What does bitcoin maximalist mean?

Question

I've heard much about bitcoin maximalism. As I've googled it, a bitcoin maximalist is a person who believe that the only real cryptocurrency would really be needed in the future is the bitcoin. Is this correct? Can someone explain it in simple language to me and also the root causes of this belief? Why would some people believe that bitcoin is the only cryptocurrency ever man would need?

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

I think your question might be opinion-based and therefore off-topic on this site, but I'll still try to give a helpful answer.

Bitcoin maximalists believe that bitcoin is the only cryptocurrency worth holding, studying and/or building upon. That belief comes from any of these and/or related claims (with varying degrees of verifiability):

• Bitcoin is the only cryptocurrency that is truly decentralized. (Its creator is unknown and has not been involved with the project for many years, and there is no central authority saying what the protocol changes should be.)
• Bitcoin is the only cryptocurrency that is distributed fairly. (There was no pre-sale for insiders, no pre-mine, everyone had the opportunity to mine right from the start.)
• Any claimed improvements brought by other cryptocurrencies can be implemented in bitcoin as well if they are shown to be useful.
• Bitcoin has the most proof of work going into it, making it the "most secure" chain.

Answer 2

Bitcoin maximalism became a thing after this blog post by Vitalik:

https://blog.ethereum.org/2014/11/20/bitcoin-maximalism-currency-platform-network-effects/

I do not agree with anything shared in the post which was written in 2014. It was a narrative to promote an altcoin.

In 2022, maximalism is a meme on Twitter that some bitcoiners feel proud to be a part of. There is no team that represents bitcoin maximalists and people are free to associate themselves with different things.

Answer 3

It is generally a catch-all trope used by people (such as Vitalik mentioned in the answer above) use to insult supporters of Bitcoin in attempt to get them to buy into a coin for which they have much larger supply of than everyone else (Ethereum in that case). You don't have to be "Bitcoin only" to be considered a maximalist, in some sense it can be seen as an economic attack on rational people to make them feel guilty. Ultimately there is no more transparent and widely looked at asset than Bitcoin making all other cryptocurrencies a scam by comparison even if they aren't a scam per-say in their mechanics.