicion, while institutional secrecy is normalised. The individual who protects their data is perceived as 'opaque', while the system that accumulates information on a large scale is perceived as 'transparent'. However, this is merely an apparent paradox arising from the misuse of words. Without a rigorous definition, the debate slips into the moral realm. Confidentiality becomes synonymous with guilt. Secrecy becomes associated with security. However, analytically speaking, the two concepts operate in opposite ways. The former redistributes control to the individual. The latter concentrates it in the hands of a central authority. In the technological sphere, this confusion has significant consequences. Any tool that allows the selective management of information is labelled 'obscure' or 'dangerous' without the underlying rules being questioned. The focus is solely on whether the information is visible, not on who controls it. Distinguishing between secrecy and confidentiality is not merely a matter of terminology. It is a prerequisite for understanding the role of digital infrastructures in contemporary society. Without this distinction, any discussion of freedom remains trapped between opposing slogans. Words define the boundaries of thought. Without clear boundaries, even freedom becomes ambiguous. #freedom #bitcoin #cypherpunk #boundaries #secret #privacy #control #confidential

Starting with fear: why we confuse anonymity with freedom. The idea of anonymous technology often provokes an instinctive reaction: relief for some and fear for others. In both cases, the response is emotional rather than rational. This indicates a deeper misunderstanding: when we talk about anonymity, we are not describing a technical property, but rather projecting a fear. Every complex society walks a fine line. On the one hand, there is the need for security and control, and on the other, the need for autonomy and individual dignity. Fear arises when this balance is not understood, but endured. Historically, fear is a powerful tool: it simplifies reality, reducing complexity and guiding behaviour without explanation. This dynamic is evident in public debate. Different concepts are merged into a single loaded word. Anonymity becomes synonymous with illegality. Transparency becomes associated with surveillance. Privacy becomes associated with having something to hide. In this semantic short circuit, technology ceases to be understood and instead becomes feared or idealised. This problem is not new. Similar reactions emerge whenever an infrastructure changes the way people exchange value, information or time. Take the press, paper money and the internet, for example. In all these cases, the central issue has never been the tool itself, but rather the relationship between the individual and the power that the tool enables. When fear drives judgement, the nature of the questions changes. Instead of asking 'How does it work?', we ask 'Who will use it against me?' Instead of asking 'What rules does it incorporate?', we ask 'What does it allow to be hidden?' It is in this space that false alternatives arise: total control versus total anonymity; security versus freedom; order versus chaos. Yet these alternatives are almost always illusory. They stem from an initial error of using emotional categories to describe structural phenomena. Before we can discuss specific tools, we must first recover a precise lexicon and make rigorous conceptual distinctions. Without this, any analysis will remain superficial and any judgement will become ideological. Only when fear is transformed into knowledge does the debate cease to be reactive and become comprehensive. This is where we need to start if we really want to understand what it means to talk about anonymity, privacy, and freedom in the age of digital infrastructure. Fear simplifies. Understanding restores complexity. #fear #bitcoin #btc #knowledge #discuss #problem #privacy #society #history #space #work #internet #anonymous #technology

