Video Of The Week: Brian Armstrong at Disrupt London

Comments (Archived):

1. Brian’s relentless optimism about Bitcoin’s future is very contagious. I think Coinbase is becoming the Google of Bitcoin with their 3-prong strategy: a) consumer wallets, b) merchant services, c) developer tools. That covers a lot of the basics for the Bitcoin ecosystem, and they will do well no matter what happens on top of that market.

   1. The main problem with bitcoin’s strategy is that they continue to focus on the “cool to use” crowd vs the “need to use” crowd.The “need to use” crowd is huge (but its not us), its the underbanked, those with no or low credit scores.Go all in on this market, the way visa and mastercard went all in in the 90s and you’ll see sometime amazing and something to be proud of.

      1. We need more use cases that are compelling for users, especially things that you can’t do otherwise on the Internet.

         1. While bitcoin is trying to figure this out companies like earthport and transferwise are executing on top of the existing currencies.

2. i still don’t understand bitcoin, blockchain, or anything related .. it’s new, it’s good, it transcends governments .. cool . but what it IS ?? no idea

   1. no blockchain equals no bitcoinno bitcoin does not equal no blockchain

      1. Still bitcoin makes for a pretty appealing frontman !”money makes the world go round”

         1. bitcoin as poster boy/ girl

      2. Not quite true. The blockchain proof-of-work requires a reward be paid to the first person who presents the proof-of-work. Without bitcoin it gets awkward … very awkward. It doesn’t need to be “bitcoin” but it does need to be a crypto-currency for the least friction usage.

         1. not quite true is quite true 🙂 just trying to disentangle the two as a starting point for better comprehension.

            1. agreed

   2. Hopefully you may never have to understand it, and only use it (unless you’re an investor or developer).

   3. In case you want to understand it, I found these videos very helpful: https://www.khanacademy.org…

   4. Bitcoin community should answer this by answering not what it is, but rather what it does, who it does it to, and why it does what it does.

      1. I’d love to see an exhaustive list ofpotential bitcoin “End-User” classesalong with its associative list ofpotential “Use-Case-Fuctions” for each of those bitcoin “End-User” classesall written up by someone very knowledgable about bitcion’s scope.That would really help non-developer laypersons like myself get some sort of visceral feel about bitcoin.

   5. Here’s a CNBC style primer. http://www.cnbc.com/id/1021….

3. Brian = knowledgeable and cool under pressure.Journo = knowledgeable and a juice bag.

4. the video window is sitting on top of the lower half of the post text when viewed on my laptop

5. A good one.Many of the ideas in this interview have been in these strings here.Who are the short list of people who are blogging with original thinking on bitcoin and blockchain?

   1. blockchain is a consensus engine

      1. don’t know what that means.

         1. *original thinking is like that, and is how you know it’s originalgoogle is a search engineblockchain is a consensus engine*n.b. it doesn’t mean the thinking is any good 🙂

            1. original thinking is like that, and is how you know it’s originalArnold frequently throws out original thinking as well.

            2. why i never understand what he means

   2. Ryan Selkis at The Two-Bit idiot http://two-bit-idiot.tumblr… Really smart. Like the Benedict of bitcoin.

      1. Thanks!I’m only reading people lately with big opinions driven by real experience and unabashed willingness to be wrong.And honestly, block chain is as if not more interesting than bitcoin in some ways to me.

         1. TBI is the one.

   3. One more suggestion….Follow my Feedly collection on Bitcoin in one fell swoop: (it includes 35 blogs/sites)http://feedly.com/wmougayar

6. How could you not mention this? :-)Bitcoin Company Coinbase Raising New Investment at $400 Million Valuationhttp://recode.net/2014/11/1…

   1. DFJ invested in Hotmail. I see a thesis here.

   2. How could you not mention this? :-)Like Woot or now http://www.meh.com (started by Matt Rutledge the founder of woot) it’s a deal a day here.

   3. Didn’t know about that post. and I make it a point never to comment on rumors

      1. Fair ‘nuf.

7. I’m so over the Arrington-style of interviewing. Defeats its own purpose.This managed to be interesting, thanks to Brian.

   1. i might have walked

      1. Why walk? It’s good practice for when you are in an interview that is more important and “you’se” can’t leave.

         1. not really. i wouldn’t want to be influenced in that way.

   2. I tend to like it. Way better than a game of softball. Moreover, it’s very similar to grilling that one might see in a fund raise.

   3. What made it different is that Brian wasn’t affected by the blunt/presumptive questioning, but also the interviewer wasn’t as persistent as Arrington. He somehow moved on.

