In the last few days, we received the disheartening news that Roger Ver was arrested in Spain, based on some allegations from the US Department of Justice.
In this article, we are going to discuss why Roger deserves the support of everyone in the cryptocurrency space as he goes through this ordeal. After all, we wouldn't be where we are today if it weren't for the early efforts of Roger and others like him.
Roger put himself on the front lines of Bitcoin vs. the banks from the beginning. He spoke out passionately that anyone, anywhere in the world, should have the opportunity to have full control of their own money.
The vast majority of Crypto Twitter came to Roger's defense, highlighting his early work in the Bitcoin space, and the fact that he invested in some of the first Bitcoin-related businesses, including Blockchain.com and Bitpay.
https://twitter.com/KimDotcom/status/1785515855893450813
- KimDotcom
While most people in the crypto space acknowledged the significant contributions Roger made to Bitcoin, it has been saddening to see some of the community throw shade on him after his detention.
https://x.com/danheld/status/1785374820617650308
Bitcoin has not had a spokesman as passionate, rational and persistent as Roger. Perhaps the way he expresses his passion rubs some people the wrong way, and that's why they feel negatively towards him.
Block Size Debates
Roger often stated that Bitcoin should be fast, cheap and reliable. That way, anyone in the world would be able to use Bitcoin, not just the privileged few who can afford insanely high fees.
He has had some heated debates with Samson Mow, Tone Vays, and others over why Bitcoin's block size should have been allowed to increase to meet the demand for on-chain Bitcoin payments back in 2017.
Unfortunately, the Bitcoin core developers made the decision to keep the block size at 1MB. The blocks gradually filled up to the point where transactions became slow, unreliable, and expensive, causing many businesses that had once adopted Bitcoin to drop the payment method back in 2017.
Those who advocated for small blocks were promoting the use of the Lightning Network, which Roger was not a big fan of, as it was essentially a computer science experiment that had not been widely adopted.
While Lightning payments here in El Salvador are working for the most part, they are sometimes unreliable, and it has yet to be determined if the Lightning network is sufficiently decentralized to prevent censorship in the future.
Pro-Peace
Roger was passionate about using peaceful means to stop global wars, and he believed that Bitcoin was the best way to starve the military industrial complex, as it took power away from the war machine and turned it over to the individual.
https://x.com/DavidShares/status/1785830263542468953
Tokyo Meetups
I met Roger personally at the Bitcoin Cash meetups in Tokyo back in 2019, where he was helping anyone and everyone setup a Bitcoin wallet, including my friends. He and his team had gone to several local restaurants and bars to educate small business owners about Bitcoin and help them receive BCH payments.
"Then They Fight You"
Taking into consideration the recent sentencing of Binance CEO CZ, and the government's battle against crypto self-custody, Roger's arrest appears to be part of a coordinated attack against the cryptocurrency industry.
Those who care more about the values of freedom and peace that Bitcoin enabled, rather than just its dollar valuation, will forever be grateful for the efforts Roger put into building out the Bitcoin network in its early days, and advocate for his quick release from custody.
If you learned something from this article, be sure to check out my other posts on crypto and finance here on the HIVE blockchain. You can also follow me on InLeo for more frequent updates.
Until next time...