Why are Bitcoiners called 'carnivores'? It's a question that reveals more than meets the eye. What started as a seemingly light-hearted question, accompanied by ironic answers, ended up arousing unexpected curiosity. This is precisely why it is worth pausing for a moment to explore what lies behind the joke. This text is an in-depth analysis written with a friend, starting from a curiosity that went viral. The most widespread idea is simple and immediate: Bitcoiners are called 'carnivores' because the seed phrase consists of twelve identical words: 'beef'. This phrase is effective, easy to remember and humorous. However, as is often the case, the short version obscures the truly interesting point. The crux is not the word 'beef'. Rather, it is why a sequence of identical words can be valid according to a cryptographic standard. To understand this, we need to distinguish between what seems 'strange' to humans and what is simply 'correct' for a protocol. Words have meaning for us; they evoke images, habits and culture. For a computer system, however, a word is merely a readable representation of a sequence of bits. This is where the cognitive short circuit arises. When it comes to seed phrases, the common intuition is that the more different the words are, the more secure the seed is. While this intuition is understandable, it is not a technical law. It is a human projection; we confuse semantic variety with mathematical entropy. A seed phrase is not a phrase. It is a way of making a number transcribable and verifiable. This brings us to the standard that popularised seed phrases: BIP39. BIP39 was created to solve a very specific problem: enabling people to reliably manage systems that were originally intended only for machines. Cryptographic keys are large, random numbers that are difficult to copy without errors. Converting them into a list of standardised words mitigates human error without compromising the underlying mathematics. The crucial point is this: security lies in bits, not words. A BIP39 seed phrase comprises a certain amount of entropy and a checksum — a short piece of information used to verify that the sequence has been written correctly. Each word in the wordlist corresponds to a number. By combining these words, a precise binary string is reconstructed. If this string complies with the entropy and checksum rules, the seed is valid. It does not matter if the words 'sound' repetitive, strange or trivial. Here is the paradox: To humans, twelve identical words seem like an error. To the protocol, however, they are just one combination among many. The famous '12×beef' seed is neither an exception nor an Easter egg. In fact, it is not the only case. There are several valid seed phrases consisting of a single repeated word that are either 12 or 24 words long. Some work and some don't, just like any other combination. The difference is that these strike the imagination because they defy the intuitive expectation of 'visible randomness'. However, true randomness does not have to be visible. It just has to be measurable. This seemingly trivial curiosity reveals something deeper about the relationship between people and technology. We tend to trust what appears complex and distrust what seems simple. However, in formal systems, simplicity and weakness are not necessarily linked. BIP39 does not interpret. It does not judge. It verifies. It is precisely this semantic indifference that makes certain infrastructures reliable; they work in the same way for everyone, regardless of their identity, culture, or expectations. The joke about 'carnivorous bitcoiners' is amusing, but its greatest value lies elsewhere. Its greatest value lies in reminding us that rules matter more than narratives. #beef #bitcoin #seed #phrase #curiosity #word #esteregg #bip39 #2013 #technology #security #entropy

CBDCs and Bitcoin: control from above, freedom from below. When we consider the digital euro, the banking system, and the architecture of CBDCs as a whole, a common theme emerges that is often overlooked. CBDCs are not designed to empower individuals, but rather to strengthen government control over the monetary system. This is not an accusation. It is a structural consequence. CBDCs are designed as liabilities of the central bank, integrated into an existing regulatory, financial and political framework. This implies that access to, use of, and permanence in the system are necessarily conditional. This is not because anyone wants to abuse them, but because a public digital currency must be consistent with the objectives of stability, compliance, monetary policy transmission and systemic risk control. In this sense, the digital euro is not 'delayed' due to inefficiency. It is delayed because it touches on the heart of the relationship between currency, banks and citizens. The introduction of a retail CBDC would alter the structure of deposits, expose the system to the risk of rapid liquidity shifts and make credit more dependent on public intervention. Limits, filters and intermediaries are therefore required to mitigate these effects. Each protection adds operational constraints. Consequently, the central bank's digital currency becomes a powerful tool, serving not only as a means of payment, but also as an infrastructure for economic coordination. It is a system that, in principle, allows flows to be directed, uses to be conditioned, and access to be modulated. Even when these functions are not active, the mere possibility of their activation changes the balance of power. Control is not an option; it is inscribed in the architecture. Bitcoin was born out of the opposite logic. It is neither a liability nor credit, nor is it a policy tool. Rather, it is a distributed social asset based on strict, public and verifiable rules. It does not require trust in an issuer because there is no issuer. Nor does it require authorisation, as it does not distinguish identities. It does not influence behaviour because it has no purpose. This apparent rigidity is what makes it deeply adaptive on a social level. Bitcoin can operate in a variety of political, economic and legal contexts precisely because it does not adapt to any of them. The rules do not change; it is the uses that emerge. It is a tool that protects individual freedom not by promising rights, but by limiting control from above through technical means. CBDCs optimise system management. Bitcoin protects individuals' ability to act without permission. These are not symmetrical alternatives. They are expressions of two different anthropologies: one based on central coordination and the other on limiting power. The difference is not ideological. It is written into the infrastructure. #bitcoin #cbdc #digital #currency #control #freedom #central #bank #infrastructure #power #permission #technology #social #level #system

