Academic impact metrics reveal an interesting truth about blockchain's unique development path. While traditional research builds incrementally on existing literature, Nakamoto's whitepaper created an entirely new paradigm with relatively few citations of previous work. Revolutionary ideas often emerge from synthesis rather than specialization: • PoW • Digital signatures • Incentives • Simple but insightful probabilistic security analysis

In networking, layered design allows engineers to focus on specific challenges with clear interfaces between components. Babylon follows this principle: its staking layer provides security fundamentals, while the new liquidity layer addresses practical utility. Moving up the stack to capture more value, taking cues from the market.

Just can't stop.

The path to product-market fit is never linear: - Merge mining - Timestamping - Bitcoin staking - Liquidity solutions Each iteration brought Babylon closer to the ideal: making Bitcoin's massive security budget both useful and productive beyond its own chain.

Many professors my age have mentally retired. I worked 19 hours straight the other week, according to my wife. I'm too old for this. But we're breaking new ground at 2 AM while others play it safe. Don't know why I'm still grinding like a 25-year-old PhD student.

Korea's previous president declared martial law and was impeached. The new government is pro-crypto. Not sure they have anything to do with one another, but great it happened.

Got invited into BitVM Alliance after our experiment. The community pushes Bitcoin innovation boundaries while fostering passionate collaboration among brilliant minds building the future. A researcher recently posted BitVM 3 concepts in two Twitter paragraphs. Some members questioned whether sharing early work was premature. This reveals how we're pioneering unprecedented development culture in cryptography research. Traditional academia requires private work, complete papers, peer review, formal publication. BitVM Alliance operates through immediate Twitter sharing, public iteration, real-time global collaboration across teams. This approach creates immediate expert feedback and rapid iteration. BitVM 3 emerges from collective intelligence rather than single inventors. Multiple teams build simultaneously on shared ideas while the specification evolves organically through community discussion. The best concepts rise through public scrutiny. We maintain technical rigor while embracing radical transparency. This proves more effective for open-source protocol development than traditional research methods, even when messier. Alliance dynamics reflect builders who care deeply about their work. Passionate debates about approaches, timing, and direction drive everyone toward building optimal solutions. These human elements enhance rather than obstruct the development process. BitVM Alliance represents world-class researchers choosing collaboration over competition. We build in public rather than hiding in labs. The community redefines how breakthrough cryptography gets developed through transparent cooperation and shared innovation.

Bitcoin had literal wars over block size. People got kicked out of the community for wanting bigger blocks. Now we're testing 4MB transactions and Bitcoin maxis are calling it "junk on chain." Same debates, different decade. Some fights never end.

Twelve meetings in two and a half days across Seoul. Different languages, different cultures, different regulatory environments. But when I mentioned Bitcoin's $2T market cap, everyone understood immediately. ₿itcoin talks.

Its the 1990s: You’re Qualcomm. You had revolutionary CDMA technology but faced entrenched standards in the US. Strategy: Partner with Korea, a newcomer eager to leapfrog into wireless leadership. Result: Samsung entered wireless, and CDMA became global standard.