   4. He was extremely patient with his annoying interviewer.

   5. I agree, and Brian did an AMAZING job, really.

8. This interview personifies what’s wrong w/ journalism today, where an interviewer has a need to usurp the person h/she is interviewing by continually infusing or coloring the Q&A w/ their own POV. For fuck’s sake, write an editorial if you want to be heard; the focus should be on the interviewee. Kudos to Brian for keeping his cool w/ an informative (and positive) dialog.

   1. This interview personifies what’s wrong w/ journalism today, where an interviewer has a need to usurp the person h/she is interviewing by continually infusing or coloringI watched exactly 11:35 of this (so far) and I disagree.Other than being a bit of a “dick” at the start I thought he was challenging him and asking reasonable questions.The purpose of an interview like this is to inform, educate and entertain. Not to be a softball interview for the interviewee. Or help them achieve their goals. I don’t take any issue at all with how it was handled (at least in the first 11 minutes). [1]the focus should be on the intervieweeThe focus is on what’s good for people watching the interview. The audience. It has nothing to do at all with either making Brian look good or Coinbase or Bitcoin look good or even for that matter being fair and balanced (think of a typical 60 Minutes ambush from back in the day ..) Techcrunch’s purpose is not to not hurt feelings it’s to get people watching. You may agree or disagree that they have achieved this goal but that’s the editorial direction they are choosing and presumably they have a reason for doing so.[1] If you have an example later on in the interview I’d like to see what you are referring to.

      1. That’s what makes our country so great LE, everyone has a voice and reasonable people certainly can disagree :)First, the interviewer could have easily asked any and all hard questions w/out being a “dick.” Second, his tone and continual need to editorialize detracted from the interview, as evidenced somewhat by the multiple comments on this thread. Third, although I’m not entirely familiar w/ TechCrunch’s editorial strategy, it’s a pretty strong bet it’s not to antagonize or confront (I didn’t say challenge, mind you) leaders in the biz community, particularly during an interview at a trade event. There’s a time and place for editorializing, and IMO this wasn’t it.There’s nothing wrong w/ asking hard questions, in fact it’s desirable, but I have a prob w/ his confrontational approach. This isn’t an investigative journalism piece.

         1. it’s a pretty strong bet it’s not to antagonize or confront (I didn’t say challenge, mind you) leaders in the biz communityWell to start I’d hardly call Brian Armstrong a “leader in the business community”.Before starting Coinbase this is what Brian did:Brian worked as a software developer at AirbnbI thought Brian did a great job in the interview by the way. But he’s not a “leader in the business community”. He may be a “leader in the bitcoin community” but so what?That said let’s take someone who is or was a leader in the business community. Let’s take Warren Buffet or Jack Welsh. Or let’s take someone that Jim Cramer fawns over when he has them on his show (which I used to watch so this is from memory).Do you want someone being cut a break because they have had their ticket punched and the journalist is in awe of them? I don’t. I hate the way everyone fawns over and thinks those people have to be right because of who they are and what they have done without respect to what they are saying makes any sense. Of course you should be respectful. I didn’t find (in the 11 minutes I watched) anything that was out of order other than the “shut up” at the start.If anything the interview was helpful training for Brian when he is in the hotseat sitting testifying before congress or similar.

            1. Re-read my comments, LE. I said nothing about fawning.

            2. Can you give an example of what you mean by “Second, his tone and need to editorialize”. Because I’m not seeing what you are seeing apparently. Other than the first few minutes when the interview started.As far as whether it’s TC’s style the interviewer works for TC and so they can decide that I guess. I didn’t find him easy on the eyes but that’s not what it’s about.Here is his background:http://www.crunchbase.com/p…Noting the degree in Philosophy (in 2012).

            3. Not sure you watched the entire interview yet, but the journalist’s tone was quite negative throughout, to the point that Brian even commented on it. When Brian asked the journalist if he owned any BTC, and he said he did, I was hoping he’d ask him why, given his general negativity.Irrespective of all of this, Brian handled himself quite well and was quite informative. I’m fascinated by BTC’s potential.

         2. Being an dick? Being a dick is when you attack the messenger not the message.

   2. I agree. I prefer the Larry King style of interviewing: always make the interviewee look good & make them talk. If they look good, you look good.

9. reporter is so annoying

10. This exceeds my BTC video viewing time alotment for today……by about 18mins. 😛

11. Seriously? Is he interviewing him to prove that the coins idea is not working?