Like Bitcoin, this book was an act of group invention made possible by many wonderful people. Andrew Ross Sorkin brought me into the job that allowed me to start writing about this fascinating topic. Later on he saw that there was a bigger story to be written about Bitcoin and pushed me to write it. I can’t thank him enough. My agent, Andrew Wylie, gave me the confidence I needed to take this idea out into the world and find it the right home. At HarperCollins, Tim Duggan immediately understood what I was hoping to do with this book, and Jonathan Jao made sure I did it. Both of them were the kind of editor every young writer dreams of finding. Emily Cunningham was my guide and good fairy through the entire process. I am also grateful for the help I was given by Joanna Pinsker, Stephanie Cooper, and the rest of the staff at HarperCollins.
This book is, at its core, the story of several people who opened up their lives to me. I have to thank, most of all, Wences Casares, Barry Silbert, Bobby Lee, Charlie Shrem, Roger Ver, Martti Malmi, Gavin Andresen, and Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss. But the story wouldn’t have come together without the time and cooperation of Fran, Hal, and Jason Finney; Dan Morehead; Patrick Murck; Erik Voorhees; Jesse Powell; Mark Karpeles; Mike Hearn; Naval Ravikant; Jed McCaleb; MiSoon Burzlaff; Nick Szabo; Reid Hoffman; Eric O’Brien; Federico Murrone; Charlie Lee; Amir Taaki; Jamileh Taaki; Alex Rampell; Emmauel Abiodun; Nicolas Cary; David Marcus; Jorge Restrelli; Bill Tanona; Pete Briger; Jamie Dimon; Max Neukirchen; Andy Dresner; Paul Walker; Marty Chavez; Alexander Kuzmin; Nicole Navas; Lyn Ulbricht; Josh Dratel; John Collins; Jennifer Shasky Calvery; Sebastian Serrano; Chris Larsen; Chris Dixon; Balaji Srinivasan; Marc Andreessen; Kim Milosevic; Brian Armstrong; Fred Ehrsam; John O’Brien; Belle Casares; Patrick Strateman; Yifu Guo; Marcie Braden; Alex Waters; Brian Klein; Nejc Kodric; Paul Chou; Jeff Garzik; Adam Back; Laszlo Hanecz; Leon Li; Gil Lauria; Monica Long; Michael Keferl; Daniel Kelman; Jack Smith; Tim Swanson; Rui Ma; Jack Wang; Ling Kang; Huang Xiaoyu; Kathleen Lee; Ayaka Ver; Alex Likhtenstein; Jeremy Allaire; Matt Cohler; Larry Lenihan; Fred Wilson; Michael Goldstein; Phil Zimmerman; Yin Shih; Perry Metzger; Tony Gallipi; Bruce Wagner; and Justin Myers. I also was lucky to be writing about a topic that had already been covered by smart journalists, academics, and filmmakers like Nicholas Mross, Joshua Davis, Kevin Roose, Eileen Ormsby, Izabella Kaminska, Felix Salmon, Andy Greenberg, Sergio Demian Lerner, Sarah Meikeljohn, Nicolas Christin, Susan Athey, Adrianne Jeffries, and Andrea Chang.
This book immensely benefited from my first readers, some of whom are also my best friends: Teddy Wayne, Peter Eavis, Lev Moscow, Mark Suppes, David Segal, Benny Gorlick, Alex Morcos, and Ben Davenport. My friends Danielle and Alex Mindlin, and Gal Beckerman and Deborah Kolben gave me lots of good advice and listened to my griping. Mirta Kupferminc and her family graciously put me up while I did my work in Argentina.
I’m lucky to work for the New York Times and DealBook, where the exceptional staff make it exciting to go to the office each day. In my time at the paper, Arthur Sulzberger Jr., Jill Abramson, and Dean Baquet have kept the paper dedicated to the ideals that made it a place I wanted to work for from the time I became a journalist. Several wonderful editors helped me develop my ideas and put up with my absence while I developed them into a book. They include Jeffrey Cane, Dean Murphy, Vera Titunik, David Gillen, and Peter Lattman, who brought me into my very first Bitcoin story. My colleagues Charles Duhigg, Jim Stewart, Ron Lieber, Barry Meier, and David Gelles shared wisdom that made it a bit easier to navigate the book-writing process for the first time. I am also forever indebted to the editors and journalists who gave me a shot at various points in my career and helped me grow. The list begins with J.J. Goldberg and extends to Ami Eden, Alana Newhouse, John Palattella, Geraldine Baum, Davan Maharaj, Tom Petruno, and Larry Ingrassia, among others.
This book was, in the end, possible only because of my family: Lewis, Sally, and Miriam Popper; Juliana, Robbie, Florence, and Beatrice Dapice; and my broader family, the Strauss clan, with special thanks to Jona, Martin, and Alanna, who helped care for my family when I could not. My son, August, put up with too little time with his father and gave me an incentive to finish. My beloved wife, Elissa, did everything that no one else could do for me, and more, allowing me to accomplish things that would be impossible without her.