Offline, resilience and systemic risk. In the debate on digitalisation of currency, the ability to operate offline is often treated as a technical detail, a secondary issue to be resolved at a later date. However, the ability to operate without a connection is not just a convenience. It is a social property. It determines who can continue to exchange value when normal conditions cease to exist. Every digital infrastructure depends on three physical elements: electricity, a network and central operating systems. This dependence is not limiting in ordinary times. However, it becomes critical in the event of crises, blackouts, extreme weather events or geopolitical tensions. In such situations, resilience is not measured by average efficiency, but by the ability to function when the system is under stress. By their very nature, CBDCs introduce greater integration between currency and central digital infrastructure. Even in intermediary models, operation requires synchronisation with authorisation and settlement systems. This creates single points of failure that may not be apparent in everyday experience, but which emerge in exceptional circumstances. Despite all its limitations, cash has a unique feature: it works offline by definition. It does not require authorisation or updates, nor does it depend on central systems. It is a basic technology, but extremely resilient. Eliminating it is not only a choice of efficiency, but also a renunciation of a form of operational continuity. CBDC experiments often incorporate partial offline solutions. However, these solutions introduce new trade-offs, such as amount limits, restricted time windows and the need for subsequent reconciliation. Each of these reduces the scope for general use and increases the system's complexity. Resilience thus becomes a designed feature rather than an intrinsic property. From a systemic perspective, the increasing digitisation of money concentrates risk. A technical malfunction, cyberattack or governance error could have immediate and widespread consequences. The question is not if such events will occur, but when and with what intensity. The history of complex infrastructures suggests that exceptions will manifest sooner or later. Some digital monetary infrastructures reduce the risk of central failure by distributing the validation and verification of rules. Bitcoin operates in this way, not because it is immune to problems, but because it does not depend on a single point of control. As a distributed social good, it guarantees continuity at the level of rules, rather than service. Resilience is not visible when everything is working. It is only measured when the system stops working. #resilience #cbdc #bitcoin #offline #system #risk

Privacy, identity and tracking: the invisible heart. In the debate on digital currencies, privacy is often reduced to a simple yes-or-no question. This is a misleading oversimplification. Privacy cannot be turned on or off downstream. Rather, it is an emergent property of the architecture. It depends on how the system is designed, not how it is declared. In a digital monetary infrastructure, identity is the first structural element. Identifying a subject means being able to link their actions over time. This is where transaction traceability comes from. Traceability enables prior authorisation. Authorisation produces compliance. This causal chain is technical, not ideological. Each link enables the next. Data centralisation is often confused with the centralisation of power. In reality, however, the latter is a function of the former. Those who control access to data and how it is correlated over time also control the ability to allow, limit or revoke the use of currency. No direct intervention is required; it is sufficient for the infrastructure to enable this. Trust is sometimes proposed as an alternative to privacy. This is a conceptual error. Trust is not a measure of security. Rather, it is a social relationship that presupposes the absence of technical alternatives. In complex and permanent systems, relying on trust means accepting that guarantees depend on intentions remaining consistent over time. Architectures, on the other hand, produce effects regardless of intentions. In the case of CBDCs, decisions regarding identity and tracking are not merely implementation details. They define the boundaries of individual autonomy. Even models that promise high levels of privacy must solve the problems of access, regulatory compliance, and interoperability. Every solution involves compromises. The question is not whether these compromises exist, but who governs them. Some digital monetary infrastructures structurally separate identity and value transfer. In these systems, the validity of a transaction does not depend on who performs it, but on compliance with public, verifiable rules. Bitcoin falls into this category as a social good, not because it guarantees absolute anonymity, but because personal authorisation is not required for it to function. In this sense, privacy is not invisibility. It is the ability to act without having to ask permission. #privacy #bitcoin #cbdc #invisibility #ability #permission #social #public #verificable #rules #transaction #transfer #identity

