I Watched HBO’s ‘Money Electric’ on Bitcoin: Here’s Why You Might Want To Skip It (or Not)

Here's the thing about HBO documentaries. The best thing about them is - the production value. The worst thing is - the production value.

What's that supposed to mean? Well, you know what they say.

After a series of award-winning and jaw-dropping HBO documentaries, such as The Inventor, Leaving Neverland, Going Clear, Beware the Slenderman, and At the Heart of Gold, we were supposed to be blown away with - Money Electric: The Bitcoin Mystery. It didn't happen.

Yeah, I've spent more time watching HBO than reading about blockchain. That's why my articles about Bitcoin always play it safe. I share true stories of how Bitcoin impacted the lives of people I know personally or the challenges of Bitcoin acceptance, and similar stuff the MAXIs won't tear me apart for.

After spending just one day reading about what blockchain is and how it works from "Cryptocurrency Investing For Dummies" by Kiana Danial, which I couldn't recommend more, I realized that it wasn't rocket science. However, you can't just show a few cubes, which looked as if they were taken out of the movie "Cube," and call it a blockchain day.

Back to the production value because it is important. Look, I don't know what happened to the author, Cullen Hoback, after Terms and Conditions May Apply, but at least he didn't stretch Money Electric which was the case with Q: Into the Storm. So, of all people, and after all these years, he was supposed to reveal the biggest Bitcoin Mystery in less than a hundred minutes, give it or take.

Who is Miyamoto Musashi?

Yeah, I'm fraking (Battlestar Galactica) with you, but for educational purposes only. Miyamoto Musashi was a legendary Japanese samurai "who became renowned through stories of his unique double-bladed swordsmanship and undefeated record in his 62 duels." More importantly, he wrote "The Book of Five Rings," and was "eternalized" as one of the most well-known Joe Rogan's tattoos.

By default, the creators of revolutionary things have to be larger-than-life characters themselves. Can you imagine the iPhone without Steve Jobs or SpaceX without Elon Musk? Thus, Satoshi Nakamoto and Bitcoin.

There's a scene in the documentary where Cullen Hoback is on the phone with someone, a producer, or whoever is calling the shots, trying to sell his WOW moment—we got him!

It was obvious that Adam Back and especially Peter Todd were tossing him around mercilessly. After some time, it stopped being fun and became painful to watch this who-is-Satoshi-Nakamoto game.

All that time and money could've been put to much better use in explaining why the block size in blockchain is so damn important. This way we were left with more trivial questions than important answers.

Some Mysteries Are Better Left Unsolved

Whether Satoshi Nakamoto is one person or a team of people is irrelevant. The myth about Satoshi's 1M BTC is an old and boring story.

If you haven't created anything in your life no matter how small and insignificant it may seem to you or enjoyed some magnificent creation first-hand, then you're going to have a problem accepting and realizing why the creations become more important to the creators themselves. Sometimes, I wanted to be published under a pen name or I had to as a ghostwriter. It's both fun and exciting.

Gamers care more about their nicks and avatars than anything in the world. I'm no different:

Let's wrap this Bitcoin story with the best reply on Reddit. You see, some people have to write one line only and be remembered, while others can write books and be forgotten. And, that's OK. We may never find out who created Bitcoin, but we hopefully know why. And, that's OK too.

Till the next HBO documentary and crypto revolutionary, in tech we trust, Bitcoin is a blast!