Part 14/19:
A key philosophical thread was whether most Bitcoin users could truly be “self-sovereign,” owning and controlling UTXOs themselves. The consensus was that, due to educational, technological, and socioeconomic barriers, widespread full sovereignty may be unrealistic. Instead, participants see a future where “pools and institutions act as banks”—serving as trusted intermediaries, but risking centralization or co-option.
The discussion suggests that Bitcoin could evolve into a hybrid system of “free banking” where a multitude of custodial or semi-custodial institutions compete, each with reputation and transparency standards. This would resemble the historical free banking era, but with cryptographic accountability and open-source hardware.