Programmable money: is it automation or constraint? Programmability is often described as a straightforward functional improvement. It enables automatic payments, conditional execution and error reduction. In this narrative, programmable money appears to be a natural extension of digital contracts. The problem lies not in what it promises, but in what it tends to confuse. In technical terms, programmability refers to the ability to associate logical instructions with payment execution. It is essential to distinguish between two conceptually different levels. 1. Payment automation: an action is performed when an external condition is met. 2. Conditioning of value use: the monetary unit itself incorporates rules about where, when, and how it can be used. This distinction is often overlooked, but it is central. Automation concerns how you pay. Conditioning concerns whether you can pay. In the former case, the currency remains neutral with respect to purpose. In the second case, however, it becomes an instrument of embedded policy. The question is not one of intentions, but of architecture: once the constraint is technically possible, its application becomes an administrative choice rather than a structural limitation. Abstract examples help to clarify this. An automatic subscription payment is an example of automation. A sum that can only be spent on certain categories of goods is a form of conditioning. Both solutions are technically feasible. The difference is that the latter changes the nature of money, transforming it from a general means of payment into a means of payment for a specific purpose. This is where the concept of 'policy drift' comes in. Rules that are introduced for limited purposes tend to expand over time. This is not due to abuse, but rather due to the internal consistency of the system. If a function is useful in one context, it makes sense to extend its use to other contexts. Ultimately, what starts as an exception can become the operational norm. In the context of CBDCs, programmability is not an accessory. It is a potential property of the infrastructure. Even if it is not initially activated, its presence alters the balance between rules and discretion. The phrase 'it depends on how you use it' loses its analytical power; what matters is what the system enables you to do, rather than what it promises not to do. Some digital monetary systems adopt the opposite logic: the rules are public and rigid, and cannot be changed on a case-by-case basis. As a distributed cryptoasset, Bitcoin does not incorporate intended uses. It does not distinguish between purposes, identities or contexts. It is not programmable in the sense of conditioning. However, it is verifiable in terms of compliance with rules. The difference is not between good or bad technology. Rather, it is between automation that facilitates and constraints that guide. #automation #vs #comditioning #cbdc #bitcoin #verify #digital #monetary

Why are CBDCs being created? Stated objectives and real incentives. CBDCs are often presented as a response to obvious needs, such as the desire for more efficient payments, greater financial inclusion and more resilient systems. These are legitimate and largely verifiable objectives. However, when monetary reform is presented as purely technical, it is important to consider the incentives that make it attractive to the institutions designing it. The stated objectives are well known. Financial inclusion aims to reduce barriers to accessing payment services. Resilience concerns maintaining business continuity in the event of shocks. Efficiency promises lower costs and faster regulations. Competition aims to rebalance power in payment markets that are dominated by a few private operators. Taken individually, these objectives are consistent with the public mandate of central banks. However, alongside these, there are less explicit incentives. Reduced cash usage is a recurring consequence of highly digitised systems. Cash is costly to manage, hard to track, and restricts certain forms of control. From an institutional perspective, the progressive marginalisation of cash appears to be a rational outcome, even when this is not formally declared as an objective. Furthermore, in a context of increasing digitisation of private payments, monetary authorities risk losing operational relevance. CBDCs also address the need to maintain a central role in the monetary infrastructure, thereby preserving the capacity for intervention and coordination. This does not imply coercive intent, but rather reflects a structural incentive: those who govern the currency also tend to govern its technological evolution. In short, they are afraid of becoming obsolete. This brings us to a key concept: the structural trade-off. Every increase in efficiency necessitates a certain level of standardisation. However, every standardisation reduces the variety of options available. In the case of money, more integrated and centrally coordinated solutions can improve system functionality, but at the cost of less operational freedom for individuals. This tension is not moral, but systemic. Efficiency and autonomy do not always go hand in hand. One often advances at the expense of the other. CBDCs make this tension more visible because they move money from the level of the instrument to that of a fully digital infrastructure, where rules can be applied immediately and uniformly. Monetary systems that do not depend on a central authority operate according to a different logic in this scenario. Bitcoin, as a social good, was not created to optimise institutional efficiency, but rather to enable economic activity to continue without prior authorisation. It does not compete with the stated objectives of CBDCs. It operates on a different level: that of constraints. Every monetary system reflects the incentives of its designers. Understanding these incentives does not imply judgement, but rather recognition of their effects over time. #obsolete #monetary #system #bitcoin #cbdc #goal #inclusion

