I'd like to propose "Virtuous Minimalism" as an alternative banner to Bitcoin’s Toxic Maximalism. Something different that the entire crypto ecosystem can embrace.
While I consider myself a long-term "Bitcoiner", I've never been able to relate to the Bitcoin Toxic Maximalist meme. I can sympathise with its origins of protecting a new technology from the onslaught of scams and detractors that it spawned, but toxicity doesn't breed collaboration or truly welcome new adopters.
As someone that also sees the value in experimenting with alternative technologies such as smart contracts on Ethereum, maximalism simply isn't an option. DAOs are challenging traditional organisational structures and naming systems like ENS are providing alternative sovereign identities to provide just a couple of examples.
We need a new banner for people to unite under, for those that believe in Crypto, not just Bitcoin, and the possibility of a wider ecosystem benefitting society.
I propose we work together as Virtuous Minimalists.
At first, this may sound like it is just the opposite to Bitcoin’s Toxic Maximalism, but if anything, I believe it actually gets to the core of what many truly want to achieve.
In general we should all be striving to create virtuous technology. Systems and protocols embedded with good moral qualities that are as simple or minimal as possible to achieve their stated goals.
Layers of complexity and obfuscation don't benefit anyone except those distracting you from potentially undesirable qualities of their solution.
With a Virtuous Minimalist approach, new cryptographic systems are kept as simple as possible and positive-sum processes are baked in to their architecture. Together, we can hold ourselves to a higher standard and start working towards what we want, instead of simply working away from what we don't.
What do we all share as moral standards? Well, that is probably a discussion best left for another day. But it will likely be solved by which technologies are embraced in the free markets by developers, while facing real economics, and the battle of ideas. After all, isn't that what true decentralisation is all about?
