The Bitcoin Standard:

The Decentralized Alternative to Central Banking

For anyone who wants to gain a clear understanding of the new, robust digital currency, ‘The Bitcoin Standard’ is an indispensable foundation that should not be missing from any bookshelf.

This book is a guide to the history of Bitcoin, its features, and user possibilities, and provides a glimpse into the future.

21 Lessons:

What I’ve Learned from Falling Down the Bitcoin Rabbit Hole

This simple question is difficult to answer. Bitcoin is a computer network, a new form of money, a censorship-resistant payment network, a financial revolution, a peaceful form of protest, and so much more.

Why should you read this book? With 21 Lessons, author Gigi chooses a unique approach, causing readers to tumble down into an enjoyable and philosophical Bitcoin rabbit hole.

The book is not intended as a comprehensive insight into Bitcoin but rather summarizes the learning journey of someone beginning to explore Bitcoin. The lessons are brief and the message is clear. Gigi effectively demonstrates that once you start reading about Bitcoin, you enhance not only your understanding of mathematics and programming but also various other areas of knowledge, such as economics and philosophy (freedom).

In my opinion, a must-read!

The Price of Tomorrow:

Why Deflation is the Key to an Abundant Future

We live in extraordinary times.

Technological advancement is outpacing our ability to comprehend it. In a world that is changing at lightning speed, we cannot afford to stand still.

We must construct a new framework for our local and global economies – and quickly. Otherwise, technology, which has the potential to bring abundance to humanity and its world, will ironically destroy it.

For 20 years, Jeff Booth has been a leading thinker and CEO in online business and technology. In this book, which challenges conventional wisdom, he deciphers the technological and economic realities shaping our present and future. He outlines the various choices we have if we want to progress – potentially alarming but deeply encouraging.”

The Bitcoin Handbook:

Key Concepts in Economics, Technology & Psychology

The Bitcoin Handbook is a collection of the most helpful frameworks, mental models, and heuristics for making sense of money in the Digital Age.

Written for a non-technical audience and packed with thought-provoking illustrations, it’s a valuable resource for all levels. Think of it as your handy companion as you journey down the rabbit hole.

The Bitcoin Handbook will help you recognize the patterns of disruptive innovation and avoid succumbing to the same fear-mongering narratives that caused many to overlook the importance of the internet.

The Bullish Case For Bitcoin:

The Bullish Case for Bitcoin, first published in 2018 as a long-form article, represents an intellectual tour de force delivered with elegance and prescience by a polymath well-versed in mathematics, computer science, economics, philosophy, politics, and engineering.

This was my main orange pill article, as it was an excellent introduction to what Bitcoin is, why it is a new form of money, the problems it solves, how it stacks up compared to other types of money, and what the future may hold.

The book also details the evolutionary stages that all forms of money go through and where Bitcoin is in this process. This book is excellent for newbies and experienced investors alike. If you ever find your conviction wavering during a market dump, just re-read this book!

Broken Money:

Why Our Financial System is Failing Us and How We Can Make it Better

Lyn Alden is my favorite macroeconomist; I have learned from her in the last 3 years. Her new book is a no-brainer. Lyn Alden’s well-researched, fresh analysis of money from a technological lens: Broken Money, is a must-read. It provides intellectual stimulation and logic to hone your cognitive kung fu. If you don’t understand money, then you don’t and can’t understand Bitcoin. 

Broken Money explores the history of money through the lens of technology. Politics can affect things temporarily and locally, but technology is what drives things forward globally and permanently. The book’s goal is for the reader to walk away with a deep understanding of money and monetary history, both in terms of theoretical foundations and in terms of practical implications.

The Blocksize War: 

The Battle for Control Over Bitcoin’s Protocol Rules

A comprehensive analysis of Bitcoin’s history between 2013 and 2017. Anyone who wants to understand Bitcoin and the debate about increasing the block size more closely should definitely read this great work!

On the surface, the battle was about the amount of data allowed in each Bitcoin block, however, it exposed much deeper issues, such as who controls Bitcoin’s protocol rules. This book explores some of the major characters in the conflict and includes coverage, from both the front lines and behind the scenes, during some of the most acute phases of the struggle. The account in this book includes discussions with the key players from both sides during the war, exploring their motivations, strategies, and thought processes as the exhausting campaign progressed and developed.

Bitcoin is Venice

Essays on the Past and Future of Capitalism

Allen Farrington and Sacha Meyers chart a crash course through the pitfalls of modern economic theory and the world’s fiat money system with a hopeful destination in Bitcoin is Venice. What if a global, digital, sound, open-source, programmable currency was monetizing from absolute zero? How might our conception of capital change? What novel forms of capital formation and economic production will become possible? How might they affect the design of social institutions? Can Bitcoin bring about a new Renaissance? With Farrington and Meyers, the discussion is as revolutionary as the answers.

A lot of the time when I read books that focus on history, notably political or economic history, they tend to be quite dry in my opinion. A lot of times, authors seek to impress the reader by using unnecessarily academic language and diving into too much specific detail about the historical event rather than getting to the point. The authors of this book are making points and immediately backing them up rather than dragging it out to appear academic or intellectually superior. They concede that much of the scope that is Bitcoin is out of their personal understanding. What they do instead is take what they know for a fact and show the reader straight up why that is so.

Mastering Bitcoin:

Programming the Open Blockchain

In 2014, Antonopoulos authored the groundbreaking book, Mastering Bitcoin, widely considered to be the best technical guide ever written about the technology.

While being mainly targeted at a technical developer audience, it is nevertheless a treasure to really grasp the way Bitcoin functions.

It gives a well-rounded and very specific explanation of the technological and cryptographic technologies incorporated into Bitcoin, leaving the reader with a nuanced and fact-based understanding of the different aspects that go into powering this groundbreaking innovation.

Everything is very well illustrated and enriched with examples, code snippets, user stories, and analogies that help understand the key technological concepts incorporated in Bitcoin.

Definitely a worthwhile read, even for non-techies!

Mastering Bitcoin provides the knowledge. You simply supply the passion.

Mastering the Lightning Network:

A Second Layer Blockchain Protocol for Instant Bitcoin Payments. 

The Lightning Network (LN) is a rapidly growing second-layer payment protocol that works on top of Bitcoin to provide near-instantaneous transactions between two parties. With this practical guide, authors Andreas M. Antonopoulos, Olaoluwa Osuntokun, and Rene Pickhardt explain how this advancement will enable the next level of scale for Bitcoin, increasing speed and privacy while reducing fees.

Ideal for developers, systems architects, investors, and entrepreneurs looking to gain a better understanding of LN, this book demonstrates why experts consider LN a critical solution to Bitcoin’s scalability problem. You’ll learn how LN has the potential to support far more transactions than today’s financial networks.