What is a CBDC really: definition and boundaries In public debate, CBDCs are often described as 'digital government money'. The expression is intuitive but conceptually inaccurate. Without a rigorous definition, the discussion quickly descends into misunderstanding. Clarifying the boundaries is not about taking a position, but about speaking the same language. A Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) is, in technical terms, a central bank liability issued in digital form, accessible to different entities depending on the chosen architecture. This is the fundamental distinguishing feature. It is not a private cryptocurrency, it is not a bank deposit, it is not a simple payment application. To understand the difference, we need to distinguish between four forms of money that coexist today. 1. Cash is a liability of the central bank, anonymous, bearer-based and usable offline. 2. Bank money is a liability of commercial banks, based on credit relationships, regulated but not directly guaranteed by the central bank. 3. Reserves are liabilities of the central bank accessible only to intermediaries. 4. CBDC introduces a new combination: liabilities of the central bank, but in digital form and potentially accessible to the public. Within this general definition, there are several taxonomies, which are often confused with each other. CBDCs can be retail (intended for citizens and businesses) or wholesale (reserved for intermediaries). They can be account-based (based on the identification of the holder) or token-based (based on the possession of a digital unit). Finally, they can be direct (managed directly by the central bank) or intermediated (with commercial banks playing an operational role). These distinctions are not just technical details. Every architectural decision has different implications for privacy, resilience, governance and financial structure. This is why it is essential to distinguish between three analytical levels. 1. The technical facts, which define what a CBDC is. 2. The possible architectures, which address how it can be implemented. 3. Political interpretations concerning how it could be used. Mixing up these levels leads to two errors: naive optimism and a priori rejection. In both cases, the central point is lost: a CBDC is not a single technology, but rather a family of institutional solutions that redefine the relationship between money, the state, and its citizens. In this conceptual space, there are also systems that are not the liability of any central authority and that operate according to public, verifiable rules. Bitcoin falls into this category as both a distributed cryptoasset and a social good, not because it is 'digital', but because it structurally separates value from the issuer and transfer from authorisation. Before asking whether a CBDC is 'good' or 'bad', we need to know precisely what it is. Without clear boundaries, even judgement becomes opaque. #cbdc #technology #privacy #central #bank #digital #currency #bitcoin

The illusion of technological neutrality. We tend to view every innovation in payments as a simple technical improvement. Faster, more convenient, more efficient. It's a reassuring insight. And it is, almost always, incomplete. When a technology ceases to be an optional tool and becomes shared infrastructure, it is no longer neutral. It begins to organise behaviours, times, possibilities. Not because it 'wants' to, but because it structures. Strictly speaking, a tool is used by an individual for a specific purpose. Infrastructure, on the other hand, coordinates multiple individuals over time, establishing common constraints. A system of rules emerges when that infrastructure defines what is possible, permitted, and excluded. The transition is qualitative, not quantitative. And it does not depend on intention, but on adoption. Currency falls squarely into this category. It is not just a medium of exchange. It is an institution that organises economic relations over time. It determines how we save, how we transfer value, how we access exchange. In this sense, currency is always power organised over time: it coordinates expectations, disciplines behaviour, makes some actions easier and others more expensive or impossible. When a monetary technology changes form, it is not just 'how we pay' that changes. The boundaries of economic action change. History shows this repeatedly: the transition from metal to paper, from paper to bank credit, from credit to full digitalisation. Each leap has introduced new possibilities, but also new structural constraints. Ignoring them does not eliminate them. CBDCs sit precisely at this point of friction. They are not simply an update of payment channels. They introduce a new, potentially permanent monetary architecture that operates at the level of social infrastructure. For this reason, they cannot be evaluated solely in terms of operational efficiency or technological innovation. The central issue is neither the speed of transfer nor the reduction of costs. Rather, it is the type of system that emerges when money becomes natively digital, integrated and adjustable. This is where technological neutrality becomes irrelevant. Not by ideological choice, but by structural effect. In this context, alternative infrastructures emerge that separate rules from control, value from identity, and use from authorisation. Bitcoin was not created to replace a currency; rather, it was designed as a social asset based on verifiable, distributed rules that cannot be altered at will. It does not promise results. It sets boundaries. Every monetary infrastructure defines what is possible, even before what is legal. Over time, what is possible becomes normal. #illusion #technology #neutrality #cbdc #bitcoin #innovation #money #ideology #choise