Bitcoin's White Paper Gave Us Liberty

One of bitcoin's earliest entrepreneurs, Charlie Shrem is the former founder of BitInstant and co-founder of cryptocurrency intelligence service CryptoIQ. This exclusive opinion piece is part of CoinDesk's "Bitcoin at 10: The Satoshi White Paper" opinion series.

Ten years after Satoshi published the white paper that gave us bitcoin - and the explosion of innovation it launched - I continue to be astounded at its transformative power.

Money is such a fundamental part of life, and it has played such a huge role in mine, for good and bad. Bitcoin is the awakened sleeping giant of it all because it has fundamentally and forever changed money and money's seat of power.

What we gained in liberty with bitcoin, we lost in the security of knowing someone else was responsible for protecting our money.

Bitcoin could have changed things for the Venezuelans if they'd had an inkling of what was to come - and they should have - and thought to buy bitcoin or some other currency not tied to the bolivar.

Many are turning to foreign currencies and many to bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.

For the few paying attention, bitcoin is changing things in the U.S. before they even get started.

People are always innovating, and bitcoin is the logical next step.

Our dependence on others to take care of us at the expense of personal liberty and responsibility has grown insidiously to the point when people are at the mercy of individuals and organizations who have never had their best interests at heart.

Bitcoin comes with great rewards and risk, but your national currency is fiat with everything that entails and has its own even graver risks, I believe.